# What fear is More than anything else, fear is the strongest [motivator](purpose.md), though we're often [unaware](awareness.md) of its presence in our minds. Beyond fear, the only close contender for overwhelming motivational drive is [love](people-love.md). - However, while love is a [choice](people-decisions.md), fear is a strong reactive [feeling](mind-feelings.md) that can override our [understanding](understanding.md). When we [imagine](imagination.md) loss in the past, we tend to experience [sadness](mind-feelings-sadness.md), but fear arises when we imagine loss in the future. Fear is a type of "cost" we expect to sacrifice for a [decision](people-decisions.md). If we're consistently anxious, we usually have an unknown "dread" we can't put into [language](language.md), but we're afraid of [the unknown](unknown.md) enough that we don't want to confront it. Our fears always start [rationally](logic.md) when something we [trusted](trust.md) doesn't protect us, but subconscious [beliefs](understanding-certainty.md) that contradict [reality](reality.md) can easily overpower facts, which can make our fears *very* irrational. While most fears have a valid basis, we create fantastically ridiculous [expectations](imagination.md) when we haven't released [past trauma](hardship-ptsd.md), and fears attached to them tend to be *way* overplayed from [reality](reality.md). When we have a fear-based reaction, our [purposes](purpose.md) will clearly address a problem we observe. If we're still anxious after exhausting everything we could have done, we will quickly explore impossible solutions through [trust](trust.md) in ourselves that we can still control the situation (also known as "panic"). We have many things to fear, and we tend to reposition it behind other [language](language.md) like "anxiety", "resistance", "nerves", "sensibility" or "walls". We often only stop reacting in fear because of a *greater* fear we're [fighting](conflicts-inner.md). We tend to be afraid about short-term issues or things we imagine (e.g., sharks, public speaking) and often overlook some things we *should* be afraid of: - We can't be [precisely certain](understanding-certainty.md) of anything, not even [who we are](identity.md) or [what really exists](reality.md). - We can't [predict the future](imagination.md) in any reasonable measure, nor have full clarity about what the past even was. - We'll all [die](hardship-death.md), with little certainty of [what comes next](religion-answers.md). Being at peace is the opposite of living in fear, and is one critical ingredient for living [the good life](goodlife.md). This comes through [intentional, willful release](happiness-stress.md) of precisely what we can't control. How we respond to fear dictates a *lot* of our [identity](identity.md) through how much we believe we can [do something about it](results.md). ## Fear of pain All fear is driven by perceived pain: - If it's pain from the past, it's [trauma](hardship-ptsd.md). - Pain of the [perceived future](imagination.md) is the fear of perceived risks, and we feel plenty of it because it makes [intuitive](mind-feelings.md) sense for us to feel that fear now instead of the pain about the matter later. - If it's in the present, it usually revolves around a [decision](people-decisions.md) that affects the future. - It can be self-pain or pain upon others, depending on who we [love](people-love.md) more at the moment. We can't do anything about pain. We can only circumvent its effects and maximize other things like [pleasure](mind-feelings-happiness.md) or [virtue](morality.md) within it. Most of our fears around diseases and bodily injuries (as well as [cultural](people-culture.md) [taboos](morality-taboo.md) about them) are from how we [imagine](imagination.md) pain from the experience. The pain itself broadly reaches to *everything* we are capable of [identifying](identity.md) with. It could be physical suffering to the body, emotional suffering, the feeling of loss, or any perception of the same in others'. Its only limit is that we feel it's something in [reality](reality.md). APPLICATION: The thought and image of something is most likely scarier than the thing itself. Often, the reason people inflict pain is from [evil](morality-evil.md), but not necessarily. It can also come from negligence, naïveté, ignorance, self-defense, or merely [poor communication skills](people-3_boundaries.md). Pain and pleasure aren't entirely separate. The pain of pursuing a worthy [purpose](purpose.md), for example, will heighten pleasure after overcoming it. The present itself doesn't have too much pain. Even while being tortured, we can withstand each present moment relatively easily. The *true* pain comes from our memories and what we [imagine](imagination.md) could happen in the future, which is a secondary product of memory. ## Fear of death The fear of death is a profound force. If death wasn't a [risk](safety.md), most pain would quickly become [hilarious](humor.md). No matter what form, death is when a critical organ fails when there's not enough time or [technology](technology.md) to find a reliable replacement. That organ could be pierced, crushed, or incinerated. Death by blood loss, for example, is from the heart running out of oxygen. Even if we keep everything intact, we reach the [hayflick limit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayflick_limit) at around age 125, where cells stop reproducing and organs stops regenerating. While we can reproduce most organs, we can't do anything about a damaged brain. It's the closest thing to whatever our [soul](humanity.md) physically connects to (along with the heart), and incredibly complicated. Transferring consciousness with a [computer](computers.md) wouldn't work because computers [only make copies and delete the original](computers-files.md). No matter how you frame it, death is certain. The reason death is so difficult to take is from a few difficult realities combined: 1. We can declare death itself to be an absolutely [certain](understanding-certainty.md) thing, far more than most things. 