On Objectifying Fear

Richard Stine might best be described as a “visu­al philoso­pher.” His can­ny rep­re­sen­ta­tions of the human con­di­tion are great stim­u­lants to self-aware­ness. This one, for exam­ple, has always been a favorite of mine. Stine has a gift for com­bin­ing whim­si­cal draw­ings with deep reflec­tions. I hap­pened to be read­ing his fab­u­lous book, The World of Richard Stine the oth­er day and found the fol­low­ing pas­sage about defen­sive­ness. It’s a gem:

How do you objec­ti­fy fear once you’re so involved in a sit­u­a­tion that it goes psy­cho­log­i­cal­ly out of control?

How does one step back from the self-pro­tec­tion mech­a­nism that injects com­pli­cat­ed sit­u­a­tions with an over­abun­dance of emotion?

Some­times will­ing your­self to be coura­geous through it all does not work. The emo­tions well up and over­take one’s good inten­tions so much that hav­ing con­trol nev­er gets past being just a good idea.

My exper­i­ment right now is to attempt to lessen the emo­tion­al com­pli­ca­tions by com­mu­ni­cat­ing as sim­ply as I can–to try not to feel that I have to attack or be on the defen­sive when I have to deal with a tough sit­u­a­tion. Just express the truth as I see it, and then let things devel­op the way they will, with­out try­ing to force them one way or another.

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