Fearless – Invisibilia Podcast Review
Review of Invisibilia’s second episode, “Fearless.” This week, the hosts talked about nothing but fear.
Invisibilia’s second episode “Fearless” was all about fear. It could have been about unheard of acts of bravery, or people’s unique survival stories.
Instead the hosts, Lulu Miller and Alix Spiegel take an analytical approach.
They look at how fear develops. They look at two ways to overcome fear. And they look at someone who is literally fearless.
I don’t mean “fearless” in the typical sense. No. There is a woman who cannot feel fear. How? It’s called Urbach-Wiethe Disease. It caused the areas of her brain responsible for fear to calcify. With those sections out of commission, there was nothing telling her to be afraid.
For safety concerns, the show withheld her personal information. They called her “SM” during the segment. They also asked her to describe what fear felt like. She couldn’t do it.
Imagining a life without fear is hard for any of us to wrap our mind around. A lot of us are scared of something. For the rest of us to be fearless, we have to figure out a way overcome those fears. And that’s the focus for this show’s second half.
Since the entire podcast is only an hour long, Miller and Spiegel only talk about two techniques for overcoming fears. Understanding why you’re afraid and will yourself not to be, or repetitive exposure to the fears.
These two stories are more lighthearted and fun. Both had moments where I laughed out loud. A stark contrast to the woman who cannot feel fear.
Invisibilia’s second episode is entertaining. The only negative thing was the opening story didn’t grab my attention. That’s fine, the other three segments make up that slack. Fearless comes close, but doesn’t pass the bar set by the show’s first episode.
