There are times when you may knowingly or unknowingly evaluate something as dangerous or something you should be anxious about, for one or more reasons. If you think about it, why wouldn’t the body honor such evaluations and trigger physical anxiety whenever those things enter one of your senses (smell, taste, sight, thoughts, etc)?
Some psychology researchers hold the view that anxiety/fear is a module (a program) humans use for protective purposes. (1)
If you have anxiety, you likely have anxiety for non-life-threatening situations and get anxious about potential events or scenarios. This shows that anxiety can be used for non-life-threatening purposes. Until proven otherwise, this also suggests that anxiety is just that, a tool given to humans by our creator that we choose to use as.
As a growing human, you may not always know the best way to handle situations, and may end up using anxiety as a way to take care of yourself.
Note: The cause of anxiety is backed by the cause of negative emotions.
What’s the solution?
Step one, which you’ve done by reading this, is having the awareness that anxiety can be unconsciously/unknowingly used as a protective tool. The next step is to decide that you no longer want to use anxiety as a way to protect yourself.
Instead of viewing things you’d like to avoid as reasons to be anxious, you can honor the reality that you dislike those things. Instead of viewing things you think are extremely threatening as reasons to be anxious, you can be cautious about those things (to any degree of your liking).
Be prepared for others to label times when you’d like to be cautious as being fearful or cowardly. You may also have to start listening and acting on your true desires rather than following the desires and wishes of others.
As you do the work of eliminating your triggers, you’ll naturally reveal the different ways you unknowingly/unconsciously use anxiety.
If you have specific questions, feel free to leave a comment or contact us directly.
Graphics and summary of this insight are below
Resource: How to uncover the root causes of an anxiety trigger and reprogram your brain to eliminate it – see the anxiety solution
To validate the insight from this article for yourself, we recommend you consider the following questions:
A) Why is it that two people can witness the same event, and only one person gets anxious? You may have experienced or witnessed this phenomenon yourself.
B) Think of your most understood anxiety trigger. What is it about that object (your trigger) that makes you anxious? If you’re able to think of just 1 answer, you’ve uncovered one of the reasons why you unconsciously think you should be anxious about the trigger. In other words, the anxiety doesn’t happen to you, but you experience it for a particular reason(s). Also consider: if things make people anxious, wouldn’t everyone have the same triggers as you?
C) Think of something that no longer makes you anxious but used to make you anxious in the past. What is it about that thing that made you anxious in the past? Why aren’t you anxious about it now?
The anxiety is likely gone because you no longer have or see reasons to be anxious about the trigger anymore.
FAQ
Beyond what’s written in this article, we’ve provided more evidence for the cause of anxiety.
Notice that you have the ability to label and describe things in real time. For example, if you see a movie you really like, you may say, “It was amazing” or “That was great.” If you watch something you dislike, you may label the movie as “bad” or something you wouldn’t watch again.
Recognizing that you have this ability to label, describe, and draw your own conclusions, it follows that you can knowingly/unknowingly label or evaluate a person, place, or thing, as something we should be anxious about.
Citations
(1) Clark, D. A., & Beck, A. T. (2011). Cognitive Therapy of Anxiety Disorders: Science and Practice. New York: Guilford Press.
– Fear is an evolutionary tool (p.6)
About the author behind the research statement in the graphic:
Dr. Aaron T. Beck is globally recognized as the father of Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) and one of the world’s leading researchers in psychopathology. He is credited with shaping the field of mental health, and The American Psychologist has called him “one of the five most influential psychotherapists of all time.”
He found that his patients’ thoughts about a situation influenced their reactions — more so than the situation itself, a construct he termed the “cognitive model.” He helped his patients change the way they thought about situations…He also worked with them to address underlying maladaptive beliefs about themselves, others, the world, and the future. He called his new therapy “Cognitive Therapy,” which was later termed Cognitive Behavior Therapy, or CBT.
The results of the first major clinical trial comparing CBT to antidepressant medication were published in 1977, showing CBT to be the first talk therapy to be as effective as medication for the treatment of depression and twice as effective in preventing relapse. After a second clinical trial in the UK replicated the results, Cognitive Behavior Therapy received international recognition and interest. Since then, over 2,000 studies have found CBT to be an effective treatment for many mental health challenges and medical problems with psychological components.
