“There is nothing to be fear as fear itself.”
Fear of heights (acrophobia)
This is
the reason why some people will never live or work in a high-rise building. Over and over, I have had people said, their
eyes turned whenever they are looking out of a certain height and others have
emphatically declared, they cannot use the ladder or engage in certain
profession for fear of falling from the height. This fear can keep one from
venturing and daring.
Fear of spiders (arachnophobia)
Maybe for
some natural reasons or spiritual emphasis, some people will hardly sleep in a
room where there is a spider. Why some have told me that spider web can retard
progress, there are others that still believe that spiders are not good
creatures. Though, there are harmful spiders but they are uncommon.
Fear of going out
(agoraphobia).
There are those that are afraid to
go out for fear that something will happen to them – and this phobia keeps them
indoor like a prisoner.
Fear
of Clowns (Coulrophobia)
If, as a child, you dreamed of
having a clown show up at a birthday party, but your mom or dad shuddered and
refused, coulrophobia could be the culprit. Fear of clowns is not uncommon these
days as many preachers and people now believe in demon, wizardry, witchcraft
and other darkness myths. There are
several people that will not eat, drink, associate or walk (or sleep) in the
dark for the fear of seeing some strange images or creatures.
Fear
of Balloons and other popping elements (Pop-o-phobia)
Extreme fear of balloons can also
put a damper on party-going. This is not just limited to balloons; it includes fear
of other elements (such as tyre, gas, tanker etc) that can blow, pop or burst –
and there are many people in our world today that will not venture for that
reason.
Fear
of Vomiting (Emetophobia)
Throwing up is unpleasant – we can
all agree. Very few, if any, people actually like vomiting or are neutral about
it but it can get to the point where people are so scared about vomiting that
they limit the food that they're eating. So they're not meeting their
nutritional needs. Or if a classmate or a colleague has a stomach bug, they're
refusing to go to school or go to work."
In such cases,
fear of vomiting becomes debilitating and must be addressed.
Costume
characters: masklophobia
When I was much younger, one of the
businesses that earned me dough was organizing kiddies parties such as birthday
but as my costumes (mickey mouse, power ranger, telly tubie) brought delight to
most kids, it was dread to others. It could be a phobia of anyone in costume clothing
or only troublesome when the wearer's head or face is completely hidden.
Whether the scariness is impairing is a matter of degree.
My son can become scary of certain cartoons
and he will become your enemy number 1 if you wear a mask or masquerade (popularly known as ‘ojuju’).
Most children avoid amusement parks,
birthday parties because there may be a costume character that might enter the
realm – and there are some smart kids that can tell their parents, "Can we
just not sit next to the mascot so I don't need to give the mascot a hug?"
And because of the experiences many
people have had with masquerades and even ‘eyo dancers’ in Lagos, Nigeria; they
still suffer from masklophobia as adults.
Fear
of Meetings (Performance-phobia)
"Let's go around the room and
introduce ourselves/update our projects/describe our most embarrassing moment
ever." For many workers, sitting at a conference room table awaiting their
turn to speak is an exercise in agony. The intimacy of the surroundings often
makes these round robins worse.
There are those who are used to
giving speeches in front of hundreds or even thousands of people, but are
afraid of being in a small meeting, when they go around just giving a little
status report.
And based on my work as a
journalist, I can tell you that performance anxiety affects professionals –
including celebrated actors, singers and concert musicians.
Fear
of Food (Cibophobia)
Texture, shape, color, size – not to
mention flavor – can bring on strong reactions to certain foods beyond mere
distaste. Grimacing after a bite of rubbery, chewy calamari isn't on the same
level as recoiling from a bunch of bananas
in a frenzy of revulsion and fear.
There was an ingrained believe that
if I eat this, I will be upset and so they don’t eat. The worst hit is the models
who go about starving themselves so that they don’t gain weight.
Fear
of Dogs (Cynophobia)
Man's best friend aside, dogs arouse
visceral fear in certain people who've never been threatened, attacked or bitten.
To qualify for a specific phobia,
it's not just being scared of something, but the fear is so much that it's what
we call excessive or unreasonable; an example would be a resident who refuses
to go for walks in the neighborhood for fear of canines, even though dogs are
friendly or safely fenced. Similar phobias surround other animals.
We should be scared of poisonous
snakes but when someone refuses to go into his/her backyard without any
evidence of slithering creatures, that's unnecessarily limiting.
Fear
of Health care (Iatrophobia)
Many aspects of health care – needles,
blood, scary diagnoses – provide fertile ground for doctor and other related
phobias. Obviously, staying away from medical settings is not a healthy option,
but that's what some people do. Exposure therapy is the behavioral part of
cognitive behavioral therapy, an effective and evidence-based treatment for
phobias,. Exposure involves gradually facing your fears to become habituated, getting
used to the situation.
Fear
of being enclosed in a small room (Claustrophobia)
This particular fear is the reason
why some people will refuse to have a magnetic resonance imaging scan (MRI
Scan) because of the closed-in feeling of the machine.
Claustrophobia
can crop up in other, less-predictable ways.
For 365 times in the Bible, God says, "Fear not!" Do not be afraid, God is in control.
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