The Paradoxes of Anxiety: Unraveling the Complexities

The concept of “anxiety paradoxes” highlights a critical aspect of anxiety management: Sometimes, the steps we take to alleviate anxiety can inadvertently magnify it. For instance, if you’re afraid of spiders or dogs and react by avoiding them, this avoidance can actually deepen your fear, making you more anxious about future encounters. This pattern of behavior reinforces the fear, leading to a cycle where the avoidance of triggers, like spiders or dogs, becomes a source of anxiety itself.

Medication for anxiety presents another paradox. While intended to alleviate symptoms, the side effects of these medications can sometimes exacerbate anxiety, particularly when they’re not effective, which is unfortunately quite common. This often results in a cycle of medication switching in the hope of finding relief, further complicating the treatment process. 

Paradoxes stem from a fundamental aspect of our biology: Our brains are wired to respond to fear with anxiety, a survival mechanism that releases chemicals making us feel the need to flee from perceived threats. However, this system can misfire, causing us to fear things that aren’t actually harmful—like an otherwise friendly dog or a harmless spider. This misalignment between perceived and actual threat is at the heart of anxiety paradoxes.

Acknowledging and saying things like “my anxiety” or “I am anxious” can reinforce the belief in one’s own anxiety, further entrenching these feelings. This cycle of recognition and avoidance feeds into the paradox, where the very act of trying to manage or escape anxiety only serves to solidify its presence in our lives.

Understanding these paradoxes is crucial in developing more effective approaches to managing anxiety, approaches that acknowledge the complexities of our biological and psychological responses to fear and anxiety.

Labeling anxiety as a disease seems increasingly incongruous in a world where the World Health Organization (WHO) reports over 380 million cases globally. This prevalence suggests that we may need to consider other factors at play.

The surge in irrational anxiety, particularly among young people over the last two decades, could be attributed to our rapidly evolving technological society and the escalating demands it places on individuals. For many young people, keeping pace with these changes and expectations is challenging, and not meeting them can lead to experiences of irrational anxiety.

This situation underscores a critical issue: Irrational anxiety is a significant problem, not because it’s incurable, but because the conventional approach to treatment—medication and therapy without reevaluation—often fails to address the root of the problem. The reality that many are left on medication for years without adequate follow-up is a testament to this failure. The author’s personal journey of overcoming 38 years of irrational anxiety symptoms highlights the need for a paradigm shift in how we understand and address anxiety.

Anxiety is less about mental illness and more about how we interpret and react to our life situations. A key issue is the misinterpretation of anxiety’s unpleasantness, leading to a cycle of fear and avoidance. This misinterpretation is a significant barrier to effectively managing anxiety.

The fear of re-experiencing anxiety often goes unaddressed in traditional treatments, contributing to their limited success and the prolonged reliance on medication for many. The path to improvement lies not in fearing irrational anxiety but in understanding and confronting it.

Reflecting on these insights suggests that a new approach, one that moves beyond viewing anxiety as a pathology to be medicated, is crucial for real progress.

The more you try to avoid anxiety, the worse it gets.

When we avoid things that make us anxious, we are essentially telling ourselves that those things are dangerous and that we can’t handle them. This will reinforce anxiety and make it more difficult to cope with in the long run.

The more you try to control your anxiety, the more it controls you.

When we try to control our anxiety, we are essentially focusing on our anxiety and how it is making us feel. This will make anxiety worse and make it more difficult to let go of.

The more you resist your anxiety, the more it persists. 

When we resist our anxiety, we are essentially fighting against it. This can make our anxiety stronger and more persistent.

The more you try to control your thoughts, the more they control you.

This is because trying to control our thoughts is a form of suppression, which is the act of pushing away unwanted thoughts. Suppression has been shown to make thoughts more persistent.

In other words, trying to avoid, control, or resist anxiety will make it worse.

So, what can we do instead?