President Franklin Roosevelt famously asserted, "The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself."
富蘭克林·羅斯福總統有一句名言：
我們唯一需要恐懼的，是恐懼本身。I think he was right: Fear of fear probably causes more problems in our lives than fear itself.
我深以為然。在我們生活中，對恐懼的恐懼所導致的問題要比恐懼本身所導致的問題多得多。
Fear has gotten a bad rap. And it's not nearly as complicated as we try to make it. A simple and useful definition of fear is: An anxious feeling, caused by our anticipationof some imagined event or experience.
恐懼可謂臭名昭著，而且也根本不像是我們所刻意營造的那樣複雜。一個簡單實用的定義是：一種因預料到某種想象的事件或體驗而導致的焦慮感。
Medical experts tell us that the anxious feeling we get when we're afraid is a standardized biological reaction. It's pretty much the same set of body signals, whether we're afraid of getting bitten by a dog, getting turned down for a date, or getting our taxes audited.
醫學專家們告訴我們，當我們害怕時，所產生的焦慮感是一種標準化生理反應。無論是我們害怕被狗咬，害怕提出的約會請求被拒絕，或報稅被審查，我們所表現出的肢體信號基本上都是相同的。
Fear, like all other emotions, is basically information. It offers us knowledge and understanding—if we choose to accept it.
同其他任何情緒一樣，恐懼基本上也等同於“信息”。它為我們提供知識和理解——如果我們選擇接受它。
And there are only five basic fears, out of which almost all of our other so-called fears are manufactured. These are:
而且，有5種基本的恐懼，我們的其他所有恐懼感幾乎都構建於這5種基礎恐懼之上。它們包括：
1. Extinction—the fear of annihilation, of ceasing to exist. This is a more fundamental way to express it than just "fear of death." The idea of no longer being arouses a primary existential anxiety in all normal humans. Consider that panicky feeling you get when you look over the edge of a high building.
1. 滅絕——恐懼被消滅，恐懼停止存在。這種表達方式比“恐懼死亡”更根本。“不再存在”這種想法會在所有正常人類中激發一種“原始存在焦慮”。想象一下當你站在高樓上往下看時的那種恐慌感。
2. Mutilation—the fear of losing any part of our precious bodily structure; the thought of having our body's boundaries invaded, or of losing the integrity of any organ, body part, or natural function. Anxiety about animals, such as bugs, spiders, snakes, and other creepy things arises from fear of mutilation.
2. 傷殘——害怕失去我們寶貴身體結構的任何部分；害怕我們身體的界限被侵犯，害怕任何器官、身體部位或自然機能受到破壞。對蟲子、蜘蛛、蛇等動物以及其他可怕事物的焦慮感也都源於這種對傷殘的恐懼。
3. Loss of Autonomy—the fear of being immobilized, paralyzed, restricted, enveloped, overwhelmed, entrapped, imprisoned, smothered, or otherwise controlled by circumstances beyond our control. In physical form, it's commonly known as claustrophobia, but it also extends to our social interactions and relationships.
3. 失去自主性——害怕失去行動能力、無法動彈、受限制、被包圍、被壓垮、被困住、被囚禁、被窒息，或其他因不可控因素而受限的情形。在實際情形中，通常被稱為“幽閉恐懼症”，但這種恐懼也延伸至我們的社交互動和感情關係中。
4. Separation—the fear of abandonment, rejection, and loss of connectedness; of becoming a non-person—not wanted, respected, or valued by anyone else. The "silent treatment," when imposed by a group, can have a devastating effect on its target.
4. 分離——害怕被拋棄、被拒絕、失去聯繫；害怕成為“隱形人”——不被任何人需要、尊重或珍惜。當一群人對一個人“冷戰”時，會對該人產生毀滅性的影響。
5. Ego-death—the fear of humiliation, shame, or any other mechanism of profound self-disapproval that threatens the loss of integrity of the self; the fear of the shattering or disintegration of one's constructed sense of lovability, capability, and worthiness.
5. 自尊死亡——害怕被羞辱，或其他任何可能會破壞自我整體性（自我肯定、自我堅定、堅守個人原則）的深刻自我否定機制。害怕自己對自己的受喜愛程度、自身能力和自我價值所構建起的認知被擊碎擊垮。
These can be thought of as forming a simple hierarchy, or "feararchy":
可以把它們視為一種簡單的等級結構，或恐懼等級結構：
Think about the various common labels we put on our fears. Start with the easy ones: fear of heights or falling is basically the fear of extinction (possibly accompanied by significant mutilation, but that's sort of secondary). Fear of failure? Read it as fear of ego-death. Fear of rejection? That's fear of separation, and probably also fear of ego-death. The terror many people have at the idea of having to speak in public is basically fear of ego-death. Fear of intimacy, or "fear of commitment," is basically fear of losing one's autonomy.
