March 22, 2026
“What’s your biggest fear?” This was the question my 7-year old asked me the other day and, for some reason, I didn’t find it to be an easy one to answer. I guess it’s one of those few questions that someone can ask us, which often may cause us to repeat the question to ourselves, internalize it and stare blankly out the window, “uhhhh…”
When a kid asks questions like these, they’re typically expecting to hear something like, “my favorite color is blue” or “I would eat tacos every day if I had to pick one food”. To play along, most people claim their biggest fear is something like heights, or snakes, or spiders, or even being buried alive! These are all examples certainly worthy of terror, but are they actually the truth?
Slippin’ Slide
For one thing, we might say we fear spiders the most, until some sicko says “yeah, but what about a spider crawling into your ear and laying its eggs inside your head?” Okay, I’m not sure if this classifies as a new fear or a twisted sub-fear; either way, this gruesome specificity will provide us with even more reason to be terrified of spiders.
Another unsettling observation with regard to the reliability of our stated, most prominent fears, is what this may suggest about us psychologically: we say spiders, but deep down is it simply just the frightful shock? Arachnids are aesthetically creepy little things, but I think most people would agree that they’d rather stumble upon an unwanted brown recluse in their basement than an unwanted human intruder.
At this point a lot of things might be going on: maybe we’re underselling what really scares us, so that it doesn’t come true (because we’ll have otherwise jinxed it); maybe we’re subconsciously using spiders as a metaphor for social, emotional, or actual intrusion, just like a fear of heights could indicate a lack of self-trust or control; perhaps we want to fit in, feel that we’re emotionally cared for, and to experience social validation for these feelings– latching onto a common fear can, in some ways, be socially or emotionally validating (but not the best way to make friends).
This colloquial analysis shows us there is often a much deeper and sometimes darker truth; but just because we’re afraid of something, it doesn’t usually mean we suffer from a phobia. Fear is something that everyone can feel as an emotional response to relative stress-inducing stimuli; whereas a phobia, a much less common anxiety disorder, is often regarded as irrational, due to its level of intensity and impairment in those who are afflicted by it– to the point where they often seek professional help.
My aunt, who’s always had a fear of snakes, sprained her ankle last year after she was startled by a garden snake in her backyard; she was not attacked by it, nor was she ever diagnosed with ophidiophobia, but having to hobble around for the next 8 weeks because a clumsy run-in with a slithering bugaboo sent her reeling into the ER, is both irrational and quite literally impairing (bless her heart). These pangs of stress don’t have to be stamped on our forehead and slapped into our official chart, in order to get in the way– we manage to do plenty of that with our thoughts.
Mind Over “Marty”
When somebody says “I have a fear of spiders”, this generally includes all spiders, there are no exceptions and if it sports eight spindly legs, it can burn in the fiery depths of hell from whence it came.
We could be presented with a very thoughtful and detailed explanation as to the different types of spiders, the variety of ways in which they are ultimately harmless and even good (e.g. they eat pesky insects and protect plant life from infestation); we could learn all about how extremely uncommon it is to suffer a death by spider; hell, someone could hand us a spider that actually spins solid gold and most arachnophobes would let out a shriek or yelp, before stomping it to death in a quiver.
Fears are rooted in expectations and judgement of a particular thing or idea that an individual perceives as a threat or “bad”. Traces of one singular source of this type of stress can easily bleed into all sorts of random areas within us that don’t logically warrant its attention, or its effect; which begins to establish a pattern, where constant tension and dissatisfaction perpetuate themselves. Within this cycle, not only are we more likely to further develop a plethora of these unhealthy negative associations, the more likely they will interfere with our daily lives.
