Anxiety

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Anxiety:

Imagine you're lying on a beach. It's a beautiful day, the sun is shining and there is
a gentle breeze wafting over your body. Sounds of nature fill the air as you chat and
laugh with family and friends. You are surrounded by people you love and respect and who love and respect
you. You feel warm, contented and happy, totally relaxed,
anxiety-free.
Now imagine a very different scene. It's the dead of night, you are alone walking
down a dimly-lit alley. There are doorways on either side - who knows what's hiding
in them, waiting to pounce?
You are scared, your senses are heightened - your sight and hearing have become
more sensitive, able to pinpoint the slightest movement or sound. Your breathing and
heartbeat have become more rapid, you feel light-headed and dizzy, want to go
to the toilet or throw up, your limbs feel shaky and your whole body is now charged
with energy, full of anxiety, ready to fight or flee, possibly for your life.

These two scenes represent either end of the anxiety scale. In the first we feel
warm, secure and safe, we are fully relaxed. In the second we are fully tense, in a
state of preparedness, highly alert and scared.

Anxiety and panic are a series of mind and body reactions that have evolved over
millions of years and are essential to the survival of all living things.

Anxiety probably serves many functions, but two of the main ones are:-

It causes us to plan ahead for any potential dangers and how we may deal
with them - an excellent survival strategy (it's better to deal with a danger or
avoid it before we get in the situation) but an unfortunate effect of this is that
we can get anxious / nervous just thinking about situations - a main ingredient
in the causes of anxiety disorders - related to symptoms such as persistent
negative thoughts and excessive worrying.

It helps prepare our body for action, make us more alert, ready to fight or flee
from any imminent threat to our survival - this is related to the direct anxiety
symptoms such as fast heartbeat, fast breathing, being jittery and on edge,
trembling etc. We can go from being totally relaxed to totally tense in an
instant (related to panic).

Anxiety is a part of being alive. Although we may not realise it, it is with us all
at varying strengths throughout our lives:-

Without anxiety [of being knocked down] we wouldn't be careful when we
crossed the road.
Without anxiety [of not having food and shelter, (or recognition, status,
achievement)] we wouldn't go to work each day.
Without anxiety, the performances of athletes, entertainers, executives,
students etc.would suffer (if they bothered to perform at all)

It is essential to our survival, yet for a number of reasons it can increase in strength
and presence. It may come to be with us more intensely and give rise to anxiety
disorders involving such things as persistent worrying and apprehension, panic,
phobias, OCD and depression.

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