“Anxiety brings particular challenges but there are a few upsides that I’ve uncovered while writing the book.  The first is that anxiety is universal and it really connects us.  The second is that if we do the work, I found that anxiety can bring us into our bodies and bring us into the present moment.  And third, I found that people struggling with anxiety typically have really beautiful and big imaginations and are creative thinkers and maybe see the world in a way that maybe can get us a little unstuck,” Sara Billups.  Anxiety and I are no strangers.  It feels a very deeply embedded part of my personality and seems to be a semi-permanent state.  There are ways to cope that help a bit but it’s ever-present most days.  Whether it’s the constant urge to DO something, the inability to focus, the inability to handle quiet all the way to the actual physical manifestations—the sweats, pounding heart, short breaths—through any flavor of those things, it’s there.  I am in favor of flipping the script and watching the stories we tell ourselves because words are powerful so if we can start looking at the positives that anxiety can bring, there is a chance that we can utilize it for something good.

I’ve cursed anxiety nearly my entire life because I let it run wild through my brain for a long time.  It is NOT a pleasant feeling to constantly feel like something is wrong, like the other shoe is going to drop at any moment.  It sucks when you question the little things like what music to listen to because you don’t want to miss something else, or looking at the clock for 20 minutes straight to leave at the exact right time so you’re not late. Or just that SOMETHING is going to happen whether you know what it is or not.  It’s living on high alert at all times always expecting the worst.  The mind can’t sustain that, it isn’t designed to.   We need to reframe it and Billups does present truth in her observations.  Everyone deals with anxiety to a degree so we truly are never alone.  It’s also true when it comes to reconciling and managing it, we are able to recognize physical symptoms sooner and more accurately so we know what to do.  And I will full on support the observation that anxiety prone people are also creative.  I mean, in a twisted way we have to be creative to constantly come up with all the scenarios we have in our minds.  But we certainly do see things in different ways and can find creative solutions. 

So instead of lamenting anxiety, we can work with it.  Yes, we can admit its downfalls but we don’t have to live in that state.  We can see where it has served us well and appreciate its purpose and we can also see that, yes, there are some benefits to it because we communicate and see the world differently.  That is a gift. Our brains weren’t all designed the same way and that means we will see and experience things in different ways and we will take different viewpoints and understand things in a multitude of ways.  That also means that there will be variations on how our base functions operate at times.  I’d be lying if I said that having a higher tuned frequency for fear and things that can go wrong is fun—it isn’t.  There is a huge amount of pressure that exists in our brains and not in reality when we constantly view the world as a place that is ready to hurt us at any time.  It’s stressful constantly being on the lookout and ever vigilant for what can go wrong.  But it is nice to be prepared and to know that we are always ready even if the worst of the worst happens.  It is nice to know that we know how to handle a crisis.  We just have to learn to work with the upsides and not live in the downside of a tool meant to protect us that got a little too keyed up.  Choose to see the good.