Is fear a choice? What do you fear and why?

[Michael-5]

DeadNotSleeping said:

Michael-5 said:

DeadNotSleeping said:

Your reasons are your own; I cannot tell you why you make the choices you make.  Not for this or anything else for that matter.  Only you can answer those questions.

Well I can tell you that I don't choose to be afraid. I love roller coasters because I love moving fast, but every single time I want to jump out and walk down because of the height. If you you say about value of life vs. payoff is true, why would I prefer to walk down the roller coaster, vs. just let myself safely fall on the train? Why would I sit on the ledge of a tall apartment just to try and overcome my fear?

Nothing happened to me as a kid which would make me fear heights, it's something I've always been afraid of, for as long as I can remember. Also I find that I'm more fearful of the safer ways to be high (like roller coasters) then the dangerous ones (like bungie jumping or sky diving).

You keep asking me questions that you ought to be asking yourself.  You made your choices, now it is up to you to understand them.  That you continue asking me these questions when I've told you more than once to look within yourself suggests to me an unwillingness on your part to comprehend yourself.  That unwillingness will only impede your progress.  At some point you set the parameters in your mind to respond fearfully when presented with certain stimuli.  Try to understand why you set those parameters where they currently are.  Not one else set them.  You chose to be afraid when those conditions were met just as you choose to confront your fears ineffectively.  Your conviction in trying to choose to no longer fear heights is simply weaker than your certainty to fear them.  But I cannot tell you why that is so, for it is your mind in question.  You made these rules for yourself, not I.  You are the only one answerable to your own free will.

My point is I didn't make these choices. I have always been afraid of heights, and I know it's irrational, but that's just the way it is. I'm calm enough to understand the situation when it happens, but I'm still terrified.

I'm not unwilling to comprehend myself, I just know that I have always been afraid of heights, and there's absolutly no reason for me to have convinced myself that height's are something to be scared of. My mind knows that if I fall I could die (even if falling off is impossible like on a rollar coaster), and when that happens my body reacts by being tense, emotional, panicked. I don't choose to feel this way, it's something pre-programmed into my head.

I'm telling you, I didn't choose to be afraid of heights. I'm telling you that you are wrong. Maybe you may have been able to confront your fears and just convince yourself that there is nothing to be afraid of, but to that I say what you think you were afraid of, wasn;t really fear. Fear is something irrational, it's a que that sets off a trigger in your mind for your body to adapt in a specific way. It's no different from smelling fire and knowing something is wrong, or smelling a phermone and being attracted to something.

I think some fears can be treated, like araknophobia, and many phobia's/fears are listed a psychological disorders in the DSM IV. However it's also accepted that many fears (like being afraid of the dark) are hard wired into our DNA because those who involuntarily feared the dark, didn't venture into it, and evolved due to natural selection.

My point is, some fears like darkness or heights (like mine) are not optional. They are hard wired into the mind. I'm telling you, that I feel you are wrong, and you didn't catch that point.