Does Fear Have Positive Effect on Life?
Humans are the most advanced species on Earth. Ever wondered why this is the case?
The only factor that differentiates humans from the other species, and which puts them on the high pedestal of evolution is – Emotions.
Primitive human emotions are the following: Joy, Sorrow, Fear, Anger, and Love. This article revolves around the emotion of Fear, and how the effects of fear in our lives.
People believe that fear only affects them in a negative way. Well, that is certainly not the case. Fear also helps us in a lot of positive ways. We would discuss this further ahead.
How Do We Define Fear?
In order to understand the depth of the positive and negative effects of fear in our lives, let us first briefly analyze what this emotion is in the first place.
We all are aware what the ‘Response – Stimulus’ combination is. A stimulus is a reaction in an environment which in turn triggers anothe reaction, the response.
Fear is a response.
To be more specific, it is a biochemical response to the feeling or presence of imminent danger, threat, or harm. These stimuli could be physical or psychological in nature, and so ins the response of fear.
Fear mainly rests on 3 factors:
- Magnitude: this is the intensity of the feeling of fear towards a threat or harm.
- Timing: this signifies whether the threat or danger is immediate or at some other point in time.
- Possible coping mechanism: this signifies any possible ad-hoc ways to cope with the feeling of threat. Immediate coping is like first aid, though it doesn’t cure the feeling, the magnitude could be reduced to a great extent.
Let us move ahead to the effects of fear in our lives, starting with the negatives.
The Negative Effects of FEAR
The negative effects of fear can be physical and emotional in nature. In turn, each of them could be either immediate or long-term.
Emotional
Emotional/psychological effects of fear are due to the impact of the emotion on the hippocampus. This makes it difficult to regulate and moderate this [particuar emotion.
In some cases, fear impacts our tendency to respond to verbal and non-verbal cues. Long exposure to fear, or periodical exposure could result in a bit more severe issues like trauma, anxiety, clinical depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
To sum up, the following are the effects of fear on our psychological balance:
- A loss of feeling of ‘Self’
We don’t feel like ourselves. It would be like we are occupying the body of some other being. We would be in a constant mode of self-denial.
- Feeling of helplessness
We could feel like crying out loud for help. This is a purely psychological issue. We could feel caged inside ourselves and would want to break free badly. We could also yearn for a helping hand to come to save us.
- Anxiety
This usually arises due to overthinking about the consequences of the situation that induces the feeling of fear.
- Obsessive thoughts leading to compulsive behavior
Pretty self-explanatory.
Physical
The physical effects of fear can be easily recognized. The immediate effect would be breathlessness and incessant sweating.
We have to be mindful of the fact that fear could also have long term physical impacts as follows:
- Malfunction of Immune system
- Malfunction of the digestive system (probably the most evident physical effect)
- Poor eating habits, resulting in weight gain/loss.
- Mild imbalance in the nervous system processes
- Poor sleep cycle
The Surprisingly Positive Effects of FEAR
Now, there is always a belief that fear only has a negative effect on us, be it emotionally or physically.
There are a few ways we respond to fear, which actually helps us become better versions of ourselves. To realize this, we have to first understand that fear is one of the precious human instincts.
The following are a few ways in which the feeling of fear adds value to us and our actions:
Fear elevates alertness and concentration
Fear bosses the sense of alertness in us. It helps us become more aware of our surroundings, more vigilant around people, and so on. In some cases, it also elevates the levels of concentration in a particular work, especially when we feel finishing that work successfully could help reduce the feeling of fear.
When we are already in fear, we are already in our defense mode. IT is all about surviving the situation. At this point, almost all decisions we make feel like ‘do or die’ decisions. This is where fear helps us. It helps us maintain maximum focus.
Fear also elevates our internal and external awareness levels. As an analogy, we could say that it resembles a thermometer which indicates whether we are moving in the hot region and thereby doing something out of the ordinary.
Fear pushes us to execute plans
Almost all of us are always high on plans. Most of the time, as humans, we tend to procrastinate. But, this does not happen when we are already in fear.
Fear doesn’t allow us to be complacent and pushes us to execute the plans we had in mind, especially if the plans would help ease the feeling. There is absolutely no room for procrastination whatsoever.
