Anxiety is one of the basic emotions we are born with. This feeling activates some mechanisms that enable us to be prepared and protect ourselves against threats that we may encounter in the future. In this respect, it is a vitally critical and healthy emotion. But sometimes anxiety can cause a problematic cycle in a person's life. Severe anxiety can also lead to recurrent and life-limiting attacks. At this point, distinguishing between healthy anxiety and unhealthy anxiety and reviewing our personality traits that cause anxiety to increase will help us cope with attacks. Because while healthy anxiety helps us, unhealthy anxiety disrupts our function.
How do we distinguish between healthy anxiety and unhealthy anxiety?
Healthy anxiety is related to possible issues in our lives. The possibilities it contains are too few to exceed the number on the fingers of both hands. We can find solutions to these possibilities that are within our control. In unhealthy anxiety, many possibilities that may or may not occur in our lives pass through our minds. The scenarios are endless. There is nothing we can do to find a solution. In other words, we think about situations that are completely beyond our control. For this reason, there is no use in thinking.
Let's start with an example. Let's say you are going to go on an intercity journey with your own vehicle.
Examples of healthy anxiety
1- Having the car maintained, wearing the seat belt
2- Taking enough money with you
3- Making sure that you take your ID, phone and other necessary personal belongings with you
4- Making your hotel reservation
Worrying about whether there are any deficiencies in these 4 areas will affect your holiday. It causes things to go wrong, so it is healthy anxiety. The issues you are worried about have logical content regarding possible risks. And if you notice that one of these is missing, you can find a solution to this issue because it is under your control.
Examples of unhealthy anxiety:
If a truck hits my car on the road
If my tire suddenly bursts due to something sharp on the road
If I get stuck on the road and cannot reach anyone
If I am attacked
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If I have a heart attack on the road
If something bad happens to one of the people I left behind when I set out (illness-death, etc.)
If I lose my money
If I have a panic attack while traveling
If I catch a disease from the hotel
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We can further increase the examples of unhealthy anxiety. As you can see, the number of possibilities is not as small as in healthy anxiety. It also includes a lot of disaster scenarios that are unlikely to happen. It is far from logic. Finally, these are events that may develop completely beyond our control, meaning it is impossible for us to take precautions against these possibilities. Because its content is full of exaggerated disaster scenarios, it causes high anxiety, tension and unrest. For this reason, it is a completely dysfunctional, even dysfunctional pattern.
If you notice that you are worried, focus on the thoughts that are going through your mind and making you anxious. If it's healthy anxiety, acknowledge it and think about what you can do about it. But if the content of your thoughts resembles unhealthy anxiety, remind yourself that this is unhealthy anxiety, that it is something beyond your control, and that there is no use thinking about it, and try to get away from those thoughts. If many bad possibilities run through your mind, you cannot examine each thought and test its realism. For this reason, just label it as unhealthy anxiety and try to focus your attention elsewhere. If you think you are too preoccupied with just one bad possibility (e.g. I have a panic attack and die) then challenge that thought with logical, realistic thoughts. For example, you can remind yourself of scientific realistic thoughts such as: "I may have a panic attack, if a panic attack comes, it will pass after a while, panic attacks will not cause any harm as I think (death, heart attack, etc.)."
I can't get out of the anxiety cycle.
If you constantly have problems with anxiety and have difficulty coping with it on your own, accept this situation and seek support from a psychiatrist and clinical psychologist. According to studies, delaying treatment can reduce anxiety problems. It can cause chronicity. Seeking treatment early will help you recognize the feeling of anxiety in a much shorter time and manage it in a healthy way.
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