When I was three years old, my parents signed me up for my first non-parented swim class at my local recreation centre. They would drag me out of bed, dress me in a pink frilly swimsuit, and sit on the water’s edge watching my class for what felt like hours.[Read More…]
Tag: fear
Birds: My mortal enemies
I didn’t see a single bird during the U.S. government shutdown between Dec. 22, 2018, and Jan. 25, 2019. While the feathery fiends in British Columbia may have just been taking the month off from antagonizing my fellow high schoolers on the frosty coast of Vancouver Island, I choose to[Read More…]
Carving fish in the sand
Every time I’m in the lecture hall analyzing a poem, I’m of two minds. On the one hand, as an English student, I am thinking of the poem as a critic would—sifting and weighing the words. But on the other hand, I am reading as a Christian, conscious of every[Read More…]
A petrified stream of consciousness
Content Warning: Vomiting, graphic imagery Fear can really humble us. In the face of something that terrifies us, we are driven to confront the cause. This can help us survive––fear is the body’s way of protecting us. Unfortunately, fear can also be completely removed from any legitimate danger. My fear,[Read More…]
The psychology of fear
For some, Halloween means curling up on the couch and watching a favourite horror movie. The resulting jump scares, hellish demons, and bloody deaths provoke an emotion we are all too familiar with: Fear. “Fear is an emotional state—the unpleasant feeling of being afraid—that emerges when we perceive an imminent[Read More…]
Overcoming the fear of missing out: What is FOMO and how can we learn to deal with it?
The fear of missing out, better known as FOMO, is a universally-felt sentiment—one that can creep up on just about anyone, caused by a range of circumstances. Although the term has been used conversationally for years, it was officially added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2013, and defined as[Read More…]
Adults need Halloween, too
Being a grown-up is really hard. Any young adult can attest that our first encounters with personal finances, heartbreak, and aging parents can be downright scary. The real world is indeed a frightful place, rife with political instability, wildfires, and unexpected ways to die. The idea of having a specific[Read More…]
Exploring loneliness within McGill’s nooks and crannies
Fear has an infinite number of personalities. Often times, the cliché examples come to mind, like phobia of spiders, snakes, or the dark. But there are fears that often go undiscussed, like the fear of being alone. It is a fear of living in isolation, of being devoid of the[Read More…]
Explaining tocophobia
Everyone is afraid of something, or at least that’s what we’re told. According to the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health, an estimated 8.7 per cent of the adult population suffers from a phobia, or a “marked and persistent fear and avoidance of a specific object or situation.” The good[Read More…]
Affirmations for your new beginning
