What are you most afraid of? The potential for darkness within ourselves.

  • Thread starter KnowledgeIsPower
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In summary, the person is most afraid of torture, loneliness, and depression. They also worry about the future and the possibility of a human-made world-wide disaster.
  • #1
KnowledgeIsPower
90
1
For me it would be the future.
The thought i get at the end of a day that I have one less day to live is a miserable and choking one that's very hard to deal with, especially for an athiest who thinks that the 'afterlife' and 'religion' are merely mechanisms to allow humans not to think about the full consequences of death.
How do you guys cope with that?

What are you most afraid of?
 
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  • #2
KnowledgeIsPower said:
For me it would be the future.
The thought i get at the end of a day that I have one less day to live is a miserable and choking one that's very hard to deal with, especially for an athiest who thinks that the 'afterlife' and 'religion' are merely mechanisms to allow humans not to think about the full consequences of death.
How do you guys cope with that?

What are you most afraid of?

Not being able to look at things simply.
 
  • #3
Not being able to see - really see - the simple things in Life.
 
  • #4
I am most afraid of out living my children or grandchildren.
 
  • #5
Can't decide whether mortality or immortality is a scary thing.
 
  • #6
What are you most afraid of?

I always most feared being captured and tortured; as in a war. I grew up listening to what happened to our guys captured in Vietnam. I also expected to go myself [in a few years] when, after nearly two decades, it ended. If people are appalled at the treatment of Iraqi soldiers, or even the beheadings or ours and other people in Iraq, check into what happened to our soldiers in Nam. In many cases death was a blessing. As a teenager, looking forward to this possibility was not a nice thing. It never occurred to me that I would never go.
 
  • #7
Ivan Seeking said:
I always most feared being captured and tortured; as in a war. It never occurred to me that I would never go.

The opposite of war is not peace- it's renewal.
(can't remember the author who said this right now)
 
  • #8
Hi All,

Hmm, perhaps my greatest fear is becoming homeless.

After that our society coming to an abrupt end, not so much by natural disaster, but a human made one. Meaning another economic depression, that could ignite a civil war in the US. The domino effect of that would cause all US foreign interests and presence to dissolve.

Would the UN be strong enough to keep world order elsewhere, without the US? Or would that trigger the often cited "New World Order" to rear it's head and take hold.

That's my second greatest fear.
 
  • #9
Loneliness. I like to be around people who I can talk to, and about issues that I like to talk about. Not very many people I know of in real life like to talk to me about the philosophical implications of quantum theory :frown:, the ones that I do occasionally meet are rare to me and I try to spend as much time around them as possible.
 
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  • #10
motai said:
Loneliness. I like to be around people who I can talk to, and about issues that I like to talk about. Not very many people I know of in real life like to talk to me about the philosophical implications of quantum theory :frown:, the ones that I do occasionally meet are rare to me and I try to spend as much time around them as possible.

That's some heavy stuff there Man! Slip-sliding away!
 
  • #11
There are certain things I worry most about, and there are other things that I don't expect but would fear the most if it ever did.

The ones I usually fear is:

Being lonely
Being stupid
Depression
Getting a nice and meaningful job (which I suspect I won't now)
Broke and homeless
People
Hurting others
Speaking up high
Also that my mom would die. I don't live at her house, but it's the person I'm definetaly closest to, and she's very good and I don't trust anyone else more than her.

The basic terror is just:

Torture. A very underestimated thing. And I don't worry about being dead, as then I see myself not existing anyway. The scary part is living Much, not being non-existant or dying)
Manic Depression. I believe that Mental torture can be as bad as physical, although it's still a very uhm unadventured landscape.
 
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  • #12
pace said:
I believe that Mental torture can be as bad as physical, although it's still a very uhm unadventured landscape.

Hey, some mental states are actually an escape from a greater fear. Like the way some homeless deal with situations by drinking. It's weird how many different levels of fear we can experience...
 
  • #13
What are you most afraid of?[/QUOTE]

being bored!
dieing, and giving up the fight!... in the battle-field of life.
 
  • #14
loseing hope that some day I'll actually make something of myself
 
  • #15
merak said:
What are you most afraid of?

being bored!
dieing, and giving up the fight!... in the battle-field of life.

Oh man! Suck it in Soldier! No battle happening here. :approve:
 
  • #16
DarkAnt said:
loseing hope that some day I'll actually make something of myself

Now THAT'S a fear I can sink my teeth into: the fear of success! It's a fear born from the millenium. Corporate society and modern life - bring it on! :devil:
 
  • #17
my children or husband becoming terminally ill...
 
