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25 Adar I 5763 - February 27, 2003 | Mordecai Plaut, director Published Weekly
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Fear
by A. Ross, M.Ed.

Fear is something felt by everyone at some time or other. Since the ghastly incident of the Twin Towers, fear has stalked a large percentage of the world population. The fear can be rational or irrational. Frequently, it is stark terror, which is very difficult to fight, and can lead to breakdown. Fear itself is a healthy emotion. It prescribes caution, action, or non- action. Don't drive through a red light; turn off the gas when you smell a leak; don't accept lifts from strangers etc. Terror, on the other hand, leads to panic, and immobilizes our minds and paralyzes our bodies.

People can be helped to fight fear by their early training. A child who lies in bed tense and afraid of the nameless, will not have the same calm nervous system as a child whose mother makes him go to bed on time and sits with him for a while, perhaps telling him a story before he says Shema. Also, the child who is kept over-stimulated by an excitable parent is more easily aroused to exaggerated nervous reaction when the occasion arises than a child who is kept calm. In families blessed with numerous children, sitting with each one at night is not always a practical suggestion. Frequently, older siblings are very popular surrogate mothers or fathers. Each family must find their own way to a calm bedtime.

Moderation and self discipline are a most important part of our defense mechanism. A mature person can be moderate in all things. He can free himself from emotional dictation and act after suitable deliberation. We are all influenced by feeling, so when we act, feelings color our actions. We are so often afraid of unpleasant feelings, we suspect that they will become even more unpleasant if we face them, so we try to extinguish them before they become established. But the unpleasant feelings are not extinguished and are inclined to raise their heads when we are weakened by illness, or other worries, and unable to cope. Once again, moderation and self control can be inculcated at a very early age.

Indulgent parents quickly substitute something the child likes for something he does not like. Thus, as he grows up, he wants a quick release from unpleasantness, before giving his emotions a chance to calm down. Education should include training to bear unpleasantness and letting the first shock pass till one can think more clearly. A chapter of Tehillim, or a short prayer, even in a language which is not in the siddur, should be encouraged as soon as a child can read. Many an unbearable situation becomes more manageable if the child (particularly an emotional teenager) is encouraged to think about it, pray about it and then discuss it, if he is prepared to. There is an old Chinese proverb, "Trouble is a tunnel through which we pass, and not a brick wall against which we must break our heads."

Fear, as mentioned, is accompanied by action. Someone who is afraid will gather all the information he can on how to protect himself against what he fears. On the other hand, someone plagued by irrational fears, terror of the unknown, will try to run away from the situation. He will not turn up for an exam, she might absent herself from a Parent-Teachers evening for fear, or rather panic, of what the teacher will say about her daughter. Instead of overcoming a fear of water, they will refuse to have swimming lessons.

With the world as it is and the daily running commentary of what has happened, what might happen, what is likely or unlikely to happen, it is small wonder that so much of the population (statistics put it as high as twenty-five percent) is steeped in panic and depression. People suffer from symptoms ranging from sleeplessness, overeating / undereating, palpitations, shortness of breath. Many people who were easy going and calm and never seemed fazed by anything suddenly become impatient with their children for no apparent reason. They find themselves bursting into tears at the slightest provocation. What are they to do? Where are they to go?

There are clinics and hot lines for all ages and for many situations. Friends and relations can do a good deal to help the unfortunate sufferers. Persuade them to keep to routine, encourage them to speak, even if they have heard it all before; explain that they are not alone and that things will improve. Above all, emphasize that neither the politicians nor the medical advisors run the world. They are fallible human beings, just as the panic-stricken sufferers are. Hashem runs the world and worries about us at least as much as we worry about ourselves. So why not leave the worry to Him?

This is easier said than done. Some people are more prone to insecurity and fear than others: partly by upbringing, as mentioned before, but partly by their nature. The public is well educated on the whole, and many people realize that medication prescribed at clinics is not really the best cure for trauma victims. It deadens the feeling of terror, but does it remove it completely?

There are many trained counselors, some of them observant Jewish men and women, who help people become more self reliant, and then, hopefully, to rely on their Creator to protect them.

 

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