Rob Dial Discusses the Greatest Fear People Have

Podcaster Rob Dial, who calls himself a personal development coach, on one of his shows last week discussed what he discovers is one of the biggest fears people have: spending time alone with themselves without outside stimulation.  When he began the program and asked the listening audience what they thought the number one fear was, I was certain he would say "public speaking" since that is the one thing that...while not necessarily terrifying me, does cause a strong negative reaction.  But no, according to Dial's source, it's just sitting by yourself and doing nothing.  He came up with a survey result where 30% of the women respondents and 60% of the men answered that they would prefer to be administered a moderately strong electric shock than to be subjected to only 15 minutes of quiet time.  To me these results are nothing less than bizarre, yet upon further reflection it does make a kind of perverse sense.  Many if not most of us walk around nowadays with a ready-made mental stimulation device, the smartphone, that is ready to instantly fill in any gaps in our busy days and eliminate the need to quietly sit and get in touch with our own feelings.  Dial pointed out that this aversion to doing nothing is probably the main reason so many have trouble with meditation, which gets the reputation for insisting that those doing it eliminate their thoughts when, in truth, the point of it all is to let different thoughts arise in the atmosphere of stillness and non-distraction and deal with them without covering them up...that's probably what causes the biggest fear of being alone and still.  From my experiences it's clear that folks are generally stimulation addicts, which to me skews the kind of relationship they seek in favor of gossip and drama, two areas that I usually find loathsome.  The same people also have a distinct sensitivity to situations they find boring and often vehemently complain whenever they experience boredom: Must! Have! Stimulation! As for me, I am totally cool being quiet and still...and boring...and not just for 15 minutes: doesn't scare me one bit...