The mind-killer pt1

LITANY AGAINST FEAR

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

The preceding was a quote from Frank Herbert's fictional book series Dune.

The mind killer. While a bit overly dramatic it is very close to the truth. Often while we are fearful our mind seems to shut down and nothing but the fear remains. Adrenaline begins to pump and we prepare for what is called fight or flight.

In the early days of man we were but an animal, always acting on instinct.  Very little separated us from the other animals. And fear was part of our instincts that helped to keep us safe. At some point though, our minds developed to the point where reason was possible. We no longer always had to rely on instinct to keep us alive. In fact, we found that there were times and places that our instincts held us back from making improvements. So, we advanced to the point where we now use a combination of animal instinct and logical reasoning.  Each has their place and each has their own benefits and weaknesses.

The animal side: You give in to the fear and let your instincts take over hoping they will be enough. The fight or flight instinct is one way that fear can help keep you alive. If the thing that you are afraid of is something that you believe can not be defeated, a larger more vicious animal for instance you may decide to run from it. If it is something you think you might be able to beat you stay and prepare to fight using whatever means necessary to scare off or kill the enemy. No thinking is happening here just reacting. You are lashing out and attacking wildly. But what happens when your fear is so great that it completely paralyzes you in both mind and body? You automatically lose.

The logical side: You may be able to reason with the person or thing that you are afraid of. Perhaps you can trap it or use some part of the environment that you are in to get some sort of edge to allow you to come out on top. You still have the options of fight or flight but using your ability to reason gives you other options to use instead or alongside them. When using logic, you can be running and coming up with a plan instead of just running in terror with no hope but to get away. If a lion jumps out at you from a bush only a couple of feet away from you and you stand there and take the time to reason out the pro's and con's of the situation you will likely end up dead.

For the most part, the animal instincts are good to keep us alive when there is no time to use the power of our minds to come up with a workable solution. Fear is a natural healthy part of our lives. Only those who are stupid or insane have no fear at all.