Even though I still get those old pangs of dread as I approach the dark basement, complete with its creaky door, they are something I can overcome with a little internal discourse that resolves itself before I reach out for the doorknob. It's an ongoing grudge match between rationality and neurosis.
One such dialogue might start with the simple argument that a door that creaks contains no more evil than a nice quiet one. This logic, I rebut, simply eliminates creakiness as a criteria for evil in a basement door and only results in a fear of all basement doors regardless of their creakiness—an uppercut to the chin of rationality.
Pulling itself off the mat after that blow and with time running out, rationality counters with a sucker punch of its own. Eschewing logic for sheer impact it goes for the old "Don’t be such a baby!" approach. TKO for rationality. The preposterousness of a grown man being afraid of his own basement is a compelling thing.
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Soon there may be a more effective way of "conquering" our fears. A study in Nature from last January found that by conducting extinction training at a certain time (when our memories are going through a process called reconsolidation), fearful responses are erased completely. More details in this ~5 minute video.
