A few years ago, when I was suffering from severe anxiety during and following an attempted adoption, I struggled to find information on anxiety that focused on managing it or eliminating it. I went to therapy. But while I gleaned a lot about myself and my failed coping strategies, I didn’t get what I needed to begin living each day as a sane and healthy person. I found the usual rhetoric about exercising more and explanations about the “fight or flight” response. But no book or article or study ever addressed the larger picture of anxiety. I needed to interrupt the processes that were eating away at my sense of emotional security. So I researched the chemistry of anxiety. I researched diet, exercise, meditation, and more. I read and I read and I read. What I didn’t find was a clear program for dealing with my anxiety. What I DID find was the information I needed to create my own.
A few weeks ago, a close friend of mine and I were talking about his/her anxiety. I realized that what I told my friend might be useful to other people who, like us, felt lost in that sea of anxiety without any means of getting out.
Excessive anxiety is a hyperbolic state of fear which has differently nuanced triggers depending on what our life experiences have been. I describe it as a whirlwind. Some trigger stirs the sensation that something isn’t right, isn’t safe. For most people this sensation comes and goes barely noticed. But for people who suffer from anxiety, that feeling begins to grow itself, feeding off fear, shame, and guilt until it is a full blown tornado tearing up everything around it.
Just like in the rest of the animal kingdom, human anxiety is a response to the perceived threat of annihilation. Despite all of our efforts to complicate the topic, our anxiety has the same root. Of course, we humans don’t like to be simple. Our big brains need something more to do, don’t they? We create complex rules and mores that can both aid and inhibit our ability to function in the face of fear. And we do not only worry about our physical extinction either. We fear the loss of our sense of self and/or our position in the social network that supports us, our worthiness. Because we are social creatures, we are not always at liberty—or at least we believe we are not at liberty—to address these concerns when they arise.
For instance, if we believe that our fearfulness shows a lack of trust in God and trust in God is an all-important value in our network, then we are less likely to seek support when we are faced with fears whatever they might be. If we believe that talking about sex is immoral or too private, then we will not discuss fears and difficulties when we experience them, and so on. You get the idea. This problem is of particular concern for children who may not have the knowledge of or access to outside support when their need for safety and stability is not being met by one or both parents/caregivers. When reaching out for support and normalization is out of the question, a vast array of coping techniques—each with inherent consequences—must be employed in order to maintain functionality. And in this way we begin to bury very simple and manageable fear beneath a landslide of muddy complication.
For me, the key was to get back to the basics and work my way out with a simple plan that, before all else, required me to slow down and be patient and kind with myself. I also needed to recognize that what I’d been doing to cope up to that point wasn’t working and I would need to learn new skills. (Ugh.) Having experienced and recovered from excessive anxiety, I can tell you that if you have excessive anxiety more than likely you spent your life building that anxiety or, at the very least, the conditions in which your current anxiety rooted itself and began to grow. So beginning with the awareness that recovery would not happen in a snap was essential to my being able to step out of the whirlwind. Habit building takes time.
This world that we live in is moving so quickly. More information is thrown at us in a given day than ever has been in the history of humankind. It feels sometimes like we live in little more than organized chaos. And we are so busy. Modern conveniences were supposed to make our lives easier, but somehow they have been misappropriated to make room for more responsibility, more obligation, more busy-work. I was struck when I learned that when analyzing the lives of the few hunter-gather communities left researchers determined that they have more leisure time, not less, than we do despite not having any modern conveniences. What does that say about us “civilized” folk? Perhaps we have modernized ourselves out of the conditions that allowed for good mental health. Let me give you an example.
The car was a huge breakthrough in the course of transportation innovation. But I would argue that the car was one of single worst inventions in respect to mental health. Prior to the invention of the car, people generally walked to get where they needed to go. Science tells us now that the very act of walking improves brain function by increasing circulation and stimulating brain growth. People who walk on a very regular basis have better memories, greater cognition and exhibit better decision making skills. Also, walking uses up the excess adrenaline which is produced in times of stress.
Because walking was the primary mode of transportation, communities were built in a very specific way, in two concentric circles. In the inner circle a large portion of the population lived close together in a town where they could practice their trade and have access to services. In the outer circle lived mostly farmers. These circles were locked in a mutual dependence which necessitated regular interaction with neighbors, friends and family. Their mutual dependency gave meaning to their work. Both regular interaction with friends and neighbors and meaningful work are known to mitigate stress. The first creates a sense of stability and support and the second enables the individual to know that s/he is efficacious and that their efforts are valuable.
With the advent of the car, people slowly began to walk less, live further apart, work further from home, spend an increasingly longer amount of time in an isolation bubble make of plastic, steel and glass. The suburbs were born. No more trips on foot to the local general store to get supplies, talk to the townsfolk, smile at your neighbors and be smiled at in turn. We’ve de-centralized. Now we need a car to get our supplies which means we have to spend our resources to afford the car, the insurance and the registration, which may mean we have to do less meaningful work to make more money to afford the car. Of course I could take this further and further. There is no end to the negative impact that cars have on our lives. But the long story short is that we have become less connected to those around us and less physically active, both of which reduce our ability to cope with stress. Recovery from anxiety is an opportunity to examine and implement a lifestyle many of us have never known—one that is slower paced, more contemplative, rooted in nature’s rhythms, and defined by connectedness.
