Fear can be based on real dangers or past experiences, but what happens when it isn't?
What happens when fear goes beyond "healthy level of caution" to "abject terror"?
Sometimes labeled as phobias, those irrational fears can still be crippling.
Redditor An_Anxious_Mess_Idk asked:
"What is one fear you have that would be considered stupid by most people?"
Never See It Coming
"I’m scared that when I’m driving anywhere late at night and the roads are clear I’ll be struck by one of those land speed record vehicles."
"I’d be afraid it would come out of nowhere and I wouldn’t see it coming."
- gameofthrones_addict
"I always had this fear (a vehicle coming out of nowhere) when crossing streets as a kid. Suburban streets, mind you..."
- unknown-permutation
"Yeah pretty much, just middle of nowhere you don’t always see everything…"
"I know it wouldn’t happen. So I know it’s an irrational fear."
- gameofthrones_addict
Detached
"Becoming detached on a space walk and drifting off into the void."
"I am not an astronaut, for clarity."
- LoneKharnivore
GiphyWooly Bully
"Cotton balls."
- DatDude999
"I can't touch cotton wool or anything of that texture. It gives me the chills and the jitters."
"My wife thinks I'm an idiot."
- cloudstrifeuk
"Me too. Everyone always tries messing with me by showing me them or chasing me because I actually run as soon as I see them!"
- AdministrativeCap998
"It's called Sidonglobophobia. The sounds and the static they make when you touch them makes me shake."
- DatDude999
Hiisssss
"Toilet snakes. Thanks, Stephen King."
- Beesareourcousins
"Wife found a 5 foot long black snake in her mom’s washer. She thought it was some sort of gasket that fell in the tub at first….reached for it and it moved."
"Our house is 500 feet away, heard her scream from the front porch."
"Mother-in-law’s house was built 1890 or so. Not very well sealed up anymore."
- tatpig
"Omg. I found a 3-4 foot snake in my hamper once."
"I heard what I THOUGHT was like, a soda bottle slowly letting out fizz, and when I went to investigate, it was A F'KING SNAKE hissing."
"Carried the whole thing, dirty clothes and all, out to the driveway and kicked it over so the snake would slither away."
"I had bombed for spiders the day before. I had opened all the windows and doors for several hours to air the house out. I’m guessing he snuck in then."
"I was ready to burn the place to the ground after that. 😳"
- SamSepiol-ER28_0652
GiphyTake A Seat
"I can't sleep with my desk chair facing my bed."
"I have to get up, turn on a light, face it away from me, and then I can go back to bed."
"I get irrationally afraid that I'm going to turn over or blink and look at it and someone is going to be sitting in it watching me sleep."
"No idea where that fear came from."
- lockehearte
Deep Blue
"Swimming in a lake, or in the ocean without being able to see the bottom."
"I was bit/cut by something once and since then it's a fear I just can't control.
"I will still go and do it though because I hate it when people tell me what to do. Even when that's myself."
- Personality4Hire
"Thank god water shoes were invented or I’d never go in the ocean or lake again."
"I stepped on a horseshoe crab and it freaked me out so bad I can’t go into those bodies of water unless I have shoes on."
- JRich61
"We had a little sand shark swimming by us one trip to the ocean."
"Haven’t been able to get past ankle deep since. It’s been probably closer to 14 years ago now."
- Negative_Shake1478
GiphyReflection
"Fear of mirrors."
"Creepy things they are."
- The_dead_are_rising
"I'm specifically scared of mirrors in the dark, or any reflective surface."
"I'm convinced that if I look at it, I'm gonna see something horrible standing behind me."
- Kotori425
"Same but I’m not scared of seeing something behind me."
"I’m scared of seeing something in it that could possibly reach or step out."
"Mirrors in the dark feel like a door to another dimension to me and I have no idea why."
- christopharo
"My worst nightmare is getting up at night to go to the bathroom, going past my mirror and I'll see myself in the mirror but the me in the mirror does something different than me..."
"It's that bad that I'll walk past my mirror with my eyes closed at night."
- JenJMLC
Unblinking Eyes
"DEAD FISH."
"UGLY MOTHERF'KERS."
"UNBLINKING EYES ALWAYS STARING"
- Flat_Bodybuilder_175
"Hate to break it to you, but fish don’t blink when they’re alive either."
- Itsafinelife
"You're... not wrong. By the law of my own phobia, I now have a fear of living fish too."
- Flat_Bodybuilder_175
"The sharks got your back bro, they wink."
- salinase
discovery eye roll GIF by Shark WeekGiphyMothra Is A Monster
"Moths."
