Thinking and Existence

How Fear Shapes Perception and Reality

At the beginning of 2025, I underwent a Computed Tomography (CT) scan of my brain. The results revealed no abnormalities that could cause the Pulsatile Tinnitus (PT) symptoms that have plagued me for the last year.

Until that moment, I was convinced that I had something dire—perhaps a tumour, brain cancer, or thinning of the arteries near my ears, one possible cause of PT. The thought of these possibilities weighed heavily on me, embedding itself into my beliefs, shaping my sensations, and dictating my perception of reality.

Before the scan, my days were filled with persistent headaches, earaches, and visual disturbances—flashes of light, floating spots, and an eerie, almost tangible sensation of ants crawling through my brain. Yet, upon hearing the reassuring verdict from my doctor, (no abnormalities) those symptoms vanished. The marching ants retreated, the spots dissolved, and the pain subsided. While the PT persists, it’s in a diminished form. I’ve since discovered it is caused by arthritis in my neck.

How could my brain trick me into believing the worst?

Was it my thinking, my fixation on a feared outcome that created these symptoms? If so, what does that imply about the relationship between thought and bodily experience? If my mental distress wasn't caused by a physical issue, what was it? Without a clear medical reason, my mind jumped in to fill the gap with baseless conclusions.

Irrational thinking was the reason for my suffering. But where did that come from? Was it from what I found on the internet?

In an era where information and misinformation is everywhere, could it be the online medical forums I visited, the YouTube videos I watched, or the endless streams of anecdotal “medical” experiences on chat forums that have shaped my perception of this illness? Did I absorb only what aligned with my fears or did the thoughts of another’s bad advice subvert my mind? Yes, it started out as uncertainty then grew into anxiety through my lack of knowledge, so, I tried searching for answers online.

When faced with an informational void, fear rushed in to bridge the gap. But if so, why does fear hold such dominion over reason, even over empirical evidence? Could it be an evolutionary leftover, a defence mechanism malfunctioning in a world of vague dangers? Who or what is it that wields this influence over my thoughts, planting seeds of doubt and dread? More importantly, why does fear, even when irrational, so often triumph over knowledge?

It appears I am of two minds—or perhaps my brain operates in two distinct modes of thought. In his 1997 book, The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, Julian Jaynes suggests that human consciousness functions as a bicameral system, divided into a commanding voice and a listening self. Across millennia, mythology, scientific progress, and cultural evolution may have woven layers of complexity into our cognition, forming what now appears as an internal dialogue, or conflict.

My experience suggests this to be correct. One part of my brain triggered distress, causing pain and anxiety, but another part used the evidence to eliminate those false beliefs. It is as though my consciousness wavered between fear and reason, and never certain of what is right.

Our perception of reality is shaped by our thoughts, even though our thoughts might not always reflect what is real. If my mind can fabricate suffering in the absence of a physical reason, then to what extent are my experiences self-generated? How much of what I believe to be the truth is merely a mirage created by fear, rather than an objective reality?

The answer is a lot, and my brain does it all the time.

Fear, it seems, overrides my senses, distorting my reality under the appearance of protection. Yet in attempting to shield me, it inflicts harm, increasing my suffering rather than alleviating it. It assumes the role of both guardian and tormentor, a paradox that calls into question its evolutionary value. If fear is meant to be a protector, why does it so often become an enemy?

Having seen firsthand the power of fear to shape and distort my reality, I am reminded of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s assertion: "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." Moving forward, I will use this thinking to shield against the unverified, the undiagnosed, and the unproven.

When doubts creep in and imagined threats appear, I know sometimes that my thinking does not align with my existence. But from now on, I will remind myself that not everything I feel is real, and not everything I fear is worth my attention.