A Short Essay on ***, Part Two

[Dy****]

“The enemy is ***; we think it is hate, but it is, ***.” -Gandhi.

 

We introduced the concept of rising past *** in part one.

In part two, we aim to discuss the finer points of ***.

Psychology tells us there are rational ***s and irrational ***s.

Rational ***s are those things that trigger our “fight-or-flight” response.  These are ***s that we know are logical.  We have experience with them in many cases, and we understand why our body responds the way it does.

Irrational *** doesn’t trigger a “fight-or-flight response.  Sure, it may feel similar, but it is indeed not.  Irrational *** triggers panic.  And panic tends to be unreasonable.

One way to think about the difference between these two responses is to consider a doubtful situation:  you are present for a bank robbery.

Let’s presume in your response, your body logically picks flight as a response, and you run out of the bank, straight past two robbers.

In this situation, you logically knew that immediate danger was present, and despite your lack of athletic prowess, you navigated yourself to safety.  Excellent work!

Now, let’s consider this exact scenario, except instead of your body (and brain, for that matter) picking flight, it becomes irrational.  You started screaming about how everyone will die, and you doubled over as your body tried to recover from the rush of adrenaline, coupled with the excessive amount of oxygen you just shot out of yourself quickly.

You panicked terribly.

Now, we can objectively look at this situation and argue why both responses described are perfectly reasonable.  There are angry-looking people in masks with guns, and their body language is no-nonsense.

But the fact is, to process this scenario correctly, we must fight the urge to panic.  Panicking is what ancient hunters did while on the path of prey, only to find themselves amid a stampede.  It’s what Neville Chamberlain did when he had to decide how to deal with Hitler.  And it’s what we all seem to do during tax season.

Be that as it may, if we want to address *** adequately in our life, we must fight the urge to panic.  Panic leads us down strange paths.  The constant association of the thing we *** to panic responses ends up being the thing that stops us from further exploring that ***.

This is often seen in people who are afraid of flying.  The panic surges through their body for weeks up until the flight, and on the day of, they experience nausea to the point of vomiting, day terrors, profuse sweating leading to dehydration, and the list of responses goes on.

We as a species were not designed for long-term panic.  Don’t believe me?  Read “Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers” by Robert Sapolsky.

The reallocation of our brain’s resources to focus on “fight-or-flight” responses gives our brain a sense of comfort, and it also gives our bodies a break……because long-term panic leads to endless disorders, from high *** pressure, hypertension, kidney disease, and compromised immune systems galore.

We can let our ***s overtake us, or we can accept that there are those things we can confront, those things that require help, and those things to run from immediately, and that’s it.

Holding onto the *** something creates for the long term leads us into panic mode, and we cannot sustain that for any time without seriously damaging ourselves on the inside.

I know heights have been a significant source of long-term *** for quite a while.  It stems from a situation where I was ***d to fight an adult man on the roof of an eight-story building.  And the fight went on for a while, and we had…….views.

I have lived with that *** for the past ten years.  But it was not until I started facing this *** head-on two years ago that I started feeling like my old self again.  The confidence I lost is regaining.  The trust I lost is back; I’m not letting that panic take me over.  I’m punching holes in it every chance I get.

While some may say their *** is complicated, I would argue that the details are complex, not the ***.  The details are what cause panic.  We decide to obsess over the details that are long gone after the event occurred, and then we hold them in our brains like they are part of a scene in a movie.  Like Zebras will tell you, you need to let those things go.

Maybe that will be our slogan.  Be the Zebra.

 

 

[CopperKnob]

I can't believe that Salpolsky choose zebra's, they're one of the more flighiest species of hoofed stock 😂 unless it's meant to be ironic 🤔

[Dy****]

43 minutes ago, CopperKnob said:

I can't believe that Salpolsky choose zebra's, they're one of the more flighiest species of hoofed stock 😂 unless it's meant to be ironic 🤔

It's more about the fact that they experience fight or flight, and once the danger is over, they immediately resume normal function.

Us humans have a knack for over-indulging our ***s.

[CopperKnob]

16 minutes ago, DyingForLife said:

It's more about the fact that they experience fight or flight, and once the danger is over, they immediately resume normal function.

Us humans have a knack for over-indulging our ***s.

Flight, they always choose flight. Never been attacked by a zebra. Horses, donkeys, goats yep but never a zebra

[Dy****]

30 minutes ago, CopperKnob said:

Flight, they always choose flight. Never been attacked by a zebra. Horses, donkeys, goats yep but never a zebra

That is a fair point. It's not so much that we should pattern ourselves specifically after Zebras, but that we should pattern ourselves toward the ability to experience rational ***, and then be done with once the danger is over.

It's the obsessing over the past that kills us inside. And that is something Zebras have a distinct advantage over us.