The Gift, and Curse, of Fear

Admittedly I haven't been keeping a close eye on the news. I have a better understanding of what's happening on Cartoon Network than I do on CNN. I used to love to read the newspaper on the weekend, but last summer my subscription expired, and renewing it feels just too tiring to contemplate. So I have only a vague knowledge of the Zimmerman case. I know that witnesses were called and motives examined, and at the end of the day the jury found George Zimmerman not guilty by reason of self-defense.

I don't know what went down that rainy night in Florida. As my friend Kim blogged, only two people know exactly what happened that night. One of them is dead, and the other has a vested interest in staying out of jail. No one really knows if Zimmerman shot because he had prejudiced notions about black teenagers or if he shot as a means of saving himself from being head slammed. But I do know one key element that was present in the interaction from the moment Zimmerman spotted Trayvon Martin - FEAR.

Attachment psychologist Dr. Brian Post posits that we operate out of only two basic emotions - love and fear. Every other emotion, from generosity to rage, can be traced back to one or the other of these basic emotions. Anger management counseling often works to peel back to the emotions hidden below the anger, emotions that often have their root in fear.

When I worked for Child Protective Services, several coworkers and I attended a self-defense workshop. (We often visited homes in high-crime areas, you see, working with families who were often not especially happy to see us.) The instructor taught us useful maneuvers like the testicle twister and the eyeball gouge (practiced using grapes). He also taught about recognizing and respecting our instincts, being alert to our surroundings and our internal warning mechanisms, citing research from The Gift of Fear by Gavin de Becker. The author studies "the universal code of violence" and uses these tools to teach survival. I use this theory with elementary students when I teach abuse prevention workshops. If they feel uncomfortable or nervous or afraid in a situation or with a particular person, we talk about recognizing that "uh-oh feeling", getting out of dodge, going somewhere safe and talking to a trustworthy adult about what the heck they're feeling and why.

Fear has always been necessary to the survival of our species. In contrast to the rest of the top-of-the-food-chain animal world, we are relatively small and weak. We are also one of the few species who prey primarily on one another, making other humans especially dangerous.  We learn to categorize and stereotype as a means of self-preservation. Those with highly attuned fear receptors more easily avoid danger, and stay alive.

But this gift of fear also comes with a curse. It's very, very easy for the fear systems in our brains to get out of whack. Early trauma and neglect can send the brain's stress response into overdrive, making even innocuous or pleasurable situations (an upcoming vacation to the beach, perhaps) into a high-anxiety event. Even as adults traumatic events such as war, a car accident, physical violence, sexual abuse, divorce, the death of a loved one can sear into the brain, resulting in easily triggered and seemingly life threatening fear in situations that may (or may not) resemble the initial trauma.

This fear response extends even into events outside our personal realm. A news story about a child abduction two states over may cause a mom to, wisely, warn her child about stranger danger, but it may also cause that same mom to forbid her child from playing outside at all. Stories of crime perpetuated by black teenagers may trigger the fear that causes a neighborhood watchman to shoot an unarmed boy. Stories of police brutality against African-Americans may cause a black teen to physically confront a neighborhood watchman.

My son attended VBS this summer. The theme verse for the week was 2 Timothy 1:7 - For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. It takes power and love and a sound mind to recognize when fear is a wise reaction to a real threat versus a curse that keeps us in bondage.

My sister visited Belize recently. (Which makes me ponder the root from which jealousy stems.) It was early evening, and she and her husband were hanging out across the street from the hotel. A police officer approached them. "You don't want to be here after dark," he warned them. The curse of fear would have terminated their vacation and put them on a plane back home with the belief that Belize City was a den of violence. The gift of fear allowed them to saunter back to the hotel before nightfall with a relaxing week of ocean paradise yet to enjoy.

Words

Living with an English language learner occasionally requires confusing discussions on the meanings of words and phrases. Paul had overheard us talking about game 7 of the Heat vs. Spurs a couple of weeks ago, and he wanted to watch. But "What's a championship?"

"It's the last game of the tournament to find out who's the winner."

"What's a tournament?"

"Like in Sam's softball, remember? When lots of teams played each other until two teams won all their games. Then those two teams played in the championship."

"But why is it championSHIP? Why is there a SHIP?"

Um...I don't know. Why is it championSHIP? I googled the origin of the word, but got nothing. So we're all now puzzled about the role of large oceangoing vessels in tournament play.

It's not always so innocuous. A couple of weeks ago Paul came home from playing with friends and asked, "What's a game rod?"

"A what? A game rod? Is it something you used to play the Wii?"

"No!" Paul still has a bit of an accent, and he gets frustrated with me when I don't quite understand what he's saying. "It's like a name or something! The big boys said it. Game Rod!"

I looked at Trent. He mouthed, "Gay wad." Oh. That.

"Gay can sometimes mean happy," Sam supplied helpfully.

"No." Paul didn't know what it meant, but he knew it hadn't been used in the context of sometimes meaning happy. He knew it had been used as an insult.

So I tried to explain what gay meant, on a seven year old level, and I tried to explain that the boys who had been using that expression were using it in a mean way, to hurt. And that wasn't okay. It's never okay to hurt with our words. But calling someone gay doesn't have to be hurtful if, in fact, that person is gay. But really it's best not to judge or comment upon anyone's sexuality. Gay or straight. Okay?

He raised those "Mama is crazy" eyebrows. "What's it mean again?"

This isn't a blog about the recent Supreme Court decision or the Boy Scouts. Others (Glennon Melton at Momastery and Kimberly Brubaker Bradley at One Blog Now) have seemingly climbed inside my head and written about those issues more eloquently than I. (And I tend to care less about "issues" and more about people, so when I think about those particular "issues", I think about people I know and love who have been touched directly and often hurt by those "issues" from other people I know and love who dig their foxhole and plan their attack on one side or the other. But I digress.)

This blog is about words. Because words matter. Whatever words we utter should be chosen with care for people will hear them and be influenced by them for good or for ill -- Buddha.

I haven't paid too much attention to the Paula Deen case. When I first heard the news about her racist jokes and language I wasn't surprised. But I was sad. I was sad that she didn't seem to understand why racist jokes are hurtful, why using the N-word was such a big deal (and again, others have written about this in more depth - (Kristen Howerton at Rage Against the Minivan and Kim Bradley, just this morning). Mostly I was sad about the day I would have to talk to my own son about the N-word, about racism, about growing up black in America, about growing up black in a white family who doesn't understand what it means to grow up black.

And I'm going to have to do a better job than I did with gay wad. Because I want him to know how special he is, how loved he is, how mean or ignorant words don't have power over him, how words can hurt but don't have to define. Death and life are in the power of the tongue -- Proverbs 18:21. I choose life.