For most of my life, up until fairly recently, I was intensely afraid of arachnids. I would say I qualified as someone who suffered from arachnophobia, and it was somewhat extreme and pathetic the kinds of reactions one would have witnessed me having to something as simple as an itsy bitsy spider inching up the wall--a spider no bigger than a couple millimeters wide, if that.
Yes, spiders the size of tiny crumbs would make me tense, and make me want to run and get a shoe to crush them. I couldn't squish them with just anything either, nor mush them with my finger... no, it had to be a shoe or something that was total overkill for the speck-sized beastie (haha, "overKILL" haha, ok moving on).
If a spider the size of a dime caught me off guard visually by appearing in the room where I was, I would often vocally react, making some gasp or short squealing noise, and I would feel intense stress and anxiety as a biological reaction to how it looked, regardless of whether it was actually species that could do me any harm.
Allow me to express this in the art of hyperbole. The following image illustrates, if over-dramatically, my method for, um, "dealing" with spiders throughout most my life:
(I went through houses like my dryer goes through socks, it's an expensive phobia I must say)
Sarcasm aside though, talk to anyone who has dealt with a ridiculous and intense phobia, and they will likely tell you that it has caused immense inconveniences for them more than a few times in their life. I know I could tell you of countless stories of "That Spider Who Was On The Ceiling Then Suddenly Was Gone And Amanda Didn't Sleep Well", or "That Time Amanda Couldn't Use The Shower Because She Didn't Want To Share It With Shelob", and other tales of arachno-woe.
Phobias Fucking Suck, And Life Would Really Be Better Without Them
I wish this article was going to give you the secrets to hacking into a phobia and destroying it from the inside out, but that's not what I'm here to offer. I know that there are thousands of ways to hack our own psychology. Thousands of stories exist around Neuro-Linguistic Programming/Hypnosis and Self-Help techniques that worked to free people of deeply-engrained fears they'd lived with their entire lives. I believe there are ways to learn to do it, and I can tell you that I had practiced my own varied techniques on myself, but with little success in the past.
No, I didn't figure out any certain way to hack all phobias, I didn't even figure out the for sure answer to dispelling my fear of arachnids.
I only am here to tell you that I simply do not have the phobia any more, and that I have what amount to a few humble guesses as to why.
Could The Saying Be True, That Knowledge Destroys Fear?
My life's experiences were beginning to really teach me this, starting a few years ago. It started with my journey down the roads of real (and buried/obscured) U.S. history, which led me into the lost tools of Logic (Google The Trivium Method if you don't know what that is), and with that I ended up de-constructing and re-constructing my whole worldview as it related to just about everything.
This is how I ended up at Voluntaryism, and it is also how I ended up losing a lot of my fears about reality that I once had. My knowledge about things and my ability to think critically and without mental fog grew a confidence within me that has become impenetrable.
I took back ownership and accountability for my own life, and with that came mental, emotional, and spiritual freedom in a way I could not have conjured before.
On this new path and trajectory, I fully expected that I would only become more fearless as life went on, since that is what my actions and thought patterns were leading me through. But I would often wonder about things like phobias, and why I still had little stupid ones that seemed to come from a part of my brain that I had not yet accessed--that I felt I could not access.
I Had No Idea What Was Coming
Starting a few months ago, I noticed something strange beginning to occur. It was rare, and a relatively small thing, but it was a change I noted because when one lives with a rather intense phobia long enough, it is fairly obvious when something STOPS frightening you.
I would be laying out on my lawn chair in my backyard as usual, and on occasion a little jumping spider would land on or near me. One day, one landed right on the chair in front of my face, and then--like lightning or teleportation--he sprung away upward to the left. It was so cartoonish, I didn't have time to react... except to laugh. Laugh? To some of you that seems a justified and normal reaction,
...to those with arachnophobia, screaming seems a lot more familiar and 'normal'.
For some reason, that little jumping spider struck me as adorable in his mannerism, and my usual phobia brain didn't have time to really categorize him as "that thing we're terrified of"--my brain that enjoys humor was too busy saying
"BUAHAHAHAHAHA!"
Ever hear of the pattern interrupt? Many of you have, but just in case-- a pattern interrupt (in human psychology) is:
"a technique to change a particular thought, behavior or situation. Behavioral psychology and neuro-linguistic programming use this technique to interrupt and change thought patterns and behaviors."
~Why A Pattern Interrupt Is Just What You Need: Huffington Post~
Pattern interrupts are consciously utilized as psychological techniques, but lots of things can be pattern interrupts to a neural habit pattern, any random occurrence that succeeds in abruptly derailing the mental/emotional train can be called a pattern interrupt. My own pattern interrupt happened when I laughed at the jumping spider rather than flipping out as usual.
So my theory is this: All of this journey to losing my fear was launched by a single pattern interrupt that then spawned several other pattern interrupts later on, and from there my phobia was DOOMED.
Over the course of 3 months, I started noticing more and more often that I was not having the same intense punch-in-the-chest anxiety when I saw little spiders here or there. Instead of running away from a room one was in, I could stay and watch it, and then decide to get close enough to just smash it, without too much anxiety. Sad, I know, that before this I was so scared I couldn't even kill one myself. Ugh! It was what it was.
A few days I noticed that a jumping spider would land on me and I'd of course notice, but hardly flinch, and I wouldn't scream or even feel scared.
I'm the introspective sort, to an extremely high degree, so you'd better believe I had the Internal Observer watching my behaviors and lack-of-usual-adrenaline-dumps with great intrigue.
A Knife To The Heart of Fear
From what I can gather, my phobia was truly doomed at the point that I started becoming actively curious.