"I get teased all the times about it and my reasons and people try to trick me in to liking them or admitting it's fake.
"Apparently being scared of spiders is ok (I like spiders) but terrified of moths is weird because I like butterflies and 'they are the same thing'."
- kyaria17
That Moth Fear Is Justified
"May 2020, my husband and I took off on a road trip. Everything was mostly shut down but that’s fine, what we like to see and do are outdoor, nature things. We stopped at a state park in Oklahoma that had only partially opened that very day."
"We walked around for a bit, let the dog run around as we were the only ones there. Then I had to pee. Now I’m a chick and 'I’ve got to find somewhere to pee' is pretty much always happening or going to within half an hour."
"The usual state park bathroom places were one hole situations but in little concrete buildings….nice enough, I’ve used way worse."
"When we first opened the door a LOT of moths flew out. I’m not scared of moths but it was a LOT. So we let them fly away and I went in. I’m sitting there beside one of those large toilet roll things….the one foot diameter ones with the black cover and you pull the paper from under."
"Even as I gave the toilet paper a yank, a tiny part of my brain knew what would happen. A truly biblical number of moths burst out from the bottom of the paper roll when I pulled."
"I ran/hobbled with shorts pulled down and toilet paper in hand just screaming out of the bathroom. My husband all but dropped he was laughing so hard. My poor dog was sure I was being attacked and ran into the bathroom barking and growling."
"It was all hilarious in hindsight. But trying to explain to anyone how moths could make me run screaming is difficult to say the least."
- rebel1031
GiphyFor me?
June bugs.
June bugs crawl out of the ground in the summer because they're mini demons emerging from Hell. I cannot be convinced otherwise.
So what's your irrational fear?
Want to "know" more?
Sign up for the Knowable newsletter here.
Never miss another big, odd, funny or heartbreaking moment again.
Myths have been around for centuries. As soon as humans were able to tell stories, we have had mythology.
Now with technology advanced far beyond the writing on the cave wall, we can more easily spread around information as well as misinformation. Some of that information can even be harmful.
Misconceptions about mental health, pregnancy, or any number of things are reinforced by social media, movies, or even word of mouth. Sometimes that can really make someone angry if they are dealing with the consequences of that falsehood.
Redditor Indieriots asked:
"What common myth p*sses you off?"
These might make you just as upset.
Mislead by TV and movies.
"That you have to wait 24 hours to report a missing person. It is a myth perpetuated TV and movies for the sake of drama, but not true in real like at all."
- tschris
"In many cases police will give missing people some kind of 'waiting period' after having checked for possible, (obvious) dangers. In many cases, because a missing person happens quite often because people make spontaneous decisions."
"But if you're sure something is really wrong and have good reasoning, they will be searching tediously even after just an hour."
- deterministic_lynx
"Yup, especially with children, the elderly, and disabled folks, those first hours are crucial. If you haven't seen/heard from a loved one when you usually would, that alone is grounds for reporting. Some cops might not take it seriously, but it's critical that you push them to listen to you."
- hayleybeth7
"Something like 1500 people go missing every day in the US. But the reason that number is so high is that most missing persons cases should probably not have even been filed in the first place. Stuff like a teenager deciding to go to a party instead of coming home at night without telling their parents."
- caninehere
An old and incorrect phrase.
"'Lightning never strikes twice in the same place.'"
"In fact, it does - and frequently."
- Back2Bach
"Lightning rods would be incredibly useless otherwise."
- gigglefarting
Gum doesn't stick around that long.
"Gum does not stay in your stomach for 7 years. Sure, swallowing a lot of gum isn't great and can cause problems in your digestive system, but it only takes a day or two to pass."
- usually-suspect
"What's funny about that is when I was kid n heard it, I took it as a challenge to only sh*t pink blobs of gum seven years after. I was quite disappointed."
- maverickmain
"Same but with the 'a watermelon will grow in your stomach if you eat the seeds!' I thought I was a genius cause I'd never go hungry again with a watermelon forever growing in my guts! I ate so many seeds lmao."
- NefariousAquarius64
Breastfeeding doesn't replace contraception.
"You can't get pregnant if you're breastfeeding. It lowers your chances but not to zero."
- Damn_Canadian
"I, a mother of two children ages 7 and 8, 100% agree with you. Doesn't matter if your baby hasn't had anything but breastmilk. Doesn't matter if you haven't a normal cycle. All of those things they say. It doesn't matter. I promise you absolutely without a doubt CAN get pregnant while breastfeeding."
"Source: my dumba** with 2 kids 12 months apart."
