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I'm not sure if this thread has been done before. I've not been around that long.

we humans as much as we hate to admit it, get scared sometimes. it could be something serious, a fear of losing your job maybe. those fears come naturally with life. fear of failing, but that is not the failure i want to talk about.

Boogeyman was recently released here in the UK and i went to watch it with my girlfriend. In Boogeyman there are quite a few jumpy bits, at these points my girlfriend emitted a little scream (bless her), and at points she covered her face but peeked through her fingers at the screen.

i was thinking about this the other day. and even though we sometimes scare ourselves with the occasional movie, we keep going back to it. or keep watching it.

i'm sure everyone as a kid hid under their blankets thinking they were completely safe ;)

I myself am afraid of heights, and piers (don't ask), but i still go on rollercoasters and piers because i like to put myself through it if i know i'm going to come out ok. i remember the first time i went on the a rollercoaster here in england called the oblivion. it has a vertical drop... (as a side point, i requested that i be secured in incredibly tightly which hurt me) anyway as i got to the top of the upcoming drop, there's a speaker that plays "don't look down"

what does everyone do? look down... even i did... there's a sign "don't look down" you look further down to see a huge hole in the floor which you then are dropped towards..."oh shit, why did i look down?" were my exact words.

another point. given the chance everyone would go into a known haunted house for the night with a few friends if they had the chance. even though they will probably frighten themselves silly.

is this kind of fear addictive?

i certainly think so, especially if we keep going back for more like we all do.

thoughts? examples? theories?

faer is just a way of reminding us that we are alive if we never felt these strong emotions then what would let us know that we were still alive?
fear is the same as love, pain etc. i dont have any answers to y we get adicted to it but we all do in our own ways. i personaly dont like rolocosters i find them boring, i play with fire but it is for the same rason...
to remind me that i am alive.

as a famous phlosipher once said "whats the point in living if you do not feel alive?"

great post Dhampir.

although in my opinion i know i'm alive. but doing fearful things doesn't make me think i'm more alive or remind me that i am, i just do it because... i can and come out the other side of it fine.

I dislike going on piers because i can usually see the cracks in the wooden floor and spot the sea below. if i fell through i know i'd be fine but i just can't get my head round why i'm naturally fearful and cautious on piers. Imagine when i went to Brighton pier... where one very close by had burnt down.

in my case, i don't understand where my fear comes from, and i try to ignore it so i can carry on with my life.

i liked that about fear having similar patterns with previous experience. kind of with thought, something/anything can remind you of something/anything

*now has an urge to go to a haunted house with friends*

*Thnaks*.. Goery. You suffer from vertigo right. Vertigo

Vertigo refers to an hallucination of motion that can be linear (straight ahead), falling, or rocking. It is often described as a spinning, turning, or whirling sensation. What's more, the spinning may be one of self-rotation (subjective vertigo) or rotation of the surrounding environment (objective vertigo). In most cases, the symptom of vertigo implies a disorder of the inner ear or vestibular system.

I myself have the '*Fear of the Pier*' It's not so much as fallening to the sea, but the sensation you recieve when you look between the gaps.. mentioned above. I hate heights with a passion, i can recall a few years back, the BPepsi Max in Blackpool, malfunctioned and got stuch at the top and people had to climb down... They would of had to get a helicopter before i moved a muscle.. It's not being affraid of falling and dying.. It just that when a person suffers from vertigo, your brain overrides everything and send out a big.. *sod this* message to your entire body. Footbridges are the same.. As for the haunted house, thats a different kind of fear, thats the fear of the unknown.. a whole different ball give.. give me a house full of ghosts over walking by the cliffs of Dover any day!

GOREY I DIDNT SCREAM DURING BOOGEYMAN... I simply squeaked a bit :-)

Anyway *laughs* Dhampir said it all, bless him, but although Im scared at a film, I love BEING scared. It reminds me I am alive and I love the feeling of adrenaline. Why do I keep going to have more piercings, when you know that Im sat in the pub with you downing vodkas to get the courage to go back, huh?

