Personal phobias #1 - Fear of failure

Degree of success is what my life is measured by. It is similar to life's 'report card'. One gets judged, marked, assessed and 'worthed' based on achievements. I see an increasing number of child proteges in academia, sport and creative arts. So that must make the 'fear of failure' the most important and deep-seated emotional phobia.
This fear could have stemmed from many sources. High-success-demanding parents/ competitive-society while growing up. Humiliating experiences suffered from a past failure.
The results of this kind of fear is mainly a total paralysis of the body and mind. The nervous system, courtesy the ever-paranoid brain, neatly archives a database of failed experiences and associated humiliation which it can bring back to the forefront of the human mind when in a decision-making or outcome-analysing mode. Most 'mortal fearers' often look at the worthlessness of the impending failure and accompanying embarassment and opt to keep safe. This avoidance of chance-taking, they rationalise, will reduce their chances of potentially slipping into an abyss of failure and being buried by further failures!
Argh!

The License Raj, as Amit Varma writes, is a system tailored to be inefficient. Beaurocracy and red-tapism have seeped into our way of life. Varna Sriraman recalls a horrifying day in the middle of one of the most cosmopolitan Indian cities. Accidents are not uncommon elsewhere in the world. But the crisis managements systems in place are effecient and trained to cope with such situations.
A trauma centre at a major hospital must see numerous accident-related cases everyday. The system in place to tackle with emergencies is appalling, as Varna finds out. The difference between saving someone's life and not happens to be that short period of time.
But this accident has turned into a money-making scheme for a corrupt police official and an inefficient, beaurocratic hospital (not to mention the autodriver).

Universal truth #1
What goes up must come down.

If you think you are having too good a day to be true, you are probably right! Your perfect day will self-disintegrate like one of those mission-for-spy gadgets, only a lot slower and painfully.

Find what you love

-read these words in a recent speech given by Steve Jobs. Having always sought to find what I love, I can personally testify how fruitless and frustrating this search could possibly be to some of us. Not even Google has helped.
With me, at times it's been a case of 'love what you find'. I think that suits me (and other lazy, safe-keeping 20 somethings). But that doesn't change the fact that this must be my greatest fear. Fear of not finding what you love; of meandering through life rather meaninglessly.

Fear. Sometimes fear stops you from finding what you love. Fear of failure; of commitment; and of pain. I'm not alone and that's comforting, in thought atleast. Fear stems from pre-judiced notions of life. Fear builds from past experiences. There's many of us going through life with a fear of living. On few occasions, I can claim to have truly lived. Been happy. Happiest. But I fear never being that happy again. How crippling?

Measure of happiness

The irony of discussing aspects of happiness over beers - which I still regard as depressants - is interesting. Central to the conversation with SA and IC was whether one could be socio-economically 'poor' and still be happy. Whether someone could work a ungratefully-paying 'clerical' job, come home to 'lower-middle-class' household, battle for basic commodities like clean water and still take pleasures from other aspects of life..ie find happiness. I was of the opinion that this could very well be possible as some of my happiness derived from events that required/neccesiated very little or no monetary resources (money/credit card). But I will be the first to admit that my argument is not qualified enough, as I have always had access to monetary resources and my point of view can not be considered middle-class.
But then, I can not assume that I or my friends have found more happiness than someone who is not as socio-economically privilleged. So, is happiness a social construct? A feel-good factor? A state of mind? A real state of mind? Can it be measured? What would the parameters be? Most of the times, I have found happiness to be relative and an illusion.
The crux of my argument was also that socio-economic status may contribute to happiness, but the two are not correlated. Someone who owns a motorbike may think that a car would bring happiness; whereas one who rides a pushbike may regard happiness as owning a motorbike. IC quipped 'A zen monk could wander with no material possesions and still be happy/content/etc'. So it is relative. And if it is a state of mind, then you can set your own parameters.

The discussion sparked an interest within me to understand what everyone else regards as happiness and a desire to find out if those living below the 'poverty threshold' are indeed happy.