What would terrify you?

[Lookingglassman]

There are all kinds of things people are scared of: aliens, monsters, diseases, spiders, etc, but what would terrify you almost to the point of paralysis if you encountered it?

For me it would be a pair of glowing red eyes staring at me out from the darkness and not seeing who or what they belong to.

 

[Starbreaker]

Monstrous, diseased alien spiders.

But seriously, I'm terrified of roller coasters.

 

[Miss Chicken]

I don't think anything would terrify me to the point of paralysis because I am more of a person to take flight.

I am truly scared of bushfires and have been since my experiences in the 1967 Tasmanian bushfires (I was not quite 9 years old when they occurred).

 

[HoneyBLilly]

Screaming.

Not from a movie. Like actual screaming.

My best friend and I got into a car accident when we were 17 and I can still hear her screaming.

Blood is also another thing. Caused by the same accident.

 

[iguana_tonante]

Like I would tell!

 

[Hilldill]

Someone breaking into my house. I know I would be scared , it's happened before.

 

[The Boy Who Cried Worf]

THE WORLD!!!

 

[Kommander]

You mentioned it. Alien abduction is my biggest fear. It is probably the only thing that would frighten me so much that I would be unable to act.

As far as irrational fears go, it's pretty good because it is unlikely to happen.

 

[Jadzia]

I remember when I was at school, and one day one of my friends was trying to make us jump with all sorts of surprises: sudden noises and movements, grabbing/jolting us, sticking her bottle of ice water on our backs, you name it!

Knowing that she was intent on doing this gave me a bit of heightened awareness and expectation, enough to have cognitive control over my scare reflex. So when she tried to make me jump, I didn't flinch one iota in all the times she tried, and I was able to respond with a calm and collected smile and a "Hi Sarah". She was quite amazed that she couldn't scare me.

All sort of things could give me a fright, but I have no idea if anything could paralyse me with fear.

The greatest source of frights is where incomplete sensory information feeds our own imaginations. Like in horror films ~ the scariest bits are the bits you can't fully see:

The creep who is following you home, and everytime you look over your shoulder he is a bit closer, even though you're walking faster now. Then one time you look and he's suddenly disappeared. Now you don't know where to look or what direction to go in for the best.

Or the shoes you can see at the foot of the doorway: Is it an intruder standing there hiding behind the wall, or is it just a pair of shoes?

Or the strange shadow on the wall that you can barely make out because it's the middle of the night and dark.

 

[Subcommander R.]

The Borg. That would be pretty damn terrifying.

Alien abduction also gets my vote. Fortunately neither of these things is likely.

 

[Candlelight]

A big fucking tsunami.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Being broke and homeless.

 

[Kestra]

An intruder. Also I'm terrified of the idea of looking out the window at night and seeing someone there, looking in.

 

[Itisnotlogical]

Being eerily alone. Not alone within a house or within a building, just alone, like there's nobody else in the world. That would scare the holy bejeezus out of me.

 

[Maestro]

Unemployment.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

This:



I found this kind of alien, talk of this alien, that book Contact which used to poison bookstore windows, stories of alien abduction.. to be quite viscerally terrifying.

I was talking about this once on a mailing list and the resident New Age guru solemnly told me this was because I had been abducted, these were the memories breaking through. I wasn't impressed, lol. And no I don't believe in the Greys (ick, even the name is horrible).

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

deleted for posting in wrong forum

 

[auntiehill]

Being diagnosed with Alzheimer's, Schizophrenia or some other brain disorder. I can't think of anything more frightening than having your mind turn against you, and knowing that it will only get worse, until very little of the real you exists anymore.

My dad has Alzheimer's. After watching him, I think I'd probably just kill myself.

 

[Kommander]

This:



I found this kind of alien, talk of this alien, that book Contact which used to poison bookstore windows, stories of alien abduction.. to be quite viscerally terrifying.

I was talking about this once on a mailing list and the resident New Age guru solemnly told me this was because I had been abducted, these were the memories breaking through. I wasn't impressed, lol. And no I don't believe in the Greys (ick, even the name is horrible).

You probably meant the cover of Communion, not Contact. I know that book cover well. Those were the aliens I was talking about.

And yeah, that reaction probably isn't because of repressed memories. There's some speculation that that reaction to images of Grays is actually related to a traumatic experience as a baby. An infant's eyes don't work quite as well, and it has been speculated that human faces look like that to infant. If I take my glasses off, with my 20/400 vision, peoples faces do kind of look that way; the eyes are large and black, and the rest more indistinct.

So, it could have been that you were frightened at the doctor's office or by people standing over your crib or something.

Despite the fear I feel, I'm actually fascinated by the abduction phenomenon and have studied it off and on most of my life.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

Yes I meant Communion. I absolutely hated seeing huge displays of that thing in windows. That explanation is a good one Kommander, a baby getting a huge fright by a face that is not mommy and maybe is giving it an injection or.. probing it! In some way.