想象一下我們常見的很多恐懼。首先是一些簡單的：
恐高，害怕墜落：這基本上是對滅絕的恐懼（可能會伴隨著對傷殘的強烈恐懼，但這屬於次要位置）。
害怕失敗？可以解讀為對自尊死亡的恐懼。
害怕被拒絕？這是對分離的恐懼，另外也很可能是對自尊死亡的恐懼。
很多人害怕在公開場合講話，這種恐懼基本上屬於對自尊死亡的恐懼。
而害怕親密關係，或恐懼承諾 ，基本上屬於對“失去自主性”的恐懼。
Some other emotions we know by various popular names are just aliases for these primary fears. If you track them down to their most basic levels, the basic fears show through. Jealousy, for example, is an expression of the fear of separation, or devaluation: "She'll value him more than she values me." At its extreme, it can express the fear of ego-death: "I'll be a worthless person."
其他一些我們所熟知的恐懼也不過是這些基礎恐懼的化名。如果你追根究底，你就會發現這些基礎恐懼。
比如說，嫉妒的根源，是害怕分離、害怕價值被貶低。“她對他的重視程度要高於對我的重視程度。”極端的嫉妒，則可能源於對自尊死亡的恐懼：“我會是一個毫無價值之人。”
Shame and guilt express the fear of separation and even ego-death. The same is true for embarrassment and humiliation.
羞恥和內疚則表達了對分離、甚至是自尊死亡的恐懼。尷尬和屈辱感同理。
Fear is often the base emotion on which anger floats. Oppressed people rage against their oppressors because they fear—or actually experience—loss of autonomy and even ego-death. The destruction of a culture or a religion by an invading occupier may be experienced as a kind of collective ego-death. Those who make us fearful will also make us angry.
恐懼通常是憤怒的基礎情緒。被壓迫之人對壓迫者感到憤怒，是因為他們害怕——或的確在經歷——失去自主性，甚至自尊死亡。入侵者對某一文化或宗教的摧毀，會導致集體性的自尊死亡。
那些令我們感到恐懼的，同時也會令我們感到憤怒。
Religious bigotry and intolerance may express the fear of ego-death on a cosmic level, and can even extend to existential anxiety: "If my god isn't the right god, or the best god, then I'll be stuck without a god. Without god on my side, I'll be at the mercy of the impersonal forces of the environment. My ticket could be canceled at any moment, without a reason."
一個人在宗教上的固執狹隘，可能根本上是源於對自尊死亡的恐懼，而且可能甚至會導致存在焦慮：“如果我信奉的上帝不是真的上帝，那麼我就會沒有上帝。沒有上帝庇佑，我就會淪落於各種冷漠客觀力量的掌控中。我的票可能隨時被毫無原因地取消。”
Some of our fears, of course, have basic survival value. Others, however, are learned reflexes that can be weakened or re-learned.
誠然，我們的一些恐懼擁有基本生存價值。而其他則是後天習得的反射，而且這些後天習得的反射可以被削弱或重新習得。
That strange idea of "fearing our fears" becomes less strange when we realize that many of our avoidance reactions—turning down an invitation to a party if we tend to be uncomfortable in groups; putting off a doctor's appointment; or not asking for a raise—are instant reflexes that are reactions to the memories of fear. They happen so quickly that we don't actually experience the full effect of the fear. We experience a "micro-fear"—a reaction that's a kind of shorthand code for the real fear. This reflex reaction has the same effect of causing us to evade and avoid as the real fear. This is why it's fairly accurate to say that many of our so-called fear reactions are actually the fears of fears.
當我們意識到，我們很多回避型反應（如果我們在人群中感到不適，我們會拒絕派對邀請；推遲看醫生；不敢要求漲薪）都是一些瞬間反射，它們都是我們對我們記憶中的恐懼所產生的反應，那麼“恐懼我們的恐懼”這一奇怪觀點也就變得不那麼奇怪了。
它們發生得是如此之快，以至於我們並沒有真正體驗到完整的恐懼感。
我們體驗的是一種“微恐懼”——類似於真正恐懼的一種快捷指令。這種反射與真正的恐懼一樣，會讓我們躲避、迴避。正是因為這一原因，“我們很多所謂的恐懼反應，實際上都是對恐懼的恐懼”這種說法是相當精確的。
When we let go of our notion of fear as the welling up of evil forces within us，and begin to see fear and its companion emotions as information, we can think about them consciously. And the more clearly and calmly we can articulate the origins of the fear, the less our fears will frighten us and control us.
當我們不再將恐懼視為體內洶湧而起的邪惡力量，而是將恐懼以及其伴隨情緒視為一種“信息”，我們就能夠更清醒地去思考它們。我們越能夠清楚冷靜地闡述恐懼的來源，恐懼的可怕程度和控制力就會越低。
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