The Only Thing To Fear - is A Top Ten Phobias List
I've been reading lately this book my stepdaughter bought for me for Christmas, called Take Me To Your Leader. It's just a compendium of minutia... Everything from drinking etiquette around the world to the oldest tattooed lady - to urban legends.
I try to read a page or so a day (while I'm drying my hair in the AM) - and the thing that kind of intrigued me the other day was a top ten list of phobias... It was a nutty list to me...
Top of the list? Not death, not being the victim of a violent crime, not global warming or terrorism... The number one fear, according to this book - is SPIDERS - those insey weensy creatures crawling up our water spouts... Here are the rest... After I give you the OFFICIAL list, I'll tell you about some of the things I'm a little afraid of...
1) Arachnophobia - fear of spiders
2) Social Phobia - fear of being evaluated negatively in public
3) Aerophobia - fear of flying
4) Agoraphobia - fear of leaving home (or a short radius from home)
5) Claustrophobia - fear of close spaces
6) Acrophobia - fear of heights
7) Emetophobia - fear of vomit
8) Carcinophobia - fear of cancer
9) Brontophobia - fear of thunderstorms
10) Necrophobia - fear of death
Here are the things that skeeve me... (in no particular order)
Rejection, slugs, The horse head scene in "The Godfather," pain, blindness, failing at work, falling too far behind, missing out on life due to being too busy, botched surgery, broken bones, poor health of my family, stupid people, social leeches, people with unpredicitable mood swings, weight gain, oversleeping, my personal disorganization, rising gas prices, poor public policy, alligators (they just gross me out... ), addicts, overcommitment, my own shortcomings... You know. The normal stuff.
Of course, without tyring to sound neurotic, I've also at some point in my life experienced all the normal fright-night dreams - being unable to run from a pursuer, being in a play and not knowing my lines, taking a test when I never went to class, being in public without my pants... These never bothered me because there's research to support that everyone has these dreams. They represent universal fears... (and universal fears do NOT include spiders... who eat the insects that I really have problems with...)
What about you guys?
I try to read a page or so a day (while I'm drying my hair in the AM) - and the thing that kind of intrigued me the other day was a top ten list of phobias... It was a nutty list to me...
Top of the list? Not death, not being the victim of a violent crime, not global warming or terrorism... The number one fear, according to this book - is SPIDERS - those insey weensy creatures crawling up our water spouts... Here are the rest... After I give you the OFFICIAL list, I'll tell you about some of the things I'm a little afraid of...
1) Arachnophobia - fear of spiders
2) Social Phobia - fear of being evaluated negatively in public
3) Aerophobia - fear of flying
4) Agoraphobia - fear of leaving home (or a short radius from home)
5) Claustrophobia - fear of close spaces
6) Acrophobia - fear of heights
7) Emetophobia - fear of vomit
8) Carcinophobia - fear of cancer
9) Brontophobia - fear of thunderstorms
10) Necrophobia - fear of death
Here are the things that skeeve me... (in no particular order)
Rejection, slugs, The horse head scene in "The Godfather," pain, blindness, failing at work, falling too far behind, missing out on life due to being too busy, botched surgery, broken bones, poor health of my family, stupid people, social leeches, people with unpredicitable mood swings, weight gain, oversleeping, my personal disorganization, rising gas prices, poor public policy, alligators (they just gross me out... ), addicts, overcommitment, my own shortcomings... You know. The normal stuff.
Of course, without tyring to sound neurotic, I've also at some point in my life experienced all the normal fright-night dreams - being unable to run from a pursuer, being in a play and not knowing my lines, taking a test when I never went to class, being in public without my pants... These never bothered me because there's research to support that everyone has these dreams. They represent universal fears... (and universal fears do NOT include spiders... who eat the insects that I really have problems with...)
What about you guys?
posted by Kell @ 8:24 PM
2 Comments:
At 7:36 AM,
Kell said…
Great. Now I have to be afraid that my tongue-in-cheek post is being overanalyzed. Crapcrapcrapitycrap. Just so you know, Social Skills, I'm also afraid of Rod Stewart music. Deathly afraid.
At 6:33 PM,
Issa said…
Don't blame you about Rod Stewart. When did chronic laryngitis become sexy?
It's so weird you posted this, when *I* just posted about *my* biggest fear, which is needles! Did that make the list in your book at all? I know there are whole websites devoted to it.
And btw, that book sounds GREAT! I think I'll get a copy! I'm the kind of person who loves knowing strange, offbeat things for the sake of knowing. Thanks for posting it!
Post a Comment
<< Home