Fear or Phobia?

Fear is normal and helps to keep us safe and healthy.  It helps us to avoid harmful situations and to decide when to get out of situations that could be dangerous. Normally one can control fear with logic and reason so that it doesn't take over our lives and cause us to become irrational.  When the fear response turns into something difficult or impossible to control it becomes a phobia.  People can become afraid of almost anything and this fear can come from a negative experience with the object in question.  As an example, if you were attacked by a dog as a child you may still be fearful of them as an adult.  Fears can also be learned from someone else.  A child may see its mother's fearful reaction to a spider and become fearful of spiders too.  Whatever the object of fear you may become uncomfortable or distressed when you confront that fear.  If, as an example, you are afraid of flying you might become anxious when you get on an aeroplane.  You might have a pre-flight drink or self-medicate in order to calm your nerves but you are able to manage the fear and get on with your life.  You may prefer to travel by car or train but will fly when you have to.  However, if you have a diagnosable phobia of an object or situation your reaction will be more extreme.  Using flying as an example, you may not be able to get on the plane at all.  If you do you may shake, sweat, cry or have other serious physiological responses, perhaps for the whole flight.  If you have a severe phobia you may be unable to get on an aeroplane, visit airports and even planes flying overhead may cause you to become nervous.  The Penguin Dictionary of Psychology says of phobias, "In standard psychiatric work, a reaction requires several factors before it is properly classified as a phobia.  Specifically, the fear must be persistant and intense, there must be a compelling need to flee or avoid the phobic object or situation and the fear must be irrational and not based on sound judgement".

Women Suffer More Anxiety.

Upon reviewing the data on anxiety disorders, psychologist Isaac Marks found that 90% of those suffering from animal phobias, 75% of agoraphobics and 60% of those suffering from social phobias were women.  In Holland a team found that women are at more than twice the risk of having a diagnosed anxiey disorder.  Dr Susan Nolen-Hoeksema found from reviewing the literature on anxiety that women are more likely to suffer from all of the anxiety disorders with the exception of obsessive complulsive disorders.

Catastrophobia and 21/12/2012 is it the end?

On Friday 21st December 2012 the current cycle of the Mayan calendar comes to an end and it will be the end of a 26,000 year astronomical cycle period.  Several other ancient calendars also end on that date and there have been many predictions that the world will come to an end on that day.  In some countries there is such an intense fear that the world is going to end that the term Catastrophobia (Catastrophobia = an intense fear of catastrophes) has been used to describe it.  Some of the predictions of how the world will end include: an invasion by aliens, the Sun will explode or a comet will hit the earth.  So great is people's fear that NASA has been moved to produce an official video stating that predictions of an apocalypse are wrong.  (See the NASA website). Telescopes world wide have been scouring the skies searching for a likely comet or even a planet that might crash into the Earth and have not found one.  The Sun has been closely monitored and has been found to be very quiet as regards solar flare activity.  So do I think the world will end on Friday?  No!  The Mayans actually called the ending of this cycle on December 21st 'Creation Day'.  Many people believe that rather than being the end of the world the day will actually herald the start of a time of improvement in conditions on Earth.  There will be a spiritual and intellectual awakening that actually started 25 years ago in 1987.  I don't think it will be sudden but I do believe there will be a continuation and a speeding up of this gradual shift in consciousness.  On the other hand many people are seeing this date as an excuse for a party and will be, 'Partying like there's no tomorrow' so instead of worrying about it, why not go out and have a good time instead.

Sales and Marketing Training

For those who share my great interest in personal development, here is some information for anyone looking to improve their sales performance.  I have recently been working with a great lady called Julia Payn, who is a sales and marketing trainer.  Julia runs courses for sole-traders through to large companies on subjects including:Sales, marketing, presentation skills, negotiation and social media skills.  Courses can be tailored to your organisation's needs.  Julia is highly intelligent, very experienced and accomplished.  She bubbles over with enthusiasm and just being with Julia is very motivating.  Visit her website at http://www.salepath.co.uk/ to find out more.  Highly recommended.  I'm doing a one day course with her in Lowestoft in September on low cost marketing for the small business.  I'm really looking forward to it!

Tapping World Summit 2012

There is a great free online event coming up that I highly recommend for anyone wanting to learn more about the Emotional Freedom Technique.  It starts on Monday the 7th of May and runs over ten days.  It features interviews with many experts on the subject as well as "tap alongs" where you can learn to overcome various problems or conditions.  Some of the conditions that EFT can help include phobias, anxiety, PTSD, pain and many others.  As they say, "Try it on everything".  Some of the famous proponents of EFT are: Dr Joe Vitale, Cheryl Richardson, Dr Bruce Lipton, Carol Look, Dr Joseph Mercola, Bob Proctor and Jack Canfield.  For more information go to http://www.thetappingsolution.com/.

Possible New Drug For Phobics

Scientists in Israel have identified the part of the brain with the greatest activity in phobics when confronted by what they fear.  Volunteers with a phobia of snakes were asked to move closer to or further away from non-poisonous snakes and their brains scanned.  The scientists now believe they will be able to produce a drug that will stimulate that part of the brain and beat the fear.

THIS STUFF REALLY WORKS!!!

Having overcome my phobia of going to the dentist in 1999 I don't bother to give myself any therapy if I'm only going for a check up.  On the 25th of January, however, I had to go for a filling so in the 2 or 3 days beforehand I had a few self-hypnosis sessions and used EFT (the Emotional Freedom Technique) a few times as well as I felt a bit nervous about it.  From the chart they showed me I thought I was going for a small filling in one of the molars in my lower right jaw.  But what I thought would be a 10 minute job turned into a major production as the whole thing seemed to take ages and the dentist kept switching between 2 or perhaps, 3 different drills.  One of these felt very harsh and grinding and she seemed to hollow out the whole tooth.  When she drilled deep into the tooth it was painful too despite having had an anaesthetic.  When it was finally all over I was able to sit up and smile and chat with her.  It felt amazing to me that I was virtually unphased by the experience.  If it had happened to anyone else or to me before I overcame my phobia in 1999 I think the experience would have been traumatic to say the least.  I therefore cannot recommend highly enough that my readers learn self-hypnosis, ideally from my book "Stress Free Dentistry. The easy way to overcome your fear of going to the dentist".  It's available at http://www.lulu.com/ .  I also recommend getting the DVD The Tapping Solution, about EFT, and the EFT Handbook 2nd edition by Gary Craig.  Both are available on Amazon.  Remember, there is no need to suffer with any phobia.  Get some help or help yourself.