Its the same principle, and may it reign for a long time!

what i do is walk out in front of cars and trucks well anything really and get as close as i can to it just to see what happens one time i did get my feet run over but it didnt hurt cause i was wearing steel toe cap trainers, i test myself to see if im alive whenever i can cause to tell the truth i dont feel alive

dhampir after reading that about Vertigo you've got me thinking... it might be that, i'll have to go on a pier again now to find out :S

and echo you are also right, it was more of a squeek... although there were some that were a little louder... like when you squeeked then burst out laughing after and hugged me :)

Fear keeps us alive! If there was no fear we could get hurt or we could die! For example: You made a hand made wings and you want to try them if there was no fear of death you could just put them on and jump off a building and die! I'm afraid of of heights but only if there is no fence or the fence is too low and I'm afraid of snakes, though I don't hate them!

Gorey. You only take me to horror films so I will jump on you on the back row. :-)

i love to be thrilled and scared by mysterious objects, like noises you cannot see and ghost movies. but i dontl ike being scared by the kinds of movies where people get thier heads choped off and limbs ripped apart. ill stick with a horror film anyday compared to a slasher flik

I dont really find slashers scary. Just disturbing.

For example, I watched Ichi The Killer last week, and it was just disgusting. NOt scary. I didnt 'squeak' *laughs* or feel at all scared, just disgusted that they would show that sort of thing. I still couldn't look though :-)

yeah, i don't usually find disturbing things scary. just... disturbing

yes echo i like you jumping on me on the back-row

fear just reminds us that we are not perfect adn that we are ?falable?. i believe is the word.fear is normal. sometimes i even welcome it

I love scary movies but I always end up freaked out. Evey time that there is a new movie I see it and the same thing happens. I think we go back because we like the feeling that we get when doing what makes us feel like that, it's like an adrenaline rush.

yes, i do believe that fear is addictive. reason being people love the thought of being afraid but still knowing nothing will really hurt them. i ask myself the same question before. i use to work in haunted house for side money a few years back and i would scare the shit out of all types of people and they loved it and came back for more. why? because everyone has an addition whether it be alcohol, drugs, or fear.. most won't admit it tho


gorey very good question

hey dhampir....out of all the details of the process of fear...the only one that makes us want to go for more....is the dopamine....it's more addicting than crack...obsessive compulsives tend to have a higher than average dopamine production.....with certain triggers....
different for each....
but yes...fear is very addicting......
my problem with heights is not vertigo....I haven't the fear of falling.....
what I do have on high ledges is a strong urge to jump.....what would that be?
and no...it's not a suicidal impulse....
i'd call it a flight instinct...
but i'd love to know the clinical term

Dhampir,
Well said :) but for me the attraction to *horror* movies or other such stimuli is that they are *safe scares*, real scares and fears protect you because that instinct kicks in... good thread

all you have to fear is fear itself,,,its only natural..it does keep us alive

i have a bit of a theory... not sure if this will be linked

i've heard that when we are born we are close to our natural instincts... of course we are so young we don't realise this and literally have no control over our brain. (who here remembers anything as a baby? very rare occurance to have memories as a baby)

so obviously you're closer to the instincts. my theory is that as you grow you become more civilised you learn to talk, communicate with people, you learn to form opinions, do things you want to and in time a person becomes a person.

in the teen years you develop so much and eventually gain much more control over the brain. you lose those instincts in your teens.

If fear, say from horror movies, brings back the sort of chemicals that are addictive. is it the brain trying to make us more instinctual again?

Stragella i would have to agree with the safe scaires but not all people like them safe people do ohigy (sp) bords and fire juggling. i find films dont scair me at all they are just funny, i actualy have to be in the life or death situation to get the same rush that others seem to get from films.

Were the top of the food chain hun, the only thing we usually have to fear is ourselves.

Basing this on the idea that fear is addictive, film companies make a hell of a lot of money out of creating a higher force... someone above us in the food chain.

we may be at the top of the food chain but we are not invinsible. it just depends if our fear is of real dangers or of fictional creaturs!

