Credit: Gemini.Google.com
Friggatriskaidekaphobiaafflicts millions of people when Fridays fall on the 13th day of a calendar month. These Friday-the-13ths, like today, happen justy1 to 3 times in each of our solar laps.
I am a self-proclaimed scaredy-cat. So I don’t like or watch Jason Voorhees attack people at summer camp, or view Freddy Krueger scissoring folks on Elm Street…
Superstition
Like many notable days in our zany world, including tomorrow’s Valentine’s Day, the rest of the story about their origins is fascinating.
Our Greek word origin comes from triskaideka, meaning 13, and phobia, meaning “fear”.
Irrational, intense fear of the number 13, particularly when it lands on a Friday, started with Christian traditions about a 13th guest at Christ’s Last Supper. Good Friday wasn’t all that good for three people crucified on a Friday, was it?
Not to be outdone, Scandinavian mythology asserts that a trickster named Lodi showed up as guest #13 at a party before bad things happened to good people. This was definitely not a case of wintry hygge!
This superstition causes avoidance of the “baker’s dozen” floor number in buildings like Hilton hotels, shown on this elevator panel here:
Some commercial airline flights skip row 13, and our daily lives can be impacted financially or mentally. Wedding planners tend to avoid Friday the 13th, and some frigga-fearful folks will not fly on Friday the 13th.
As the lyrics of a classic song by Stevie Wonder go, seven years of bad luck for things you don’t understand can become the way.
What would Emerson share?
You may recall that I share written pearls from a forbear of mine, Ralph Waldo Emerson. Well, my great-great-great uncle shared that we should “break through cobwebs of fear“. Sounds appealing – yes?
I offer yet another Frosty acronym for you to ponder:
False
Expectations
Appearing
Real.
This beckons the question, “What about you, Koach Dave?”
My mini-fears?
I get white-knuckled and knee-buckled when I am at a height where I can see over the edge like a restraining rail at the Empire State Building’s observation deck, or see clear to the ground or waterline – like walking on the “catwalks” from the flight deck of an aircraft carrier.
An episodic dream in my REM sleep is that I miss flights or classes. I have read that “missing movement” is a common dream and fear of sorts.
One Newsweek report offered that “Planes take off, and rise higher and higher and take you places, so the dreams of missing a plane likely represent the pressure to accomplish something that will ‘take off’ and help you rise in your career or reach a high goal before it is too late.”
Could it be a Frosty case of FOMO, or that Fear of missing out?
And/or is it my quest to promote the big KAHUNA movement to Keep America’s Healthspan UNAbated?
I sense that these answers are YES.
Dream on, and believe in achieving. Forego Friggatriskaidekaphobiaand work your way through cobwebs of false expectations as I do.
#wellpastforty #stronghtosave
#bigkahuna, #healthitude, #strongtosave, #wellpastforty, Healthitude