- Signal_Skill9761
A misconception about mental health disorders.
"That bipolar means you are 'happy one minute and sad the next minute.' It's a disorder where you have episodes of depression and episodes of mania/hypomania. These episodes last weeks/months/years. There's nothing about emotional lability at all. That's an entirely different disorder."
- 292to137
"True that! Plus manic phases aren't always happy."
- Bebe_Bleau
"Hell yeah that's for sure. I've been going to my local DBSA support group weekly for years and it seems like it's not a happy thing like for most people. Hypomania can be, but mania doesn't seem to be."
- 292to137
"Corollary: Depression does not mean you are sad all the time or can't express happiness or joy. I can bawl my eyes out for 20 minutes for no reason, and still laugh at a dumb sitcom joke before crying again."
- Forceflow15
"In my experience, Depression is more about a great feeling of emptiness than a lot of sadness, crying etc."
- Vladimir_Putting
"That OCD is liking things to be extremely neat, tidy or organized."
- clumsyumbrella
"As someone with diagnosed OCD who lives in a house that is actually a disaster, yes lol."
- wickedflowers
"This! I didn't realize I had OCD because of this and because it often overlaps with other mental illnesses."
- CapriciousSalmon
Just trying to keep the kids busy.
"'You can tell a ladybug's age by counting it's spots.' Even as a kid this didn't make sense to me. Why tell your kid this? What's the point?"
- Lvcivs2311
"Because it made kids shut up and sit still long enough to count the spots of a loving moving ladybug. 5 min to a kid, blissful peace and quiet for the parents."
- girlwhoweighted
There's no way this is true.
"We only use 10% of our brain."
- WarriorOfTheWord
"Ah, yes. The logical thing to do when you try to survive is to evolve a bigger brain, just to not use it."
- YouTube-r
Hopefully this shed some light on these important (and trivial) myths that we've continued to pass down over the years.
Thank goodness we can google the real answers.
Want to "know" more?
Sign up for the Knowable newsletter here.
Never miss another big, odd, funny, or heartbreaking moment again.
We all feel a certain pressure to be above superstitious beliefs. There's a powerlessness within superstition that we'd rather avoid.
But what if we simply can't?
There are just some situations that people can't help but feel convince that something supernatural or otherworldly at play.
It may be due to an old bed time story or urban legend that they never could shake, or perhaps there is something about the dark that brings out the beliefs.
Whatever it is, plenty of Redditors had experiences to share.
Francucasteddaju asked, "People who aren't superstitious, what is something that still creeps you out/ you won't mess with?"
The Underworld
"The basement when the lights are off." -- rosekayleigh
"I don't believe in anything paranormal, spiritual, religious, etc. But sometimes the dark makes me feel so uneasy and on edge, even if it's a room I've just been in with the lights on, like a primal fear kind of thing."
"Which is super weird considering I'm a night owl." -- diosexual
Just Gotta Do It
"I don't know where these superstitions originated or how exactly they're supposed to work, because I live in the American south and we have a bunch of superstitions from both Europe and Africa, but..."
"Most people around here paint the roofs over their porches a specific shade of blue to ward off bad spirits. I also turn my shoes in two different directions after I take them off by the door."
"This supposedly confuses hags/haints/bad juju in general so it won't find you."
"I do this fully recognizing how ridiculous it is."
-- noregreddits
Regional Tales
"I grew up with stories of Bell Witch. As an adult, I don't believe any of it is real. But it was such a huge part of the culture I grew up with in Tennessee."
"We used to dare each other to call for her three times in front of a mirror in a dark room. None of my family or friends ever did it."
"My mom claimed she did it once, and ended up with scratches down her face. To this day, I don't have the balls to do it."
"I'm getting an eerie feeling just typing this out."
-- efluxr
Zip the Lips
"As a health care worker: Saying it's 'quiet' today."
"You just don't do it. If you say that, the rest of your shift is certainly not going to be quiet."
"Also, being on call overnight during a full moon is for some reason guaranteed to be your busiest call shift."
Irish Tales
"My grandma was Irish and she always told me if you hear music at night don't follow it." -- Bunnystrawbery
"Unless you're in a rave." -- stygyan
"For some reason Irish folklore just manages to creep me out so much more than all the Hollywood horror ghost stories." -- aloic
Never Again
"I was able to postpone a final I wasn't prepared for in college by telling my professor that my aunt died."
"My aunt ended up actually dying the day after from a brain aneurysm and her funeral was held on the same day as my make up final."
"It's 13 years later and I still regret that and don't f*** with that kind of sh** anymore. I'm not religious, nor am I superstitious, but that f***ed me up and it felt like I caused her death."