As a primary illustration, our digital exposure to countless personalities has toxified our perception of what it means to have actual healthy relationships, making it easy to latch onto yet another form of displeasure. Dread and agony are oddly arousing to us, which is ultimately why we find doomscrolling through headlines and newsreels so addictive (in addition to the hypnotic blue screens and manufactured dopamine hits), with the excuse of “needing to be informed”. Through this behavior, and the aforementioned patterns, we are training our minds to identify danger and risk in the benign, as we surge ahead with unwavering, insular convictions.
Confusion seems to be the most natural and logical reaction to this influx of unnatural stimuli; instead, in an effort to avoid this response, we often decide to pick silly little battles, one after another, always taking a side. Eventually, there are so many battles and so little time, that once our minds have been made up and a position has been declared, it’s extremely difficult to reverse its course. All of this creates anxiety, which is just another word for fear.
If we are immersed in a state of fear/anxiety, then no, meeting our neighbor’s pet tarantula “Marty” and maybe even holding it, will not sway our terror; in fact, it could quite easily amplify it. For once this negative track has been installed, there’s virtually no going back– that is, unless we begin to see all things from a more neutral perspective: spiders are just hanging out doing spider shit, which they probably hope has nothing to do with humans (so just leave Marty in the aquarium there).
Definitely Probably Not
At this point, we may be compelled to think about approaching fear as a natural part of life, that just is. “It is what it is” might bother some people as a catch-all phrase, but it rests at the heart of this neutrality and acceptance: as in the Tao, death is neither good nor bad– just as basic as the sun rising or the wind blowing, it simply happens. To understand this is a skill which requires a great deal of practice and effort; but it’s easier than convincing an aerophobic that the plane probably won’t plummet to the earth in flames.
If we were to avoid and erase everything that scares us, however, there would be no progress, no justice, no humanity; and yet, sometimes we don’t know what really scares us until we see it. There have been moments in history when a society collectively feels the tension and comprehends what is at stake– but with Hiroshima, the Holocaust, no one could have possibly imagined the horror that would consume them, just how dark and hopeless humanity could get, until it did.
How does one remain neutral in the department of persecution, mass murder and genocide? “Oh, well, that’s just Hitler doing Hitler shit”, is a position that most everyone (I sincerely hope) would not be willing to accept today; yet, as it was occurring, there were enough people from top to bottom, who did accept this, or at least tried to ignore it, which directly paved the way for such devastation to be fulfilled by callous and evil interests– the scary part is that civilizations, to this day, continue to repeat these mistakes.
Sometimes fear can be something entirely different from an inconvenient distraction, an obsession or a mental health disorder; sometimes fear presents itself in the form of a battle cry, a call to action requiring us to confront an impending threat in a very real and uncomfortable way; in this light, fear is not just necessary for our growth, but for survival. Justice, progress, civility, humanity, all depend on this emotion, the complexities of which we’re still struggling to understand and manage, as we each continue toiling with our own personal demons.
We pathologize all types of little fears, either conjuring them up in our heads, or numbing ourselves with constant micro-bursts of stress every day, in order to stay “informed”; or both. Not only does this contribute to disease, it further prevents us from being able to differentiate between trivial fears and those that require our attention, making it exponentially more challenging to stand up to these forces when it actually counts.
Nothingness
Our perceptive grasp can be tenuous at times, but nearly all of us have a biological mechanism, some version of a moral compass, which tells us when we’re losing control– it just depends on whether or not we’re willing and able to access it. When our unease takes precedence over the well being of others, it’s time to step back and create space for less worry and more hope; for less concern and more care.
It’s important to exercise gratitude and develop a perspective that doesn’t weaken us, but which serves us. It’s okay to be afraid, even if we’re not able to fully contextualize or justify it. And it’s okay to say “I don’t know” when someone asks “what’s your biggest fear?, for it is precisely every horrific thing we cannot imagine, which most likely, deep down, scares us the worst.
“The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself” are profoundly existential words, especially for a 7-year old who may be anticipating something like shark attacks or quicksand; but after fumbling my response, I asked him what his biggest fear was, and his response was both profound and equally existential: “nothingness”.