Fear has many names, such as worry, stress, nervousness, and good old anxiety. All are forms of fear. In the modern world anxiety is usually seen as a problem. In some cases fear in any form can be problematic and sometimes downright debilitating. But in other cases it is a useful emotion that keeps us safe and happy. Our primative brains are designed to take over when we feel fear. A panic attack is just your brains way or fighting or fleeing a threat. In one instance the response is a problem and can be quite awful to experience. in another instance you have climbed a tree to prevent the wolves from attacking you. In modern times the traditional threats are not common. We do need to respond quickly to other threats though. House is on fire and you need to let fear help you deal with the situation. So why do we have so many issues related to fear now? Simply put fear is triggered by something, but the program response does not work. In traffic fear can overwelm you. But you can’t just hop out of the car on the highway and start running. What needs to be done is to help fear learn the correct response to the situation. If you have a complete lack of fear you would not get up to shower and start your day. Fear that we will not have food and shelter in the future keeps us going and hopefully in a productive way. Fear often is the driving force behind productivity. But the key is it needs to be just the right amount and creating the right behaviors. The modern challenge is how to help fear be an asset and not a detriment. Once we have had fear do the right behavior for our situation then we can feel safe and spend some time enjoying all that we have and have done. My job is to help people figure out how to do just that task.
Anger and Anxiety are connected more than you think.
Anger and Anxiety share a lot more than just feeling words starting with the letter A. The connection to each other is so much more common than most people realize. First when you need to look closer at Anxiety. Anxiety is related to emotions like Worry, Apprehension, Concern, and Stress. All of these emotions are a form of Fear. Yes, so Fear is the root emotion for many of our more specific feelings. So what if Anxiety is a type of fear, how does that connect to Anger? Many people remember hearing in school that in times of Fear Humans and other animals will react to Fear with a Flight, Fight, or Freeze response. Well that middle emotion Fight is connected to Anger. Fight tells you to get worked up and do something to save you. Try to lift weights why you are laughing and watch as you don’t get anywhere. Then try when you are Angry. Your lifting results will be a whole lot more positive. The problem we have in the modern world is that the part of the brain that responds to Fear is not the part where any intelligent thought occurs. Sometimes we are lucky and are Fear response works for the situation and sometimes it does not. So in the United States our cultural response to Fear is Fight. This again as a country is a mixed blessing. The problem is that when Fear is caused by misunderstanding or exaggeration the Anger response we have will miss the spot. Since Fear and Stress are related it is easy to see how we might use Anger to try to respond to our emotions. We yell at our loved ones because we are feeling Stress. The primitive brain takes over and we do something that may somewhat help or Stress, but it hurts our relationship. So when you see Anger in someone you might want to ask yourself are they really feeling some sort of Fear.
The Most Anxious Generation
According to a recent study the Generation now know as the Millennials are the most anxious in modern history. Now with all studies there can be much debate, so I will not defend the results. However , I will support the general conclusion. Individuals in their early 30’s all the way to the teens currently are among this group. This generation is growing up in the techno age. This age has its positives and negatives. But for my purposes I will focus on the negative effects that I believe have contributed to the high incidents of anxiety in the Millennials.
First is the need to be connected. This group is always reaching out and being reached by others. This creates increased sensory stimulus. The senses can’t tell the difference between stimulus that requires fight, flight, or freeze response or just plan data. The primitive brain goes on high alert. This pumps out chemicals that prepare the individual to deal with the situation. But wait there is no situation. Anxiety then happen under the surface influencing the individual in ways they may not even realize. This creates an assortment of problems. Digestive issues, eating issues, pain and fatigue just to name a few. Individuals need to be “off” some to relax and feel safe. The techno age makes this increasingly difficult.
Second reason falls on lack of appropriate social interaction. The Millennials text and tweet, and rarely talk to each other. And Face to Face time is way down. Eye contact is becoming a lost art to the Millennials. Humans communicate the most effectively face to face. The worst form is written. The irony that I am writing this does not escape me either. Without proper communication many Millennials misunderstand each other causing stress in their relationships with each other. This of course leads to more anxiety. The lost art of appropriate social interactions are causing them difficulties face to face, because they have far less practice with this skill than previous generations.
Third reason is a lack of understanding how to decrease anxiety. Coping strategies like meditation and exercise are not understood and utilized. Talking with others to decrease anxiety is also still a problem because of the poor social skills. Classes in Yoga and Meditation are popping up out of necessity. And of course preventing the triggers to anxiety all together escapes them.
Until the Millennials learn how to navigate the techno age effectively they will be destined to have increasing levels of anxiety. This is a much more serious issue than we might realize. Issues with Health and productivity will increase. The potential for violence increases as anxiety often lead to an aggressive response to the heightened fear state. I suggest we all take breaks from technology and relax. Spend some time actually talking face to face without interruptions. Your health and generally well-being is at stake.
Jeff Fry LCSW
Anxiety, Worry, Stress, and, Fear can be good
The mental health community in its effort to help people, unfortunately has created some misconceptions. Whereas it is obvious that various forms of anxiety are not generally considered to be a positive, they should not necessarily be considered a negative either. I will elaborate as best I can. In the wild all types of fear have a positive function. I am afraid of the tiger so I will not let him get near me. That is a simple example, but really if you expand on it one can really see that fear is one of the essential ingredients to survival. Now to use the tiger metaphor a bit further lets say that any “perceived” threat to our survival is the tiger. The perceived is in quotes for a reason that I will explain a bit later. So the tiger could be that you have not stored enough food for the winter. That fear would drive you to increase your stores of food. The tiger could be your dwelling does not feel safe enough to survive the storm so you work to make it sturdy. The tiger could be the land you farm seems to be under producing so your fear makes you look for new land. Simply put fear motivates new behaviors to try to ensure survival.
Modern humans rarely have the more obvious threats to their wellbeing that humans had not to long ago, but we still have them. Our job pays the bills so that we may have the resources to feel safe. Our relationships with others also provide reassurance that we will have help to survive. Modern humans have tigers near all the time. They are just not thinking correctly about the situation. So the word perceived comes up now. When we feel fear in any form our brains try to compel us to act. For example I am worried the doors not locked so I am compelled by my fear to get up and make sure the door is locked. Ok that is no big deal, but for some people their behavior does not alleviate the fear. They are compelled to repeat the behavior again. Some people will repeat it over and over. This is what we call OCD or Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Now many people have some degree of this issue. It actually can be an asset at times. Double and triple checking to see if the mushrooms are poisonous or how many sponges need to come out of us before the surgery is over are two good examples. So why don’t we openly praise people for this behavior. The answer is that we see how the fear can become misdirected and illogical. The behavior that is repeated often makes not sense or is excessive. The mother following the bus in her car on the first day of school is one example. What possibly can this behavior due. She can stop her child from being teased. She can ensure the bus driver is safe. Her fear for her child compelled her to perform a useless behavior. In fact it took her away from behaviors that actually could be of benefit to her and her family.
Fear and all it variations is a vast subject so I can’t begin to write enough about it. But the key point of this document is to begin an examination of the positives and negatives of fear or anxiety. Lack of enough fear can lead to incorrect behaviors just as much as misdirected and illogical fear can. Each of us must examine how our primitive survival instincts can both be helpful and harmful if not supervised by our good human judgement. So if you deal with anxiety you should not beat yourself up about it, but try to understand it and drive it towards truly healthy behavioral responses. Because really that is why we have it.