ABOUT PHOBIA

PHOBIA:

Michael Jackson was afraid of flying.  Emperor Napolean was afraid of cats.  Madonna, the singer, is scared of flying.....and the list goes on and on!!   I am afriad of heights.  I can't go near a parapet wall and look over, i get heebie-jeebies all over me and start sweating bullets.

Phobia is a severe, unwanted fear of certain situations, activities, things, animals or people.   When this fear goes out of control and interferes with our daily life or routine then it could be described as phobia.  People affected by phobia will try their best to avoid what they are afriad of.  If they are cornered by it, they may start panicking, start trembling, start sweating profusively,  experience rapid heartbeating, and will have a strong urge to get away from that situation.

There are specific phobias.  For example: If you have the fear of marriage, it's called Gamophobia;  If you are afriad of death, it's called Thantophobia; Fear of darkness is called Achluphobia; Fear of heights is called Altophobia.  There is a name for all sorts of 'fears'.

How to overcome Phobia? First,  be clear on what you fear is; think back to around when that fear was created.  For example, you are afriad of snakes.   Let's assume you first became scared of snakes when you were 8-years-old.  Your neighborhood kid threw a dead snake at you, and since then, you are scared of snakes!  The very mention of snakes sends chill all over your body.

Now, listen to this carefully:

Step-1:  Imagine you are sitting alone in a movie theater, watching a movie about the first time you learned to be afraid of snakes.

Step-2:  Next, watch the movie in reverse.  This has the effect of jumbling up (mixing and confusing) the memory even more, so it will become harder for your unconscious memory to associate snakes with that horrible incident.

Step-3:  Now that you have watched the movie in reverse, watch it again in reverse, but this time in black and white and in double or triple speed.   When you do that, you really scramble up ( to gather together in a hurried or disorderly fashion and mix it) the memory of that event.

Step-4:  While you are doing that, begin to drop in different elements to the film.  For example,  make the snake wear a cap as your neighborhood kid threw at you. Give the snake the face of Jim Carrey or Charlie Chaplin smiling at you.

Note well:  This technique is to make your memory so nonsensical  that it will be impossible for the snake or the phobia you have to bother you any more.  If it still bothers you, go back and do those steps again.

Friends, this technique is guaranteed to work wonders.  Try this at home or in any quiet place and see your fear leaving you once and for all.  Remember, you can overcome fear.

A couple of quotes:  "The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear". (H.P. Lovercraft)

     "Fear makes the wolf bigger then he is". (German Proverb)




                                    LIST OF FOBIAS (A-Z)