Anxiety will make itself the single most important thing in the universe at all times. It will kick and scream and make a scene and demand that you make every decision and take every action based solely on how it will make you feel. No matter the event, anxiety will invariably demand that you evaluate it based on how it effects YOU.
☕ “How does this make me feel?”
☕ “Is this making me anxious?”
☕ “If I do this, will I get more anxious?”
Sound familiar? Here’s the most insidious variant on that theme:
☕ “Did I FEEL right when I did that? Was I supposed to feel that way?”
This one really grinds my gears. Anxiety will demand that you ask this question after you face a challenge, complete an exposure, or do something that you knew would be difficult. You did it. You accomplished the task. But anxiety will twist things so that you only care about how you FELT while you were doing it.
This most often expresses as as sense of failure because you were afraid during an exposure, or because you experienced panic. You FELT a certain way, so only how you FELT seems to matter. What you actually DID goes right out the window and gets thrown away. This is also seen as a demand to feel a certain way. This is most prevalent when an anxious person can’t conjure instant feelings of nirvana, unbounded love and intense joy when interacting with a child or someone else they love.
“I was at the playground with my son but only felt fear. I did not feel love and joy, so not only am I sick with anxiety, but it has turned into me into a bad mother.”
That’s heartbreaking to see, primarily because it is so tragically wrong.
☕ ☕ ☕
How you feel is not the only thing that matters in the universe. It is not the ultimate measure of success, failure, or correctness. Judging recovery progress and measuring yourself against idealized feelings that you DEMAND to have is a huge mistake. Sometimes we will feel one way. Sometimes we will feel another. It’s all allowed, and all OK.
☕ ☕ ☕
Anxiety will demand evaluation based on how you feel, and many anxious people get caught in this trap. So if this email can offer one bit of advice, it would be this:
At least consider for a moment the possibility that how you feel - especially while in an anxious state - is simply not the most important thing and not reflective of anything in particular. This may sound ridiculous to you, but even if it does, just try to imagine what your recovery might look like if this assertion turns out to be true.
Just a little something to think about on a Tuesday morning.
Tomorrow we’ll start a little three part mini-series focusing on the topic of hope, and hoping for better days.
I’m currently reading “Living Beautifully With Uncertainty And Change” by Pema Chodron. It was gifted to me by my friend Lauren Rosen (@theobsessivemind on Instagram). Everything changes and nothing is ever truly certain. This book is a lovely guide to accepting and living with that uncomfortable fact, written in a very kind and compassionate voice.
Every Tuesday I’ll let you know what I’m currently reading. I read quite a bit on psychology and philosophy, but really you never know what I’ll have in my Kindle or Audible libraries! If you’re on Goodreads and into books, you can follow/friend me over there. Here’s a link to my “currently reading” shelf. I’d love to see what you’re reading and what you recommend.
47. Judging Everything On How You Feel