What do you think of this statement?

[Multifavs]

I've read several articles claiming that the key to managing anxiety is to learn to live with it. What are your thoughts on this? To me, it sounds like something someone with no knowledge of anxiety would say. I can see this working if you only have symptoms in certain situations, but not when you have generalized anxiety disorder. Anxiety is normal, but it's not normal to have it all the time.

 

[Friedrich Rubinstein]

Learning to live with something is effective - if you know how to learn it... Did the articles explain that part as well? It's easy to tell someone "learn to live with it", but if they have no clue how to learn that then nothing will change in their lives.

I can tell how I learned to live with anxiety, but I don't think there is a recipe that works for everyone equally. The first 18 years of my life I was terrified of people. So much so, that I wouldn't say a word in public. My classmates thought I was mentally challenged because I wouldn't talk, I couldn't buy lunch at school because I was too scared to talk to the person behind the counter and even phone calls were so frightening to me that my parents or my brother had to do them for me.
When I was 18, after finishing school, my parents bought me a visa and a plane ticket to a foreign country where the people didn't even speak my native language. I spent the next 6 months completely on my own there, and the circumstances forced me to talk to people despite my extreme anxiety.

Today I can greet people on the street, make phone calls and even talk to my boss if needed. Did I overcome my anxiety? No, I'm still afraid of people and have my legs turn to jelly, but the level of anxiety just seems so small compared to the level of anxiety I experienced at that time when I was 18 that I can do it anyway. Would you say I learned to live with my anxiety? To me it looks more like an "exposure therapy", but perhaps that's one way to learn it.

 

[KevinT]

I've read several articles claiming that the key to managing anxiety is to learn to live with it. What are your thoughts on this? To me, it sounds like something someone with no knowledge of anxiety would say. I can see this working if you only have symptoms in certain situations, but not when you have generalized anxiety disorder. Anxiety is normal, but it's not normal to have it all the time.

Some anxiety/stress can be helpful. There is a classic curve showing that too little anxiety/stress causes under-performance, while too much can cause meltdown.

I think what you are talking about must be about being in the red-zone. But perhaps what the article is trying to get to (I haven't read the article) is that when you sense that you have some anxiety, perhaps you can see if this is stress that is really in the "optimal zone"??

While there are medications that can help with anxiety, the truth is that some people are just wired differently than others. I like to think of this in the terms of breeds of dogs. Consider of the difference between a yappy little dog that barks and barks at any little trigger, and then a Golden Retriever who lets children climb all over them and pull their tail, with nothing seeming to bother them. There is just a genetic hard-wiring difference between them. I personally am more like a little dog, and am easily startled into the fright-or-flight response. I wish I was more laid back.

Some who are anxious are furthermore anxious about their anxiety. Perhaps the article is trying to help those people to realize that it is OK to have some anxiety and to learn to roll with it.

Best wishes,

KT