Overcoming Anxiety: Beyond Willpower

Why Willpower is Not Enough

Many people believe that overcoming anxiety simply requires willpower. However, relying on willpower alone is often ineffective. This is because anxiety is not a matter of simply choosing to relax; it is a complex interplay of thoughts, feelings, and physical sensations that can seem beyond conscious control. Willpower can be easily overridden by the brain’s stress response, making it difficult to consistently apply it in the face of anxiety. When stressed, the older parts of the brain override the new brain. This is why trying to force yourself to stop feeling anxious does not work.

Habit Loops

Anxiety often operates through habit loops, where a trigger leads to a behaviour (anxious reaction), which results in a feeling (such as relief or avoidance) that reinforces the loop. These loops can be powerful and automatic, making it difficult to interrupt them with willpower alone. Trying to break these habit loops using the same old strategies that have failed before, often reinforces them.

The Problem of Control

The desire to control anxiety can actually worsen it. When individuals try to suppress or get rid of anxious thoughts and feelings, they often become more focused on these experiences, thus amplifying their perceived importance. This struggle against anxiety can create a cycle of avoidance and control that fuels the very thing it seeks to eliminate.

Self-Help and Professional Help

Overcoming anxiety requires a multifaceted approach that goes beyond willpower. Both self-help strategies and professional guidance can play important roles.

Self-Help Strategies

• Mindfulness and Acceptance: Learning to observe thoughts and feelings without judgment can reduce their intensity and impact. Mindfulness helps to accept experiences without needing to change or control them. Acceptance involves being open to experiencing what there is to be experienced, without trying to change the experience. This allows individuals to move forward without being controlled by their emotions.
• Values Clarification: Identifying what is truly important in life can provide a sense of direction. Focusing on personal values helps individuals make choices aligned with their goals, rather than their anxiety.
• Emotional Regulation: Learning to manage emotional arousal levels, such as through relaxation techniques, can help reduce the physical symptoms of anxiety.
• Challenging Negative Self-Talk: Identifying and reframing negative thought patterns can reduce their impact.
• Focus on Action: Taking actions aligned with values, rather than reacting to feelings of anxiety, can help a person regain a sense of control. When people take actions based on what is important to them, they build agency and confidence.
• Self-Compassion: It’s important to treat yourself kindly when dealing with anxiety. Self-compassion is an alternative to self-pity.
• Recognising Patterns: Understanding how anxiety works, what your triggers are and how your anxiety impacts on you can help you make informed choices.
• Reduce External Stressors: There can be practical causes of anxiety such as a lack of sleep, drinking too much coffee. Managing these practical factors may help a person to cope better.

Professional Help

• Coaching: Coaches can help individuals change their relationship with their thoughts and feelings, focusing on what they can control – their actions. This can empower them to make choices that are aligned with their values.
• Specific support for Anxiety: There are also professionals who can work with people to explore the way their brain responds to anxious thoughts and feelings, and help them to retrain their brain.
• Therapeutic Support: Some individuals may require professional help to make real change, particularly if the anxiety is having a significant impact on their lives.
• Solution Focused approaches: Working with someone who can support you to move towards the future you want, by identifying your strengths and resources may also be helpful.

The Importance of Changing Perspective

A key aspect of overcoming anxiety involves shifting from a perspective of trying to get rid of anxiety to learning to live with it. The attempt to eliminate anxiety is not only futile, it can also reinforce the anxiety cycle. This is because by trying to get rid of it, the anxiety becomes a problem. By accepting that anxiety is a normal human experience it becomes possible to focus on building a fulfilling life regardless of these feelings.

From Fighting to Living With

• Acceptance: Rather than battling anxiety, acceptance encourages allowing anxious thoughts and feelings to be present without needing to control them.
• Psychological Flexibility: Developing the ability to adapt to situations and experiences while staying aligned with personal values is essential.
• Focus on Values: A focus on what matters most helps people to make choices that move them towards their goals.
• De-fusing from Thoughts: A key part of moving from fighting to living with anxiety is learning to detach from thoughts and see them as mental events, rather than facts.
• Reframing Anxiety: Changing perspective might involve seeing anxiety as a signal for care, a need for a change, or a need to reconnect with important values.

If you have been trying to overcome your anxiety by yourself and failing, perhaps it’s time now to reach out for help. Please give me a call and let’s see if I can help you make some quick positive changes.

Summary

Overcoming anxiety requires more than just willpower. It involves learning to break out of unhelpful habit loops, and a willingness to accept anxious thoughts and feelings, while focusing on making actions that are guided by values. This can involve self-help strategies or professional help. A crucial shift is moving away from trying to eliminate anxiety to learning to live with it, building a meaningful life and working towards personal goals in spite of anxious feelings.