Indeed, Curiosity seems to be the true knife to the heart of my phobia. This speaks profoundly about the chemical/psychological makeup of the human brain, I think, and warrants your sincere effort to understand it--at least in yourself. Look, it deserves some attention as an area to learn about, if for no other reason than it might help you with phobias that have inconvenienced the hell out of you.
On occasion I started looking up species of spider or trying to identify ones I found outside in the wild. Rather than thinking of the things I didn't like about them (and that was almost everything), I started to focus on QUESTIONS ABOUT THEM.
I started asking every king of question eventually: What species is that? What does it eat? Where does it like to live? How does it go about mating? What are its moving parts and what are the various uses? How many color variations does it have? How many eyes does it have? How aware is it? What kind of web does it spin, if it spins one?
I asked so many questions and was too busy studying them and so I eventually changed my brain's relationship to the spider.
Fear is destroyed by knowledge. Knowledge is arrived at through Curiosity. And Curiosity begins in The Question.
In this last week or two, the most impressive thing happened in my psyche. I decided to start asking questions about the most scary spider to me--The Tarantula!
Suddenly I was reading about all these different species (there are over 850 species of tarantula, did you know?), from the Chromatopelma Cyaneopubescens, to the Avicularia Versicolor, to the Poecilotheria Metallica and many dozens of others. Google those, and some of you will get a surprise as to just how insanely colorful and stunning tarantulas can be.
My fears were no longer simmering below the surface. I was too busy being amazed, and in awe; I was too busy appreciating, and discovering.
I was spending hours oo-ing and ah-ing over all the amazing species, their colors and webs and neat capabilities.
I eventually picked my first tarantula species to have as a pet, after a lot of research about it, and ordered my first sling (aka 'spiderling', a baby tarantula). It is a Green Bottle Blue, the species pictured just above. It will arrive this coming Wednesday, and I'm nothing but fully excited.
I even found a few Arizona Desert Blonde tarantula babies in my house this past few weeks, and my reaction was excitement, squealing, and feeling bummed out that they WERE DEAD when I found them!!! Quite a different response from before, right?!
To date, I have held two tarantula carcasses in my bare hand (as evidenced above), and also hunted down a mama spider who webbed up inside my house (of the species Kukulcania Hibernalis, Southern House Spider) after I had found two of her dead babies not far from her web's location on my window. I removed her from her web gently, using pliers to grip her leg, and studied her in the light while taking photos. I then determined her species after a lot of internet reading and searching. I have since pet her gently, as well as fed her a small spiderling I found.
For most of my life, all of that would have been the unthinkable.
This is very strange. I had a dream about a really cute tarantula last night. I got this a few months ago so I didn't have to hold or hurt the spiders in my house. It works great :)
I dreamt about a tarantula last night, but that's also likely because I'm excited about my cute baby coming in the mail this week.
Telepathic dream connection? Maybe you were seeing into my brain?! :D :P
I'm gonna have to get one of those tools. Excellent idea.
Probably my favorite post of yours so far. Thank you! Please put this on a meme and share it far and wide:
That is a great way to becoming less afraid. I used to be scared of spiders as well so I bought a rosehair tarantula from a pet store. I fed her and looked at her every day. After a few weeks, I was able to handle her, and, after a month or so I would let it crawl all over me. It's favorite spot was where my shoulder meets my neck. Now I am no longer afraid and it is a very freeing feeling. Also if you think about it, they kill hundreds of flies and mosqitos each, so, just another reason to like and appreciate them. Great post. I hope you love your spider like I loved mine.
I can TOTALLY relate. And it's even worse with scorpions.
But as I've studied more about biology and ecology, I have learned that they're very helpful critters, well, the spiders are. :) Now I just let them be, except when the black widows get in places where I need to work. Then they still get squished. But, in the garden, I love seeing various spiders now. Here's some eye candy from Haiti!
"It's the exposure that weakens phobia while escaping makes it grow."
Although most people hate them, in some place spiders are valuable creatures.
Nice post. Thanks :)
There are few words that can describe how this blog makes me feel! Life is about learning, yet most shut it off in favour of their comfort zones. So sad, because a lack of comfort zones is life. Thank you for your article. Ps I quite like spiders :)
I absolutely love your writing style here! Intriguing to read!
I've gone from being deathly terrified of spiders to happily living with spider webs in my home... as long as they know who's boss. But the big ones still give me shivers.
I'm not afraid of spiders but for me they are a uncomfortable. Although maybe I'm afraid of them. Thanks for the post. It is useful!
I too had a phobia of spiders. It is not completely gone but mostly is. If it at all resembles what could be a black widow in its shiny black shape then I still have a fear response. If I saw something that might resemble a brown recluse then that too would unnerve me.
I have not become an Arachnophile. If they are in my house I kill them. I've seen one too many eggs hatch in my time and I don't like the 100s of spiders suddenly all over a room in my house. So if they are in my house I still kill them.
If they are outside I leave them be.
My phobia began when I was really young first with tarantulas and later on with some really close brushes with Black Widows.
thats good shit, i was laffing today how im more scared of turtles than the governments
Fear is enslavement of the self.
Intriguing article. I'm going to have my wife read it. Spiders send her into a panic.
I hate spiders. My reaction to one in my vicinity is a mortal duel to the death (not the small ones the size of dots there ignored). It must die for me to have a peace of mind. I never made any sound more then a grunt when discovering a spider has inadvertently crawled on to me but for a half hour after I feel like my limb is going to go necrotic and fall off.
I think it's a mild phobia and I seem to hate flying stinging things more because they like to invade your personal space and get pissy if they think your going to move or something when they land on you. for the most part my reaction to spiders has gotten lesser but Ill still flinch over a spider on steroids like the ones you have in some of those pictures above. Rather get rid of the bees and wasp more then the spiders honestly and don't even get me started on house centipedes.