The Anxiety Paradox

When anxiety becomes pathological, it's often because of its intensity, disproportionality, and functional impact. When anxiety and fear intensify to panic and when worries blossom into disproportional mental ruminations about imagined rather than actual threats, the result is that we often freeze up or get stuck in our heads to the point of immobility.

And since normal anxiety is a necessity for survival, not having any anxiety would also put us in harm's way. Pathological anxiety prevents us from taking the necessary action to figure out how to deal with the issues that lie at its root.

Because excessive anxiety is so visceral, including not only mental panic but physical symptoms including a "nervous stomach," chest discomfort, or trouble breathing, it's often experienced as intolerable. As a result, our natural response isn't to problem-solve, but to avoid—we tend to be more focused on "flight" than "fight" and will often try to do whatever it takes to escape the source of our fear.

The paradox of anxiety is that what feels most instinctual and self-protective—escaping from the source of our fears or trying to ablate intolerable anxiety with a drink or a pill—often just reinforces it by teaching us that our fears are too powerful to face. It also primes us to monitor for its return when we are able to find temporary relief, but if we're constantly scanning the environment for threats or our bodies for evidence of fear, we're certain to find it.

Treating pathological anxiety often requires allowing ourselves to feel anxious. That doesn't mean "white-knuckling" it or subjecting ourselves to terror; it's more about engaging with and confronting our fears "one step at a time" in a safe and therapeutic setting with someone at your side. Through that process, we can do the work we need to do to shift from being immobilized by fear or from incessant worrying to problem-solving.