Avoid At All Costs
"Setting the volume to 44."
"I'm not superstitious but 4 sounds like the word for death in my mother tongue. I always go to 43 or 45. I keep having uncontrollable thoughts of getting into a car accident if I set the volume to 44 in my car."
"I know it makes no sense, aside from potentially inducing a self-fulfilling prophecy, but still."
-- Morbidhanson
Leave Things As They Are
"Totems/dolls/weird voodoo guardians. Look if you buy a car and it has like a doll or something in the glove box, dont remove that sh**."
"Second you do everything goes to hell."
"Found a tiki head in my barracks room, took it out, internet failed, power failed, ac failed. Put it back in after searching through a dumpster and everything works now."
Inherited Approaches
"I will never put a hat on a bed, even for a second. Or a couch for that matter. That's about the only superstition I've ever taken seriously, and I have no idea what it means, and only seen it in one other place, in a movie from the 80s. Drugstore Cowboy."
"But my dad told me once when I was a kid, kind of an off hand comment, but for some reason I've always taken it seriously and I even passed it on to my sons."
"My wife hates it lol."
-- Rowe0311
Steer Clear
"Both my parents are nonreligious, very pragmatic people, and I'm their creepy black sheep type daughter."
"For some reason having to do with a story from his teen years that my dad REFUSES to talk about (weird because he's a very talkative person), I was never allowed to have a ouija board."
"I've watched scary movies since I was little with my parents, they never cared about any of my darker interests, but that's where the line was."
"To this day I've never touched one and I've been out of the house for half a decade."
-- qabril27
Fair share
I am a nurse and saw my fair share of dead people (two as of yesterday) but I have a keen sense of "this person is gonna die today". Like sometimes I dreamt of my patient dying and the day after I learnt that he died at that exact time. I also had strange dreams such as one time (the one that creeped me out the most), I dreamt that I forgot to buy a birthday present for the girlfriend of my boyfriend's bff (a girl I met once and that I don't follow on any social media).
When I told him about my dream he laughed it off just to come back one hour later with an uneasy look on his face, and he showed me her fcb page. It was, indeed, her birthday. I had no way to know. It was awkward. These very specific dreams creep me out sometimes. And sometimes I feel in my guts that my patient will die, and... I rarely get mistaken. Like nearly never. I want to believe that it is from experience but I am indeed a young nurse.
I get that sense too sometimes! Although my sense is usually around silly things, pregnancies, or just random moments that are a little off putting to see in advance. It must be hard to have those moments with patients, but I think it shows your compassion too. You're "in tune"
Fae-ry Real
Fairy Rings or anything Fae related.
My cousin told me very firmly that all faerie stuff is all ridiculous, not real, and that the only reason he keeps a faerie fort on his property is that the government pays him to out of a heritage maintenance fund. He keeps injured cows in the ring because it helps them feel safe once he's separated them from the herd. He then goes on to tell me that his uncle, who lived down the street, bulldozed his faerie fort and then BAM! Cancer! And urged me never to mess with faerie forts.
I visited the for later on that day and left some whiskey for whatever may be there. My cousin signed the cross at me for protection, once I got back.
That song
Generally, I'm not superstitious, but when I got into a bad car accident a few years ago I developed some weird ones. I wouldn't wear my hair in a bun if I had to drive for quite a while since that was the hairstyle I was wearing the day of the accident and I have not listened to the song that I was listening to when I got hit.
Lefties
I never put my left shoe on first. I read that it was unlucky in some weird library book back in high school and it stuck. I also have clinically diagnosed OCD so maybe that has something to do with it...
Q
I work in a 911 center. The "Q" word is strictly taboo. Do I know it's nonsense? Yes. Have I heard people say it and then seen absolutely nothing happen? Yes. Will I ever say it while at work? Absolutely not. I won't even think the word. That's just tempting fate.
What's the q word tho
Quiet. As in, "It sure is quiet." Or any sentiment or statement that we are not busy. Because shortly thereafter the excrement will hit the fan.
T-bone
The number 13.
About six years ago, I had finally had enough of my stupid, specific superstition, and I finally decided to let my car stereo be at a volume of 13, since this seems to (infuriatingly) be the perfect volume on every electronic device.
About 10 minutes later, I get my custom ordered 2012 Wrangler Rubicon t-boned by an old man who ran a red light.
The number 13 is no longer welcome in my life. Never again.
Days are a changin'
Just talking about this with my coworker - I will not change a calendar early - just can't do it have to wait til the first day of the new month/year. No idea why....tried to look it up maybe bad luck?
