Face Your Fear!

All types of phobia are curable.

- Tapapriya

Phobias are fears that are extreme, disruptive, irrational and in fact, it is not real. A fear of climbing a height is not a phobia if it merely makes you eager to reach the top. But if you start finding out a way to avoid climbing then you could be developing a phobia.

In the same way, you may try to avoid facing an audience in a public meeting and sit at home investigating reasons for your absence. Such things mean that you require treatment for phobia.

Phobias are of two types- Simple and complex. Simple phobias involve simple objects or situations, such as heights, snakes, lizards or enclosed spaces and normally the patient is aware of the problem.

Complex phobias combine several fears and often trigger intense panic attacks as well. Agoraphobics, for instance, may fear not only leaving the house but also heights, enclosed spaces and germ contamination.

Victims of such conditions are less likely to realise that their behaviour is abnormal. Phobias attack more than one in 10 people at some time or other in their lives. The commonest fears are public speaking, heights (acrophobia), dogs (cynophobia), thunder (brontophobia) lightning (astraphobia), darkness (nyctophobia), flying (aerophobia), crowds (ochlophobia), fire (pyrophobia), death (thanatophobia), strangers (xenophobia), people (anthropophobia), vehicles, driving (amaxophobia), bridges (gephyrophobia), water (hydrophobia), and places (agorophobia) etc.

So, a person can have a phobia of just about anything. But we cannot attribute all these to fear and anxiety. Because fear and anxiety grip us all periodically and can sometimes even lead to better performance. Only if it gets out of hand, can it cripple a person.