The Art of Fear

Fear is a human emotion that paints itself across the mind. It’s interesting how fear can control our actions, much like a person painting on paper every stroke drawn for a reason. People often believe fear is something they can control, but fear is more like ink. Once a drop hits the paper, it spreads.

I stared at my math quiz, the quiz I had convinced myself I understood the day before. I flipped through the pages one by one. Every problem felt like a battle. I skipped questions until I reached the end. Fear rose from my gut to my hands. My fingers grew cold as I tried to think, but all my mind could focus on was failing. I imagined how in the future there will be problems even harder

than the ones in front of me.

I told myself to calm down as I glanced at the clock. With five minutes left, I wrote down everything I knew about all the equations and tried to piece them together. I shook as I searched the room for some kind of clue. The bell rang, but I still had a problem left. I kept writing until the last second, trying to beat the clock. Finally, I handed in my paper. I gave my teacher a smile, pretending I hadn’t just completely destroyed my grade.

After class, I went to the bathroom and cried, crying because I thought I understood, because I hadn’t worked hard enough, and because I felt like a failure. Later that night, I thought about what I could have done differently.

When I got the quiz back, I had received a D. When all you can think about is the lowest point, even that feels like a prize. I talked to my teacher about what went wrong. We realized that I had answered some questions correctly, but my work was hard to follow because the page was so messy. Looking at the quiz again, I understood that I couldn’t change that grade but I could change what came next. I have beaten the ink, not by erasing it, but by splashing my tears onto

the page to dilute the pigment . The fear of failure can make you fail at things you are capable of succeeding in. I realized that even when you know you didn’t do well, you can’t keep letting fear control you. Fear is threatened by people who accept their mistakes and try to fix them instead of worrying and doing nothing.