Acceptance and Transformation of Inevitable Emotions

Anxiety is often framed as an adversary to conquer, but this perspective might be misplaced. Instead of striving to eliminate it, understanding and integrating anxiety into our lives can become a powerful catalyst for personal growth and self-mastery. This approach acknowledges anxiety as a natural, sometimes even beneficial, aspect of the human experience.

The Existential Roots of Anxiety

Anxiety, derived from the Latin “anxietas” meaning distress or affliction, serves as a fundamental defense mechanism. It signals perceived threats, prompting individuals to respond to danger. Yet, its essence runs deeper than physiological responses like rapid breathing or intrusive thoughts; it is profoundly linked to our awareness of mortality, the potential loss of loved ones, and an uncertain future.

Philosophers like Søren Kierkegaard, often called the father of existentialism, termed it “dread in the face of freedom.” Martin Heidegger spoke of “being-towards-death,” and Jean-Paul Sartre described “nausea” when confronting nothingness. In this context, anxiety is not a systemic flaw but a natural outcome of consciousness, an inherent part of the human condition, an “anxious Homo sapiens gene.”

Beyond Personal History: External Influences

While clinical psychology frequently links anxiety to childhood experiences, trauma, and attachment styles, we often overlook the pervasive impact of external circumstances throughout life. How can one avoid anxiety in a world grappling with wars, economic instability, job insecurity, demanding workplaces, and social media-driven comparisons? Even success can be a significant source of anxiety: artists using substances to manage stage pressure, investors losing sleep over potential financial ruin, or celebrities burdened by the demand for constant perfection. Clearly, anxiety isn’t solely an internal dysfunction; it’s a normal response to a demanding and unpredictable world.

A Society Selling Happiness, Not Embracing Anxiety

Our culture has commodified happiness, portraying it as something to relentlessly pursue and acquire. Conversely, anxiety is often hidden, pathologized, and met with quick fixes. Rarely are we told, “You will experience anxiety, and you can still find happiness.” The truth is, both are integral to our journey and existence. Psychologist Paul Watzlawick, in “The Art of Being Unhappy,” satirized how we habitually manufacture worries. French writer Albert Camus, in “The Plague,” depicted existential meaninglessness as characters, trapped in a disease-ridden city, found no time for love, only the constant threat of death. However, just as misfortune can dominate our inner dialogue, we can also choose a more absurd or humorous rumination, like Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot,” which reflects the world’s inherent anxieties, suggesting laughter might be a more honest response than denial.

The Normalcy of Being Anxious

Neuroscience supports this perspective. Joseph LeDoux, a leading neuroscientist studying survival circuits, demonstrates that anxiety is a deeply ingrained brain mechanism that helped our species survive. In small doses, it keeps us alert and prepared. The real issue isn’t feeling anxiety, but believing we shouldn’t feel it. Historically, what we now label “anxiety” has been called worry, sleeplessness, or anguish – familiar terms describing humanity’s perpetual unease in the face of uncertainty. Anxiety is not a modern invention; it’s an age-old concern in new attire. Speaker and author Brian Tracy notes that action helps manage worry, a sentiment I wholeheartedly agree with. We often magnify future fears, only to discover, when the moment arrives, that we possess more resources to cope than we initially believed. Irvin D. Yalom, an existential psychiatrist and one of my favorite authors, succinctly put it: “Anxiety is the price we pay for being alive.”

Channeling Anxiety: From Anguish to Creativity

Accepting that anxiety isn’t “curable” doesn’t equate to resigning ourselves to suffering. Instead, it means embracing it, learning to coexist, and, more importantly, transforming it. Many artists and writers have harnessed their anxiety as creative fuel: Edvard Munch expressed it in “The Scream,” Sylvia Plath in her poetry, and Virginia Woolf in her novels and diaries. Creativity, learning, and curiosity offer pathways to channel this anxious energy into something productive. Instead of obsessively trying to extinguish the fire, we can use its warmth to forge something new.

This brings to mind an anecdote: a man was constantly throwing buckets of water at his house. When asked why, he replied, “Just in case it catches fire.” While comical, this illustrates our common approach to anxiety – expending ourselves trying to prevent what hasn’t happened. Perhaps the solution isn’t senseless prevention, but accepting the possibility of fire and learning to use it for illumination, warmth, or creation.

Coaching: A Methodology for Living with Anxiety

In my experience as a personal coach, this goal-oriented tool for communication and self-awareness proves particularly effective in addressing anxiety linked to worries. It doesn’t aim to eliminate worry, as it’s a part of life, but to transform it through productive conversation, guided reflection, and conscious action. Actively channeling anxiety through coaching involves:

Transforming Anxious Energy into Action: Worry ceases to paralyze and becomes an impulse to act in alignment with one’s values.
Providing Structure and Support: Coaching offers a safe space to dissect anxiety and translate it into a tangible plan.
Strengthening Resilience: The process doesn’t seek to remove anxiety but teaches how to sustain it and use it as a lever for development.

Instead of battling anxiety, individuals learn to redirect it towards clear goals rooted in meaning and well-being. My sessions often incorporate Brian Tracy’s six practical steps for progress:

Identify What Worries You Clearly: Articulating anxiety precisely reduces mental fog.
Distinguish Imagination from Reality: Powerful questions help separate facts from interpretations.
Take Concrete, Even Small, Action: Coaching assists in designing achievable micro-actions that restore a sense of direction and responsibility.
Focus on What You Can Control: Work is done to accept the uncontrollable and reinforce what is within one’s power.
Practice Mental Detachment: Recognizing that others’ actions are not one’s own is crucial. Techniques like deep breathing, drinking water, or taking a few seconds for self-connection can aid self-control in specific situations.

Reviewing results with humility and gratitude is also vital. More than suppressing anxiety, coaching helps us coexist with it, even to the point of forgetting it exists, and to navigate worry (if it persists) without paralysis, transforming discomfort into a driver for change, learning, and creativity.

A Glimpse with Humor and Hope

Perhaps the true revolution lies in accepting that there are no magic techniques or definitive manuals. Instead, there’s an invitation to confront anxiety directly and, when possible, to laugh at its excesses. “Anxiety is like your shadow: it always goes with you, but it also reminds you that you are standing and moving forward.”