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The title of this post is not how to treat anxiety or stop anxiety because the very nature of anxiety makes those frames of reference unhelpful. Reducing the frequency and intensity of anxiety, however, is very achievable if we think differently about anxiety itself.
What is anxiety?
Anxiety is essentially a false alarm triggered by the brain’s threat detection system, what we often call the “fight or flight” response. This system evolved for, and is very effective related to, immediate existential danger, but is frankly very bad at responding to most modern triggers of threat. It simply can’t distinguish between the existential peril of a predator and the stress of a critical email from one’s boss or the distress of not being able to pay a bill.
The brain’s threat-detection system triggers fight-or-flight responses (adrenaline, cortisol, elevated heart rate, etc.) automatically and involuntarily. The feelings are real regardless of whether or not danger is present. Interestingly, most anxiety is secondary – anxiety about anxiety—and the more we push back against it, the more we validate the fear of the fear. Moreover, our resistance adds a second, distressing level to the experience of the anxiety itself.
Working with Anxiety in the Moment
As soon as we feel anxiety, we often immediately go to an intervention to stop it whether that is taking a pill or engaging in breath work or some other method of counteracting the sympathetic nervous system response to perceived danger. Although that makes intuitive sense, and even works in some ways, it does not solve the longer term, underlying problem related to repeated false alarms from the threat response system in our brains. To mitigate the cause of anxiety rather than just dealing with the symptom, we have to act very differently.
The first step in dealing with anxiety is to change our relationship with it, to accept it as one of the feelings we as humans experience and to see it as an attempt on the part of our threat response system to help us, but that has gone awry. In effect, we change the relationship by actually welcoming anxiety from a place of curiosity, with the understanding that it is an “honest mistake,” something like a friend that cares for us, but has expressed that care in an unhelpful way. By doing this, over time, we also end up changing how anxiety makes us feel because we stop associating it with dread.
This is counter-intuitive because we naturally and instinctively want to avoid or stop something that doesn’t feel good. Unfortunately, the very act of fighting against anxiety sends a message to our brain that there must really be danger because we are actively responding in an avoidant way to the “danger.”
Once we have engaged anxiety in a non-combative way, sat with it, noticed all the nuance of how it feels, talked to it, etc., then we can engage in self-calming practices that activate the parasympathetic nervous system to re-regulate ourselves. Fortunately, the more commitment we make to changing our relationship with anxiety in the first place, the less activated and dysregulated we become in the face of anxiety to being with.
Preventative Ways of Working with Anxiety
In addition to changing our relationship with anxiety as it is happening as well as engaging in practices that activate the parasympathetic nervous system, there are many preventative or “lifestyle” choices we can make that support resilience in the face of those pesky fight or flight false alarms. Some examples include getting adequate sleep, avoiding psychoactive substances, and limiting social media among many others listed below.
- Honor all emotion: feel and express what makes sense in the moment
- Sleep
- Build and use a daily mindfulness practice
- Learn somatic approaches for calming and re-regulation of the neurological system
- Limit or eliminate exposure to social media
- Find and engage in daily, in-person interactions
- Pursue and engage in at least one relationship that is psychologically safe
- Spend time outdoors every day, preferably in sunlight
- Limit or eliminate highly processed foods and sugar
- Limit or eliminate psychoactive substances (alcohol, cannabis, nicotine, caffeine, etc.)
- Slow down: Build time into your daily schedule that does not have deadlines or deliverables
Summary
What Anxiety Is
Anxiety is the brain’s threat-detection system misfiring. It evolved to handle physical danger but can’t distinguish a predator from a stressful email, triggering real physiological responses (adrenaline, elevated heart rate) even when no true danger exists. Most anxiety is actually anxiety about anxiety — and fighting it only reinforces it.
Key Concept: Rather than trying to eliminate anxiety, the goal is to change your relationship with it — which, paradoxically, reduces its frequency and intensity over time.
In the Moment
The instinct is to immediately suppress anxiety (medication, breath work, distraction), but this signals to your brain that there is real danger, making the cycle worse. Instead:
- Welcome it with curiosity — treat anxiety as a well-meaning but misguided friend, not an enemy
- Sit with it — notice how it feels without resistance
- Talk to it — engage it as non-threatening, almost child-like
- Then, once you’ve engaged non-combatively, use calming practices (deep breathing, tapping, etc.) to re-regulate your nervous system
Prevention & Lifestyle
Building resilience over time reduces how often and how intensely anxiety fires:
- Prioritize sleep and daily mindfulness
- Limit social media, processed foods, alcohol, caffeine, and cannabis
- Spend time outdoors daily, ideally in sunlight
- Cultivate at least one psychologically safe relationship
- Build unscheduled, pressure-free time into your day
- Engage in daily in-person social interaction
The Key Takeaway: Acceptance and curiosity — not avoidance or suppression — break the anxiety cycle at its root.