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J.  Krishnamurti – The Network of Thought

Suppose one is afraid; either one is afraid of something, afraid of something one has done in the past which one does not want another to know, or something has happened in the past which again awakens fear, or is there a fear by itself without an object?

At the second when there is fear does one call it fear?  Or does that happen only afterwards?  Surely it is after it has happened, which means that previous incidents of fear which have been held in the brain are remembered immediately after the reaction takes place; the memory says 'That is fear'.  At the immediacy of the reaction one does not call it 'fear'.  It is only after it has happened that one names it as fear.  The naming of it as fear is the remembrance of other incidents that have arisen that have been named fear.

 One remembers those fears of the past and the new reaction arises which one immediately identifies with the word fear.  That is simple enough.  So there is always the memory operating in the present.

...[So] fear is something which happened maybe a week ago, which has caused that feeling which we have named as fear and the future implication that it must not happen again; yet it might happen again, therefore one is afraid of it.

In other words the incident which happened last week which has awakened the sense of fear is remembered and projected into the future – I may lose my position, I may lose my money, I may lose my wife.