Anxiety As Symptom
Anxiety isn’t a permanent label—it’s often a symptom that points to deeper fears. By exploring those fears and their causes, you may be able to move from coping to healing.
“Anxiety as symptom”—what the heck does that mean? Good question. Lately, anxiety and depression have often been talked about as if they came out of nowhere or else were 100% caused by our biology, so there’s nothing we can do other than take drugs for the rest of our lives. We might simply say, “I have anxiety” and view it as something that causes other things—social awkwardness, physical tension, etc.
I get that viewpoint, but what I want for you is to have vastly more choice / power / agency than the viewpoint above provides you. In the “I just have anxiety” approach, you can cope—meds, avoiding triggers, etc.—but you won’t have any permanent or pervasive relief.
If you view anxiety as a symptom, however, you can explore the causes, heal those causes, and get lasting relief. Some amount of fear and anxiety is inevitable, but I’d love for you to have as little as possible!
What Is Anxiety, Anyway?
I see anxiety as a vague, diffuse version of fear. It’s tense and worried. Sometimes we connect it with a specific fear (losing a job, etc.), but sometimes not. When I notice that I’m anxious, I ask myself: “What am I afraid of?” If I can realize the source of the fear / anxiety, I have more clarity and more options for dealing with it.
Sources of Anxiety / Fear
Sometimes the sources of anxiety are hard to pin down, but I’ve had a lot of success with bringing them to the surface. The fears may be somewhat specific or limited, such as losing your job, or they can be sweeping and general, such as “Am I lovable?” In my experience, turning vague anxieties into clear and particular fears helps you get a clear map of how your fears work and helps you to start resolving those fears.
I won’t go into all the ways of healing fears now since that’s not the scope of this article, but those ways exist, and we can use them!
So, by “anxiety as symptom,” I mean seeing anxiety as the beginning point of an exploration, not something we have to resign ourselves to dealing with forever. That exploration can go into the sources of the fears that drive the anxiety and into how to heal those fears. I find this approach empowering and productive. I hope you will too!