2. Until we're near death, we have [no idea](unknown.md) what will cause it. 3. Death always alludes to irreconcilable uncertainties of what happens afterward, and [there are many religions that can't all be correct at once](religion-answers.md). To stay [mentally well](mind-feelings-happiness.md), we subconsciously employ a remarkable technique where we keep the reality of death as [knowledge](understanding.md) separate from our [feelings](mind-feelings.md). That all changes when we [experience](understanding-certainty.md) death firsthand, but it permits us to *not* think about it constantly on a moment-by-moment basis. To fight death, we tend to obsess about preserving life: - The survival impulses for food, water, and shelter are [themed](symbols.md) extensions of death. - We try to prolong its inevitability with [risk management](safety-riskmgmt.md) tactics such as [weight management](body-2_diet.md) and [preventative healthcare](body-4_health.md). APPLICATION: The [healthcare industry](body-4_health.md) (and [law](people-rules.md) enforcement, to a more abstracted degree) concerns itself constantly with death and pain management, so they have an unusual perspective compared to the rest of society. The fear of death contributes to far more [illogical](logic.md) behavior than we often realize: - We try to expand a [legacy](legacy.md) that outlives our passing, often through our [children](people-family.md). - People generally [trust](trust.md) [law](people-rules.md) enforcement out of a sense of self-preservation. - We'll believe [prophecies](religion.md) that promise to avoid death (e.g., rapture, immortality). - As we [get older](maturity.md) and time becomes more [scarce](values.md), we think about death more frequently, which contributes heavily to the [purposes](purpose.md) we pursue. - Even [wars](people-conflicts-war.md), when not directed to [destroying a people group](morality-evil.md), are fought with the [appearance](image.md) of fighting for scarce resources that would lead to death if depleted. APPLICATION: If death had no consequences, nothing would be serious, which is why most [religious people](religion.md) who sincerely [believe](understanding-certainty.md) their afterlife [stories](stories.md) have a great [sense of humor](humor.md). Since diseases reproduce some experiences of dying, we become insanely irrational when we encounter them, frequently with [obsessive](addiction.md) or excessive [hygiene](people-2_image.md). Ironically, our bodies successfully fight 99.99% of them off without help, become [stronger for it](hardship.md), and the thing that often kills us is the body's *response* to the disease (e.g., inflammation, fever) or the [political control](power-types.md) around that response. The fear of death isn't *the* worst fear, though. Dying is, after all, only a few seconds of painful transition to something else that [we can't know](unknown.md). People will generally have a far worse fear of [eternal hell](religion.md), which would in some capacity harm the [soul](humanity.md) directly. When we take that fear of death into a more broad application, we tend to create [apocalyptic scenarios](hardship-disaster.md). ## Fear of truth [Reality](reality.md) itself can be scary, and we'll frequently block or [distort](image-distortion.md) our perception of it. We have an [irrational](logic.md) fear of true things because they force us to [change](people-changes.md). Every time we encounter a change, our [habits](habits.md) must reprogram, and we introduce more of the [unknown](unknown.md) into something we had thought was [certain](understanding-certainty.md). The [openness to experience](personality.md) aspects of our personality comes through how well we can resolve the conflicts due to change. APPLICATION: Everyone's fear of death is why the topic is typically inappropriate [in modern polite society](people-4_friends.md), and also why thoughts like suicidal tendencies make people generally [feel](mind-feelings.md) uncomfortable. ## Fear as fun Like with other feelings, we find comfort in the familiarity of fear within [fiction](stories.md). We find joy in [entertaining ourselves](fun.md) when we know we won't feel pain from an observed consequence. The fear-based themes in [fantasy stories](stories-myths.md) take on a [symbolic](symbols.md) association to real-life experiences, and are typically derived from them. The way we internalize recreational fear can make us stronger to fear (through a type of [achievement](success-1_why.md)) or weaker (through [continued exposure](hardship-ptsd.md)). ## Prolonged fear We react about seven times as