This column has been a long time coming, but after two and a half years as a staff member of The Pitch, I finally find it relevant to make the following confession: I am neurotic. I am a bundle of irrational fears and phobias.
From my reasonable fears of the dark and of heights, to my slightly less reasonable fears of crowded buses (what could stop someone from injecting me with a syringe of infected AIDs-blood?) and of wild parties (what could stop someone from injecting me with a syringe of infected AIDs-blood?), I have an almost constant stream of reservations dictating my actions.
My hesitance in writing this column lies in the fact that this neurosis is not well hidden. Its prevalence in my demeanor alone forces this negative trait out in the open for everyone to see, and its conspicuousness, I thought, made any dramatic confession silly and superfluous.
That is, until I had to test some of those fears out in the real world.
Two weeks ago, I had a revelation. After much anxious planning and preparation, I was standing alone in the middle of the largest airport in the United States, my clueless expression and eye-catching, bright turquoise backpack no doubt screaming, “Steal all my money!” and my gate lost somewhere in the great expanse of rolling suitcases and fast food joints. I was alone, unattended, braving the elements, surrounded by unfamiliar people, in an unfamiliar setting, grappling with unfamiliar activities and customs, every aspect of which had consumed me with anxiety the night before – and, bizarrely, I felt nothing. Calm and collected, I addressed the situation as any sane person would: I asked someone for directions, was pointed the right way and eventually found my gate. I did not die. There was no room for fear and no time for stupid phobias.
It’s regrettable that it has taken 17 years for me to come to the profoundly simple conclusion that irrational fears are not only silly, trivial quirks, but they are also severely limiting. Had I followed my gut instinct and canceled my flight, I would never have experienced that (albeit banal) thrill of adulthood that is traversing an airplane terminal. And this reality does not limit itself to unfamiliar experiences; it finds its most prevalent roots in everyday life. Listening to a fear of rejection, for example, might save a person from opening that dreaded college letter, or from suffering through an awkward encounter with a disinterested crush or from acting like a fool at an audition — but it also makes acceptance impossible.
My fears have held me back on numerous occasions from experiencing new and exciting life experiences, each of which could easily have turned out just as well as my solo trip to Wisconsin. Not only that, but they have placed a barrier between me and adulthood; a barrier which I plan to tear down, following the timeless words of FDR: “The only thing to fear is fear itself.”
