What over amplifies our fears?
“Wow look at the size of that thing!” exclaimed the medical intern as he pressed his pudgy face closer to the brain scan.
“You mean the long centipede-like shadow that is coiled around patient #531’s brain?”
“Yes, Doctor! I have never seen something like that before! What is it?”
“It is a deceptipede. It starts off as a small harmless spore that is exhaled when a person breathes out a lie. Those who are unfortunate enough to allow it to incubate in their minds for too long, will cause it to hatch. It then infests your amygdala and distorts your view of reality. The longer this parasite stays in your mind, the more it amplifies your fears towards very specific triggers.”
“Is that why this lady is so afraid of being single?” pondered the medical intern as he looked sheepishly at her charts.
“Precisely” replied the doctor.
“Soooo… do we kill this sucker with antibiotics? Zap it with some radiation? Or do we dissect it out the old-fashion way?” questioned the giddy intern as he prematurely reaches for his surgical tools.
But before his sausage-like fingers could clasp the cold metal hilt of the scalpel, the attending doctor slapped it away.
“None of those treatments work!” barked the doctor. “The deceptipede has infested her mind for so many years. It has now become a part of her core mindset. The only way we can kill this parasite is to revisit her childhood and capture that original spore-infested lie.”
And with a flick of a switch, the room began to pulse with a bright and blinding light. All the electrodes that were connecting the doctor and his intern to the unconscious patient began to buzz and hum with electricity. In an instant, they were transported back to the night, where patient #531 lay crying under her bed covers. Her mother had just falsely blamed her for her parent’s destructive divorce.
Many of the crippling fears we struggle with in the present, may actually have their roots deeply interwoven in lies we naively believed in the past.