much to pain as to pleasure, so the [feeling](mind-feelings.md) of fear can quickly become a state of mind. That state of mind is the secondary feeling of anxiety. It emerges when our [purposes](purpose.md) start associating with uncontrollable or [unknown](unknown.md) factors. The only way to resolve anxiety is through fearing *much* worse things (which is typically through [death](hardship-death.md), but can be from worse [hardship](hardship.md)). Most prolonged fear comes from [past trauma](hardship-ptsd.md), but it can also come from generalized fear of the [unknown](unknown.md). We don't do well with extended fear. With enough [imagination](imagination.md), all possible adverse events are likely, so we tend to become increasingly fearful of *everything* if we focus solely on those fears. When left unattended, fear can create a [feedback loop](habits.md) that [dramatizes](stories.md) everything to the point of [obsession](addiction.md). Among others, we'll also often try to hide our fears from a different fear of [what other people think](power-types.md), which will make us even *more* fearful over time. If we persist in fear, we can [extend](stories.md) our connection with death to other needs and wants that are *completely* unrelated to death. Most fears, when nurtured, become an obsession with [power](power.md) towards [staying safe](safety.md) against any perceived *and* [imagined](imagination.md) threats. At its farthest, a person becomes a victim of their reactions and loses their [humanity](humanity.md) as they create more victims from the [consequences](results.md) they feel justified in delivering. ## Fighting fear Courage is [pushing](conflicts-inner.md) against fear to accomplish a [purpose](purpose.md). We find courage when we're trying to [preserve](safety.md) something we [love](people-love.md), but can also summon a lesser form of courage out of [social shame](mind-feelings-shame.md). APPLICATION: Since fear is a [feeling](mind-feelings.md), it's fundamentally comparative. Therefore, being gripped by fear can be easily resolved by addressing a much larger fear (e.g., of death), which makes the other fears trivial by comparison. We don't typically need much courage to counteract fear, and a few seconds of boldness at the right timing can change the [outcome](results.md) of a very significant [threat](safety.md). APPLICATION: One of the greatest forms of [hardship](hardship.md) we must endure is finding the courage to suffer. Feeling things that harm us is painful, but we are [responsible](meaning.md) for enduring it. Most people are more afraid than they appear. Ironically, they have a fear of expressing their fear as well, which stems from what would they imagine would happen if [others saw](image.md) their fear in its entirety. Within a [confrontational environment](people-conflicts.md), most fear can be made useful as [anger](mind-feelings-anger.md). Most [worthwhile endeavors](purpose.md) require us to face our fears. Over time, if we keep [succeeding](success-1_why.md), we will start noticing that the presence of our fear is also where we can gain the most success. Eventually, we'll start *looking* for things that scare us because those will create the most significant [results](results.md). APPLICATION: If you feel pain, you can dramatically cut down on its effects by either connecting it to hope in the future or completely disregarding the future altogether. On the other hand, if we keep *running* from things that scare us, we will likely fall into a trap of [addiction](addiction.md) somewhere along the way to cope with the feeling of failing and the [consequences](results.md) of cowardice. APPLICATION: We all must reconcile how to live our lives without fear, given how much death and pain we all invariably experience. Releasing the fear is a difficult lifelong process, but [is profoundly worth it](mind-feelings-happiness.md). ## Fear in groups Some people know how to [exploit](influence.md) fear within others to get their way. This is almost always [evil](morality-evil.md), but is the basis of most [large-scale leadership](groups-large.md). A fearful group is toxic. People will repeat [stories](stories.md) that bear few facts as if they were [true](reality.md), with the only [group members](groups-member.md) opposing it risking [popularity](influence.md) in that group. Fearful people [trust](trust.md) a [large group](groups-large.md) to address their problem, mostly because they trust that [power](power.md) over what they can't see. One courageous person is capable of sparking a [trend](trends.md) of boldness across an entire [group of people](groups-member.md). It isn't uncommon to see entire [political revolutions](people-conflicts-war.md) shift from one person's unwillingness to back down from an [idea](values.md) they [believe in](understanding-certainty.md). Leaders often become aware of the individuals' trust in them, and can use a steadily reliable [political](power-types.md) trick: 1. Heighten existing fears. 2. Make impossible promises to make people feel [secure](safety.md). 3. Claim those promises can only work sufficiently if everyone honors [the group's standards](people-rules.md) (which are usually directing [power](power.md) toward the leadership). 4. Use various [forms of image distortion](image-distortion.md) if the leadership doesn't meet those promises.