Daermon thats called Inverse Vertigo
or also known as but not hitting the nail ..
Catapedaphobia- Fear of jumping from high and low places.

I also have an urge to jump when i am on the edge of a building , bridge or so...but I think that i am adicted on fear of loosing persons who i care for and being betrayd. I am nnot afraid of being alone,but i just freak out when I loose someone, or when i think that i am gonna loose someone...
from that fear i developed another one : ferar of bonding with family members( those that are still alive) I just keep them distant so that it doesnt hurt so much when it comes to the point they are gone.
So it ends up like this: i bond to wrong persons, maby because i know that they will betray me and that i will lose them.
Freaky isn`t it?

i am afraid of death surprisingly, and spiders, i am afraid of being along, and i have agrophobia

http://www.phobialist.com/reverse.html
there are lots of phobias and fears lol .. this list is just so damned amusing!!

DAMN now I've given everyone a way to become hypocondriacs *grumbles* everyone will now know the clinical term of illness for whatever made up or real fears or phobias lol *shrugs* ohh well more amusing for me to read in the long run then lmao

To be honest, there really isn't anything that I fear. But preying on someone else's fear is a rush. Well at least when I work haunted houses in October, it is such a rush when you can scare the hell out of someone. *grins*

Fear its like a thrill trip, an adrennaline rush.

you can be awake for days....and you get some one to scare the heck out of ya....
that fear.... can keep ya awake for a few more *smiles*

Fear gives us an adrenilin rush that can be/is very addicting....which may explain the reason that i keep climbimg trees although i've fallen out of them plenty of times....

fear is what you make of it..
but you have fear to drive you for life...

We all love it or we would not keep gping back for more.

thats the same for me octavia, but i dont fear wat im capable of, i know there is a reason why i lose control, sometimes good and sometimes bad.

I'd like to tell you that this is very interesting and original.....
I do agree that humans may be addicted to fear,probibly its the trill you fear while being scared......but the 'don't look down'
thing is just a phycological effect....after reading the sign you get destracted by it and do it

I love to be spooked .......BOO!!!!!

The Adrenaline rush after a good scare ...yay!!! ....jelly knees ... brilliant!!!!...

Come on scare me ..do it...do it.. I love it ...hehe

humans do seek a thrill and the biggest thrill that they can generate comes from testing their limits, pushing themselves to the edge every chance they get, some people do that by trying to overcome their fears.

Ok Sunshine if you insist!

i have to say i agree with Dhampir
a little fear keeps us going

fear is what you haven't over come yet. I believe fear is the reason why we never really better ourselves

"Fear is the path of the dark side. Fear leads to anger, anger leads to
hate, hate leads to suffering."
-Yoda

I, personally, do not scare so easily. I wish I could go to a scary movie and enjoy the gore and horror, and actually get scared. Instead, I usually make fun of the movie and laugh through most of it. Go figure.

If I could find one thing that scared me, made my adrenaline rush, that would rock. Until then, I will just laugh and throw popcorn.

fear is great but it depends on the type of fear. its such and adrenaline rush and blood pumping experience its a great feeling. what would we do with out it.

Sunshine, I guess that all of us love to be freaked out, spooked, or something sometimes... but that's not fear.
think about the other side; fear itself...

fear is curiousity. we are scared of something like heights or spiders, but actually we are more curious about them. inside we know we want to know more of why we are curious, more about those things, but we hide it with fear. that is why ppl keep going back to scary movies, look down at a high place, and do all sorts of stuff

curiousity kills the cat

I think you have a point.. its this curiosity that sparked the traditional formulae of a 'person faces their fears/ goes to see what the noise was/ goes in the closet.' films which never fail to be popular.

i think fear is addictive or at least the adrelane rush you get from being afraid I love a good adrelane rush or high as they say i will perposeily talk myself into beliveing something is more dangerus then it really is so i can get a better rush. Thats just what i think