Sarah Prohens

ENG 160

Ms. Boyle

10/25/21

The balance between courage and fear is tricky and not many people can balance. There is a constant imbalance when dealing with fear and courage like creating a courageous dream like becoming an astronaut or rocket scientist. However with no courage there is little that a person could do without having the strength in themselves or finding the willpower to continue on with the career they want to pursue. Finding a balance between the two creates a constant struggle for power which can either let yourself chase and achieve your dreams or fail with doubt because you let fear take over. Having too much courage could lead to foolish actions and a pride which would be unrealistic. With too much fear, no dreams and accomplishments could get done and would persuade you to settle for less than what you are capable of. Finding the balance in between the two is where the magic lies and opportunities open where dreams could be fulfilled. Finding the balance between fear and courage is not an easy one and it’s a pressing matter that people deal with everyday.

Yara E. Yar Khan’s ted talk discusses balance and the beautiful magic that lies in the balance of fear and courage. Her story discusses the hard truths on not letting fear control your actions and not letting your courage get to you. The empowering message in her discussion creates a feeling of hope that dreams and ambitions are reachable but you must have the courage to continue with difficult tasks and use fear to ground yourself and bring yourself back to reality. In the beginning of her ted talk she mentions with no fear everyone would do childish actions like pursuing being an astronaut or evil scientist. For Yara, finding a balance of fear and courage was especially difficult for her, including the fact that she had become disabled with HIBM and hid her chronic illness from many people. Although she was disabled and had little to no function in her legs, she dreamed of going on adventures and seeing the world. She embarked on a twelve day exhibition in the Grand Canyon and trained for almost four years to become fully capable of fulfilling her dreams of adventure. For twelve days she rode horseback down five thousand feet of terrain downhill with many complications along the way, one being the fear of heights which heightens the fear of scaling down a giant cliff. When at the bottom, she and her team white water rafted along the Colorado rapids to reach the end of the canyon, which they successfully accomplished. In all of the years tourists had been attracted to the Grand Canyon, only 1% out of five million travelers make it to the bottom successfully, and Yara who has little function in her legs, took her dream and made it a reality. In four years, she tossed back and forth from the fear and courage of learning how to ride a horse and intense white water rafting to complete her grand journey down the grand canyon. “My deepest fear can somehow manifest a mirrored response of equil courage”. Her story speaks to many people because it shows how possible the impossible really is. By taking one of the riskiest, dangerous, and terrifying moments for many peoples lives, she took her fear and ignored it, and through that response found courage from how well she was doing it and how strongly she felt to go through with the adventure.

Fear is one of the most important human responses and can even help us learn and grow. Learning through fear creates a neurological response to not do what causes fear and discomfort. For example, as a kid who doesn’t understand the way the world works, might get attracted to a red hot burner on a stove and be enticed to touch the burners. However when they learn and see that the burners are hot, they respond with fear and ultimately decide to not touch the burners again since they are too scared to burn themselves a second time. Your fight, flight, or freeze response is very important in controlling the fear in many people’s lives. Many when faced with fear will simply ignore it and try to ignore what is causing the discomfort however when pushing through that fear, you can conquer what you did wrong, or couldn’t do the first time.

The fight between fear and courage is something that many people face daily and have a constant struggle with. In Yara e. Yar Khan’s ted talk discusses how she faced her fears and conquered one of her hardest challenges of going on an outdoor adventure in the Grand Canyon disabled. Her story speaks to many people in a hopeful manner that through fear you can find courage. She explains that turning your fear into courage is a difficult balance to learn and finding that balance can lead to extraordinary and magical opportunities. In many instances in my life I find the struggle with balancing out the two. Being an art student at Suny New Paltz, creates massive fear in me that one day I won’t be successful and have less opportunities as my peers. While in the art department is an amazing accomplishment and for many hard to do, there is a lot of criticism and unknowing of what certain outcomes could be. Feeling and taking a risk like this is one that not many people are willing to take and many feel as if it is betting on their future. I feel a lot of fear going into the art department, especially by being a photographer in foundations classes where all students are skilled at different things. Finding the courage to stay in the art department is challenging for me because being out of place in my classes causes a big factor in choosing my major. Integrity can unwittingly turn into moral suffering.

https://web.p.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=5&sid=4a13ca81-a9ef4185-a73c-29b72e75c1bf%40redis

https://www.ted.com/talks/cara_e_yar_khan_the_beautiful_balance_between_courage_and_fea r?referrer=playlist-how_fearless_women_lead#t-597349