Video: Neuroscientists have actually shown that human beings are hard-wired to be optimists. Maybe that’s why we think of fear being of a danger in itself; maybe that’s why we say things sometimes like “Don’t worry” or “Don’t panic”. Fear is something we like to conquer, it’s something we fight. Maybe it can be useful to us.
Imagine you’re a shipwrecked sailor adrift in the enormous Pacific. You can choose one of three directions and save yourself and your shipmates — but each choice comes with a fearful consequence too. How do you choose? In telling the story of the whaleship Essex, novelist Karen Thompson Walker shows how fear propels imagination, as it forces us to imagine the possible futures and how to cope with them.

Video Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwgWkUIm9Gc