It is right and proper to have fears and phobias. They drive a response in us called 'flight or fight'. In other words "shall I run like the wind and hopefully escape" or "shall I stay and fight" because I think I can win, or because i have no other option. In short, your subconscious is trying to provide you with the correct solution to keep you safe. Remember it does not know the difference between right and wrong and only does what it thinks is right to protect you!
Let's take a crazy situation. Imagine that you were woken in the dead of night and heard a noise coming from your kitchen. You creep downstairs and find that an escaped Tiger from the local zoo has escaped. It's broken in through your back door and is eating the contents of your freezer! It is absolutely right that you are filled with fear about the Tiger and that you run away, (flight response) And to help you run away your subconscious releases a useful mix of substances into your bloodstream, adrenaline being just one, which stimulates things like your breathing and heartbeat to rise significantly to achieve increased blood flow to the muscles and help you escape. You might even get that feeling in the pit of your stomach and feel sick, as blood supply is diverted to the important parts of your body, the muscles. I think most people would agree that it's right to run away and be fearful or scared.
Assuming that we manage to successfully escape and 'phone the appropriate services to get the Tiger recaptured, we now have a very significant event in our lives. Therapists call this the Initial Sensitising Event. (I.S.E.) For a lot of people this I.S.E. can sit in their subconscious mind for many years until a similar situation arises and triggers a repeat of the episode. It does not have to be as significant as a Tiger snacking on the contents of your fridge by the way!
So many months or years later we might be sitting at home watching TV and a documentary about wild animals comes on. There on the screen, in all its glory, in full colour is our Tiger! Your subconscious says, "Whoa, I remember the last time we encountered a Tiger, time to run". And all those feelings and emotions we experienced during the I.S.E. come flooding back. Is it right to have the same response to the TV picture that you might have had to a Tiger in your kitchen, not really is it?
So hopefully you can see it's right to have fears and phobias, they protect us and allow us to investigate new situations with caution. But it's the inappropriate or out of context response to the stimuli that can cause us the problem.
A brief word of caution. This is a generalistic example of the development of a fear or phobia. Sometimes there can be a number of 'incidents' which lead to their development. Your therapist will work with you to uncover what they are, and then develop a bespoke treatment plan to affect a cure.
I've never had a Tiger in my kitchen!
We talked in the paragraph above about having an Initial Sensitising Event, (The I.S.E) and we used the extreme example of a Tiger in your kitchen. Clearly this was a metaphor for any event, which is so traumatic to the individual that they, or rather their subconscious, was going to make sure they were not placed in a similar situation again. But actually a fear or phobia can effectively be taught, learned or acquired. People who are afraid of flying usually have not been through an aeroplane crash themselves.
But it might be that at some time in their life they saw an aeroplane disaster movie or even a 'plane crash covered dramatically on the news. It might also be as our 'aero phobic' was growing up, a significant adult such as a well-meaning parent or grandparent, said something like, "you'd never get me up in one of those, they are always crashing". Put all these factors together and it's easy to see how suddenly we might become scared of almost anything. There are loads of people out there who are scared of spiders or mice just because one of their parents was! By the way, DON'T think about a green elephant wearing blue swimming trunks whilst smoking a pipe, sitting on a sunlounger! It's not possible, to NOT THINK of something, your brain has to process this information, whether it's negative or positive. Hopefully you can see that to our 'aero phobic' friend saying, "just don't think about being frightened" is not the solution!
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