  • #18
KnowledgeIsPower said:
For me it would be the future.
The thought i get at the end of a day that I have one less day to live is a miserable and choking one that's very hard to deal with, especially for an athiest who thinks that the 'afterlife' and 'religion' are merely mechanisms to allow humans not to think about the full consequences of death.
How do you guys cope with that?

What are you most afraid of?


when i was aware that my fear is controlling my life instead of me controlling my own life and being so pathetic and helpless to allow that happens. fortunately, i am aware of this.
 
  • #19
I am most afraid of actually finding something that I am really afraid of. Right now I am not afraid of anything. I learned a long time ago that fear is the battle lost. It is the spiritual equal of defeat. Fear warps reality, and shifts our ability to perceive drastically, and in dangerous situations, our perceptions are extremely important. An open mind runs better, than a fearful mind, in every form of endeavor.
 
  • #20
I fear of choice. The choice of my dreams doing what I want or the choice of my visions doing what i need.
 
  • #21
There is nothing to fear but fear itself?

Boloney! You've never seen Tsu mad!
Also, I now fear our new kitten at 3AM every day - when my feet are uncovered and she's on the attack: "God, please don't let me move my feet tonight"

I think Oyéah makes a good point, but I would distinguish between fear, and being consumed by fear. After all, fear is associated with a physiological state that is hard to avoid at times. It is sometimes said by people like soldiers and law enforcement people, and self defense experts for that matter that you can use your fear to make you stronger.
 
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  • #22
I am afraid that I am no genius...useless in the field of Physics who will become a teacher who teaches emotional physics and never to contribute anything.
 
  • #23
teaching is contributing ;) Also most of the best inventors through time was teachers. It helps you think through stuff in another manner.
 
  • #24
I have a fear of failure. Every day that I work I wonder where it is going to lead me, whether I'll be stuck in a dead end job having never achieved anything, and just failing myself in life.

Maybe this is why everything I do seems so hard... :cry:
 
  • #25
jimmy p said:
I have a fear of failure. Every day that I work I wonder where it is going to lead me, whether I'll be stuck in a dead end job having never achieved anything, and just failing myself in life.

Maybe this is why everything I do seems so hard... :cry:

Im sure you've heard of this before, but treat failure as another opportunity to learn. During Track season, I placed last in every single event (mile and two mile) :yuck: but I kept up with it.

In my opinion, as long as you percieve yourself to be successful in life, then you will be successful.
 
  • #26
APATHY! in myself or society.

we can handle any challenge if we are not apathetic!

love&peace,
olde drunk
 
  • #27
- The most horrible thought is being put into a casket and buried alive. The thought initiates panic symptoms in me just thinking about it.

- Loss of loved ones

- Snn Snnnn Snn Snakes

My own death? Bring it own. As long as it isn't related to 1 and 3 above. :eek:
 
  • #28
I fear my visions comming true, and sometimes I fear them not comming true. I fear misleading others and I fear misleading myself. I fear the future of my children on this planet and the future of all children. The future of the planet, as we shred it with all that was. Not being able to communicate what I understand with others.

Most of all never to drink coke from an iced long neck glass bottle ever again. Last time was 8 years ago.
 
  • #29
I fear death mostly or seeing friends suffer and die and then being bored to death, but I wonder is it possible for fear to have such a degree of control over one on some subject that they might not be readily able to know of what and why they are afraid of it? If so it would be a good thing to admit one's fears in that being the first step toward overcomming the threat since running away isn't always the best response to take. Fear must have some evolutionary usefullness though.
 
  • #30
Electricity is beautiful and i would touch it but the fear of the side effects keeps me from not doing that. We all fear something to some degree, afterall we all feel pain and pain is proof of fear and why we avoid it.
 
  • #31
KnowledgeIsPower said:
What are you most afraid of?
Helplessness.
 
  • #32
TENYEARS said:
I fear my visions comming true, and sometimes I fear them not comming true. I fear misleading others and I fear misleading myself. I fear the future of my children on this planet and the future of all children. The future of the planet, as we shred it with all that was. Not being able to communicate what I understand with others.

Most of all never to drink coke from an iced long neck glass bottle ever again. Last time was 8 years ago.

cryptic as always ten? Glug glug.. bloop.. be the bowl

It was a lot longer than 8 years ago for me, but I remember
 
  • #33
I fear the unknown

I fear not being true to myself and my loved ones

I fear not going the distance

I fear I will one day grow tired of looking for ways to improve myself, or finding new hurdles and challenges to face- that would be too boring.
 
  • #34
I rose up from the depths of the water, from the silence of eternity, to find them running madly. My fear is that I join them, sometimes my fear is that I do not.
 
  • #35
I am most afraid of losing. Actually, no, that's what I HATE most, not what I'm afraid of most. I'll have a think about that one.
 

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