Bangalore: Are you afraid of something or someone? If yes, then you have phobia/phobias. One of the French proverbs says “He, who fears to suffer, suffers from fear.”  Unfortunately, many of us have phobias which overrule us sometimes. Fear of noise (Acousticophobia), fear of heights (Acrophobia), fear of disorder or untidiness (Ataxophobia), fear of imperfection (Atelophobia), fear of failure or defeat (Kakorrhaphiophobia), fear of writing or handwriting (Graphophobia), fear of flying (Aviophobia), fear of height (Hypsiphobia) are some common kind of phobias associated with most of the people.

Phobias are just anxiety disorder until it becomes as a long-lasting and irrational fear. One of the leading providers of health information services, WebMD describes phobia as "a lasting and unreasonable fear caused by the presence or thought of a specific object or situation that usually poses little or no actual danger." Either social or specific, phobias can be noticeable at workplace. Many of the phobias can hamper your work. Fears of making decisions, fear of speaking over phone are kind of specific phobias which can ruin career progress. Fears are not so harmful but it can be harmful if you let it power you. Before starting your career, you need to check whether you have such kind of phobias which can ruin your job. There are famous people who have phobias, even the father of Psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud had suffered Siderodromophobia (fear of train travel), and many of the other famous men who tried to rule the world feared cats, including Hitler, Mussolini, Napoleon and Julius Caesar.

In a latest study, National Institute of Mental Health found about 5.3 million Americans suffers from overpowering anxiety and self-awareness in social settings. If your phobia will prevent you from doing your job, it is better to inform your interviewer. Even though, you have a phobia but if you can still perform your task, in that case you do not need to mention about your phobia. In some cases, the level of phobia can be increased to the level of disability and it may limit a major life activity of yours. When it starts to affect your performance at workplace, you should get the help of human resource to make a plan of how to work which can benefit you and your company as well.