We tend to keep aside everything else and focus on the plans at hand. This is also catalyzed by various biochemical reactions within our body, which enables our brain to attain maximum intensity.
Fear helps us exercise worst-case scenarios
Fear arises when we are worried about a particular outcome of a situation/action. So, basically, we could say that fear usually is focused on future events.
For every action, there could be multiple consequences. Similarly, the situation that causes fear could result in multiple outcomes in the future. Out of this, there could be an outcome that would benefit us in a great way and there could be one that would hurt us the most.
The latter is the worst-case scenario. Fear helps us analyze this scenario boldly enables us to accepts this as a higher possibility. As a result, we would no longer be worried about the outcome4 as we have accepted the worst-case scenario as it is and in a way expecting it.
This helps us to plan and execute things with a bit more freedom and confidence. In most cases, the end result would be a good one as we would have executed the right set of actions automatically.
Fear pushes us out of our comfort zone and makes us explore
The initial reaction to fear would be to get into a shell and hide from the external world. However, over time, fear pushes us out of our comfort zone and makes us explore to search for a possible solution that could alleviate the situation we are in that causes the fear.
In a way, it acts as a catalyst to boost our willpower to get ourselves out of the situation we are in, which brings in the feeling of fear.
Fear makes us experiment with our strength of ‘letting go’
In most cases of fear, we would be worried about what would happen if we surrender to life and indirectly to the situation causing fear. We would be worried about accepting defeat to the fear-inducing situation.
In these cases, sometimes, fear helios us put our minds to ease by encouraging us to let go of the situation. It would remind us that sometimes it is ok to accept defeat in order to get ourselves back up again.
Letting go of control over the situation reduces the worrisome feeling in our minds, thereby venting out a lot of fear-inducing feelings and thoughts.
Helps us understand others who go through the process and help them
Once we have been through the rollercoaster ride of fear, we would automatically be in a position where we know how the entire journey would pan out, with possible decision points.
With this knowledge at hand, we could help a lot of individuals who go through this journey. We could be a helping hand.
This could create a ripple effect through our society where the people who benefit from our help, would in turn help others. In time, handling fear could become a relatively easier process.
How Do We Organically Handle FEAR?
Though it is almost impossible to prevent the feeling of fear completely, we could try the following ways to handle it the best to our abilities:
Anticipate the areas which could induce fear in us
This could probably be the best way to defend and reduce the effects of fear in our lives. Anticipating the inflow of fear enables us to be subconsciously ready to face the heat and its consequences. This is much better than fear hitting us out of the blue.
Exercise self-control
Develop a few personalized ways to exhibit self-control during the period of fear. It could be anything based on your personality. Usual methods range from workouts, swimming, music to long drives, meditation, and the likes.
Elevate our confidence levels
Boost up our self-confidence to great levels that we feel on top of the feeling of fear, no matter its magnitude. This is a difficult task to achieve, but, could be mastered over time by assimilating a lot of experiences and wisdom.
Find ways to vent out emotional pressure due to fear
This is very crucial to maintain our psychological balance. This could be considered analogies to a pressure cooker. If the whistle key is not places on it, pressure builds up inside it and eventually the cooker blasts open.
A similar thing could happen to our minds. Excessive pressure buildup could result in severe psychological and even physical issues.
Find ways to vent out this pressure. It could be any way that suits our lifestyle and personality. A usual way is to share the news with someone really close to you.
Learn, equip and move on
Every experience of fear is a learning curve. The issue, situation, and everything involved could be different every time. Consider each of these as a lesson, thereby learn from it.
We could extract takeaways from these experiences, equip them within ourselves so that we could handle the same issue if at all it happens again.
Most importantly, keep moving. A stagnant mind is also a place for fear and anxiety.
Fear is something that is very common among people. However, there could be situations where it could completely overpower us. This could result in total surrender, both psychological and physical. Since fear is an innate emotion in humans, meaning it is coded in our very DNA, we cannot do away with it completely. However, we could still find ways to handle it.
What are some of your fears?
How do you handle your fears?
Let me know.
