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By Nicky Cohen
What is your fear? Everyone is afraid of something, or someone, and people often struggle to cope with it. Specifically, people can be afraid of a bully that often torments them or an animal like a spider. My biggest fear is the future because it is always uncertain. No matter how hard a person tries, no future is set in stone. All it takes is one wrong choice or moment to ruin someone’s life. I can plan and prepare for what might happen but I do not have full control over my future. My three concerns for the future are letting my hard work go to waste, being a bad parent, and how my children will turn out.
Letting all my hard work in school and sports go to waste is one of my biggest fears. I have always tried hard to get the best grades possible and excel in whatever class I take. Furthermore, I have encountered many struggles throughout the years and I take pride in being able to endure the challenges. However, I fear that all this will go to waste in the future. One wrong move in college or in life can permanently scar my future. Even though one wrong action does not make it impossible to succeed, it limits my opportunities in the future. For example, being arrested by the police is something that is always on someone’s permanent record and you can’t take it off. I constantly hear stories of celebrities or kids with high athletic talent who have their futures ruined by one moment. Earlier this year, Salisbury had a speaker named Kevin Pierce, a prominent snowboarder that was in route to be the next big star of the sport. However, one near-death experience severely damaged his brain and he cannot do professional snowboarding anymore. Kevin has accomplished a lot since his fall, he started a program to help other athletes who have major accidents and still gets involved in extreme snowboarding events as a commentator. Although he has achieved success, he constantly talked about his desire to snowboard again. His major head trauma makes it impossible for him to become the best snowboarder in the world.
The biggest fear I have about the future is being a bad father and husband.
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The biggest fear I have about the future is being a bad father and husband. I grew up in an affluent family, and I have been fortunate to do all the things I want to do. However, my family is far from perfect. Throughout my high school career, my parents have been going through a horrible divorce that has drastically separated my family. Although my siblings and I get along great, my relationship with my father and other family members has been broken. Because of my parents’ divorce, I have barely met any of my cousins and I was hardly ever able to see my grandparents.
My fear is that I will not be able to take care of my family properly because I had barely any experience of a proper holiday celebration or family event. Specifically, I want to give my children a normal life filled with family events and connections that make them happy. I want them to look forward to family dinners and events so that they feel their house is an open place to talk and communicate. I am also afraid of not being able to financially support all my children’s needs and desires. I don’t want to say, “no you cannot try out for hockey” because I lack the sufficient funds to buy the equipment.
My last fear of the future is becoming a bad husband. I want to be a husband that will help his wife through hard times and be a role model for my children. I want my children to feel safe at home and not afraid to bring friends over because of our current family situation.
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Although it is uncertain that I will even have children, one of my biggest fears is how my children’s life will be. Specifically, I am not sure if they will be born with the same learning disabilities as myself: dyslexia and attention deficit hyperactive disorder (ADHD). Over the years, I have grown accustomed to handling my disabilities and they hardly ever restrict me from doing what I want to do today. However, I do remember a time that I struggled to cope with these disabilities. Before entering high school, I was the slowest reader in my classes and often wrote poor quality essays. It took years of extra help and a special school for me to catch up and excel in English. I remember feeling different and inferior to others because I had to take special tutoring classes while everyone else in my grade was taking a foreign language. I don’t want my kids to go through the same thing because it took a lot of extra work and struggling just to become normal. Even today I struggle with foreign languages which further isolates me from others. I fear with similar disabilities my children will have to struggle through life and school the same I did.
The future can never be accurately predicted. I fear my future because I will be unable to control it; I will not dictate my future in the workforce or for my family. I was not this afraid of the future until the college process. There are many factors that colleges consider determining whether you should go to their school. A person might have the best academic record but if they fail to do extracurricular and other activities they will not get into the best colleges. I was unsure about most of my college decisions and often surprised on the schools I got rejected, waitlisted, and accepted to. This process revealed to me how uncertain and surprising the future can be which led to my phobia.
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Photo credit: Getty Images
This is true especially when the wealthy elite shredded the social contract in America for the last 37 years. It would be interesting to hear kids’ stories from about their fear of the future due to the Great Depression.
This is all very solid and true. I would imagine most everyone has this fear of the unknown. It’s part of the human experience. Uncertainty is also what makes a horrible situation bearable because we know everything is tenuous and temporary. That knowing can give one hope in the darkness: “This too shall pass”.