Do you remember the first time you tasted “Yakee” gum? How your face looked like the very moment your tongue rolled against that round gum? Or how you even tried to resist your friends pushing you to taste it? As for me, I remember it so well. I was just a kid when my brother lent me one red “Yakee” gum, already been told that tasting one would be a total disaster, that I would surely puke or cry. As a kid, I had that little nervousness on actually seeing one before me- and worse, being pushed by my brother to taste the “horrible” gum. I didn’t give in to what a kid see as an enticement. I was pretty convinced that it sure was a “horrible, horrible” gum. But I end up wondering why my brother and friends are chewing more of that gum all day, seeing how their faces initially looked like. So I tried to taste the gum. Yes, it tasted like hell the moment it was in my mouth but later on, it was rather delicious. (It’s really not the taste that made me love it but the thought that I was able to bear the “horrible” taste.) Even as a kid, we already face little experiences as this. I say, little nervousness or more correctly little fear. As grown-ups, things are different but the substance is just the same. We are now even more exposed to bigger situations and bigger fears, but the underlying substance is the same. What I mean is that fear is important. It is some sort of evolutionary mechanism for most of the species to survive. It alarms us to a threatening situation, signals us to back out for a moment during a dangerous phenomenon – all for our survival. Yet more surprisingly, it becomes our motivation. How very often are we motivated to avoid something that is fearful than being motivated to experience happiness? Fear really is something, don’t you agree? It oftentimes derides us to limit ourselves on what we can do or what we can experience. I totally agree that it has become our motivation, but we as a rational being with the goodness that we can become, should be able to transcend the survival tendency of an animal. Do we live just to survive or with that common thinking as perpetuation of species? No! Never! Fear succumbs to those who wallow in it.
(Written 10:45Pm 21 Dec 2005 QC. Pic Source: www.confectioncollection.com)
