Fear and Its Value.
The link between the imagination
and
fear itself.
Click on photo above for link.
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What can fear teach us?
Karen Thompson Walker, on TED Talks, makes a wonderful presentation on how fear manifests. She tells us about the link between fear and imagination, and how we can learn about it from visionaries and young children. Fear is an unintentional story telling of the mind. Your brain can concoct these crazy scenarios out of almost anything. From spiders to cannibalism, our imaginations exaggerate stories told to us so long ago that we may not remember them. Small things can turn into manifestations of our own anxieties. Karen throughout her explanation of fear tells us a story of sailors who were stranded at sea. At that time, technology was not like it is today. No one knew anything had gone wrong. The men were truly alone. As she tells this story she creates a suspense by not finishing the story. What she does is shares the tale in fragments, making you want more. Making us ask "What will happen next?" In 12 Angry Men, a screen play written in 1957, there is a jury of men who have to decide the fate of a 19 year old boy accused of killing his abusive father. All the evidence points to the boy. However, one juror is not convinced the boy is guilty. This juror is known as Juror Number 8, and he is locked in a room with various characters of different ethical values. Juror Number 8 has to reverse the effects of the incited fear from the prosecution. The audience is left constantly worrying what will happen next. The ability to think about the future is a unique capability. In Karen's video she talks about how fear helps us think about the future. It helps us plan ahead and be prepared for what is next. Karen says, "In other words, our fears make us think about the future." Juror Number 8 fears the other jurors. He fears the difficult task of convincing the others to think for themselves. Unlike most people in this situation, Juror Number 8 does not succumb to his fear, he does not let it metastasize and he keeps on trying no matter the odds. Juror Number 3, in 12 Angry Men, seems to be fearless. He has an anger inside of him that he tries to spread the others. By being this way, he reveals his greatest weakness. That weakness is his pessimism. People are hardwired to be optimists, and because we see fear as a possibility for danger, we resent it. What we don't realize is fear can help us prepare for difficult tasks, like facing an angry pessimist. Facing our fears is considered a hard and noble feat, but if fear is from our own imagination, doesn't that just make it something we created? Imagination can be seen as a type of perception. When we dream, we are only living in a simulated reality of our own making. In 12 Angry Men, isn't their fear of judgement the only thing stopping these men from speaking their own mind? When we have a dream, a real one, for when we are awake, a dream to do something with ourselves, isn't fear the only thing stopping us too? |