Many people suffer from anxiety. In fact, it’s the most common mental health disorder, affecting over 40 million adults in the U.S. according to the ADAA. Despite it being so common, there are still common myths about people with anxiety that are damaging and further stigmatize the disorder.
Anxiety is tough.
Most people never get formal treatment for it and it’s difficult to quantify. For many, it isn’t until something physical happens—like hospitalization or disease—that they look for support and realize its seriousness.
To help our community better understand anxiety, here are three things to remember about what’s going on inside an anxious mind:
1.) Anxiety doesn’t mean uncontrolled emotions.
Anxiety builds up over time with challenging emotions that simmer just beneath the surface. These emotions are, in fact, very controlled—sometimes to a fault. Anxious people are experts at controlling these emotions so they can still function on a daily basis. Oftentimes, these feelings aren’t addressed until they explode, leading to an anxiety or panic attack that others may perceive as “uncontrolled.”
2.) Anxious people haven’t chosen to be negative thinkers.
If you are able to shift negative thoughts to positive ones naturally, you may wonder why people with anxiety “choose” to think about negative things. The truth is, people with anxiety would love to stop worrying, but anxiety hijacks their minds and makes it extremely difficult to do so. The mind has literally wired itself to support this thought pattern.
3.) Anxious people aren’t self-centered.
If you don’t suffer from anxiety, it may be easy to lose patience when your loved one seems to constantly be asking for reassurance that they’re making a positive impact, doing things right, or not angering anyone. It may also be easy to pin them as self-centered or selfish when they become introspective or dissociative. The truth is, people with anxiety tend to constantly second-guess themselves, and their inner critic is very, very loud. Because they’re so focused on their failures internally, they consistently seek external assurance.
There are ways to heal anxiety by gently addressing challenging emotions, shifting from negative to positive thinking, and creating a new relationship with that pesky inner critic. To learn more, visit www.truesage.com.
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