Phobias that stymie writers
What fears are keeping you from doing your best work?
William Shakespeare was reportedly afraid of dogs. Ray Bradbury had a fear of flying. Hans Christian Anderson was terrified of being buried alive. Stephen King’s list of fears include spiders, closed-in spaces and writer’s block.
Yet these phobias didn’t stop these authors from writing. After all, “You have to be a little nuts to be a writer,” King once said.
Let’s take a look at the types of fears that could impede your progress as a writer. You may not get very far if you don’t confront these phobias.
(Terms from Oxford Dictionaries, Phobialist.com and Fearof.net.)
- Ataxaphobia — fear of disorder or untidiness
- Atelophobia — fear of imperfection
- Atychiphobia — fear of failure
- Bibliophobia — fear of books
- Chronophobia — fear of the passage of time or the future
- Cyberphobia — fear of computers or working on computers
- Doxophobia — fear of receiving praise
- Enissophobia — fear of criticism
- Epistolophobia — fear of correspondence
- Graphophobia — fear of handwriting
- Hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia — fear of long words (also sesquipedalophobia)
- Katagelophobia — fear of ridicule
- Logophobia — fear of words
- Metrophobia — fear of poetry
- Onomatophobia — fear of a particular word or name (also nomatophobia)
- Papyrophobia — fear of paper
- Peladophobia — fear of going bald
- Scriptophobia — fear of writing in public
These types of fears usually originate “from a negative experience in one’s past,” according to the website Fearof.net. “Apart from technicalities, many Scriptophobes are also afraid of fear of rejection, fear of ridicule or the fear of embarrassing themselves or fear of being criticized, etc. A student might have been rebuked or laughed at owing to something s/he has written or even for their handwriting.”
How would you advise writers to overcome their phobias, PR Daily readers?
This post was first published on Ragan Communications PR Daily.
