By: Rebecca Riggs
False Evidence Appearing Real. Everyone has had some overwhelming fear, recurring nightmare, or made up illusion come to life in the darkness of their closet in what was once their safe space. How does one get over their fears? Growing up, knowing monsters weren’t real but still feeling your stomach drop at the slightest creak of a door, thump on the porch, or flickering light, didn’t stop the uneasiness. Sitting in bed paying even closer attention to sounds than before is what made it even worse. Maybe we like the thrill of the unknown? Why do we convince ourselves there’s something there when there isn’t?
In 6th grade I was terrified of the girl from The Ring, you know, the creepy one in the white dress with the black hair covering her face. I had never even seen the movie, she just started appearing in my dreams. A popular saying, “face your fears” is easier said than done. I didn’t believe that going at it full force would do anything. But, upon being forced in my ELA class to write a scary story to be published in a book in Rhode Island, I took that as my opportunity to see if I could get rid of this nasty dream. It worked! Completely went away somehow, crazy right?
Sometimes your fears aren’t as bad as you might think they are. People get so caught up in the idea that they’re afraid of something that it isn’t even one to be afraid of. Last year, I watched a documentary in my Statistics class on the effects of a placebo, a sugar pill that was given to individuals who had an overwhelming fear of something in particular that often affected how they lived their lives. A placebo is a treatment that appears to be a drug but doesn’t contain any active ingredients. This was given to them and they were told it was proven to help cure their fear. These individuals took the sugar pill (placebo) for an extended amount of time, and throughout the weeks would purposely encounter their fears in some way to test if it was working or not. It did, these people were less afraid on the placebo because of the ideology that the pill they were taking actually was curing their anxiety for this specific thing they were trying to overcome. Once told in the end that it was a fake, they found that they had been worrying about nothing all along. So maybe it is all in our heads.
Now I’m not saying all fears are fake, unrealistic, and foolish but maybe reconsider if it is worth all the anxiety and stress. I’ll admit I’m terrified of worms and I don’t think I could ever get over that, but maybe some other things you may overcome like a fear of heights for example.
As a member of Isenberg here at Umass, we are expected to develop the social skills that are crucial for networking, presenting, and just communicating along with everyone else. I know social anxiety can be a real issue. But is it as bad as you think? People aren’t judging you like you may believe, we are all just as nervous as everyone else. Recruiters know it is expected that students will be nervous, we want to perform the best we can, but stop. Take a deep breath, know everything is going to be alright. No monsters are going to get you, you’re worrying for nothing. Whatever happens, happens, you will succeed and just knowing you did your best should be enough.
We all have different types of fears but we shouldn’t let it stop us from achieving our goals and striving for success. Just like those who got over their extreme fear of heights from a placebo, just like how I overcame my fear of that creepy girl just from writing a poem about it, you don’t have to let your fears consume you. Hey! We literally have Halloween to celebrate it because it’s not that bad really, it’s mostly in your head.