This reminds me of something a favorite highschool teacher of mine said. We were reading Crichton's Eaters of the Dead (His best book probably because it was actually written by someone else). We get an interesting perspective on how incredibly brave the Vikings were, then a little ways into the book there is a scene where they find a small statue of an obese pregnant women, an ancient Venus figure. The Vikings are literally sickened from fear at the sight of this. I pointed out that it was funny that these warriors would be terrified of a stone figurine of a pregnent woman. My teacher looked up and said: "That does make you wonder what they were really frightened of doesn't it . . . Maybe, Commitment!"