Mocking the sharks
I don't let my son wear swimwear with sharks on it to swim in the ocean. It just seems like you're mocking sharks and if you got attacked by one it would seem like your own fault.
Lingering
That when someone dies their soul lingers for a few days in our realm. You have to tell them it's ok to leave or ask what unfinished business they have and help them out or else they won't leave to their final resting place.
I'm not too religious but grew up catholic, when my husband's grandpa died, two days later, two of the daughters of the deceased invited a lady who sees things when in prayer and is her friend. This was 4 years ago, the woman had cancer and already passed away. I was waiting for my ride but they invited me to pray while I waited. We were St Cesar's house.
The lady started a normal rosary but started saying that, let's call him Cesar, was still here, so the daughters told him "dad is ok to go, go find mom, we are ok.". The praying lady said he couldn't leave cause he was worried about the family business and some specific stuff about some money. There is no way the lady knew the specifics. It did shock me.
-c05u
Three-finger scratch and pranks
According to the customs my tribe follow, we also believe that the soul will linger on for few days after the death of the person. So we have a ceremony on the 11th or 13th day after their death to honor them and let them know that they can leave this realm safely. We cook their favorite dishes, pour their choicest drinks, and keep flowers in front of their photo. Apparently, they will make their presence felt by either scratching someone (a three-finger scratch), or emit a sweet-smelling fragrance, or play a prank. The younger the person who's dead, the higher are the chances of pranks being played.
I did not give it much thought until I witness two incidents. An uncle of mine was a chain smoker (who eventually died of a heart failure). On thé day of the ceremony, the entire house was smelling like cigarettes.
As if someone had lit a smoke and was walking around. Nobody else smoked in that house and all the linen and curtains from my uncle's room were put to wash.
The second incident was on the day of the ceremony of my aunt. She died after suffering a lot of emotional and mental turmoil caused by her son. So we knew that her soul was not gonna leave in peace. When we all sat down to drink, the entire table collapsed and the bottles broke. It might be a correlation and not causation, but it was weird as the table was sturdy and only a year old.
Want to "know" more? Never miss another big, odd, funny, or heartbreaking moment again. Sign up for the Knowable newsletter here.
People Share Which Superstitions Are So Ingrained In Society We Do Them Without A Second Thought
D Dipasupil / Contributor via Getty Images
Everyone is at least a bit superstitious. The particulars might differ depending on where you grew up, but all human cultures have Superstitions of one sort or another.
Reddit user u/Noerdy asked:
10.
The Farmers' Almanac.
Its never been through peer review. It supposedly uses secret equations and the positions of celestial bodies (astrology anyone?) to predict weather.
"But they're over 80% accurate!"
That number is self reported using standards they establish.
9.
Telling someone "God Bless You" when they sneeze.
Yet, for every other bodily function, the offender says 'excuse me'. Its so weird.
8.
Pretty sure death will come to me if I ever open an umbrella indoors. And when I see someone do it, I automatically wince because I know their life force is about to be taken from them.
I pissed my mother off to no end because I once asked her if she thought umbrella factories were all outdoors, or if they just had an unusually high turnover due to deaths in the family. She was very superstitious and not at all amused.
7.
Nurses will murder people who say a shift is quiet. We aren't allowed to say the q word. (I don't believe it, but it's fun to give each other hell about saying it or getting to blame someone when sh*t hits the fan.)
Nurses are ridiculously superstitious (generalization, but I've met so many superstitious nurses)
So many believe in ghosts, spirits, deities, luck, ect...
6.
That if you've had a bad run like at the casino, you're 'due' for a good run. Not how probability or binomial distribution works.
The same goes for investing. People won't sell a stock they lost money on because they feel it "owes" them something. But if you look at your portfolio as a point in time, you sell the ones that aren't doing well and buy ones that are a better investment.
5.
Just in time for the holidays, christmas colors are red, green, and white. Blood on snow to bring back the green plants after winter. Pagan tradition of blood sacrifice to ensure spring would come back each year.
3.
Not to swallow gum. It’s perfectly safe to and passes just as fast as anything else, but instead an old superstition about it being stuck in our digestive tract causes people to litter the stuff everywhere.
2.
Telling someone not to just say that something will go well because you don't want to jinx it.
Break a leg!
Spent the entire autumn 2017 rehearsing for a major role. The premiere is a hit, performances come and go, and we retire for the year to continue in January.
What happens on Christmas Eve? Of course I break my bloody leg.
(ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻
1.
GiphyThat a full moon brings out the crazies. I think this is mostly confirmation bias.
Here's one source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-sc...