The Anxiety Cycle: How Anxiety Keeps Itself Going
Anxiety can be a strange experience. You can know that you're probably okay and still find yourself checking something again, replaying a conversation, asking someone for reassurance or trying to work out every possible outcome.
When we do these things, we're usually trying to get somewhere very understandable: we want to feel safe.
If you could just be certain that the email was fine, that your partner wasn't upset, that the conversation would go well or that nothing unexpected was going to happen, perhaps you could finally relax.
The trouble is that anxiety can turn that understandable wish for safety into a never-ending search for certainty.
And this is where the anxiety cycle begins.
Anxiety wants certainty
When something feels uncertain or potentially threatening, your mind naturally starts looking for answers.
Did I do something wrong? What if something goes badly? What if I can't handle it? What if I've missed something?
You might check, prepare, seek reassurance, avoid something difficult or spend a lot of time thinking things through. These responses make sense because they offer the possibility of feeling more certain and, with it, a little less anxious.
And often, they work.
You check the email and feel reassured. You ask your partner if everything is okay and your mind settles. You put off the difficult conversation and feel the tension ease.
Your brain takes note of that relief.
It learns that checking, reassurance or avoidance helped you feel safer. So when a similar feeling of uncertainty comes along again, those responses become more tempting.
This is one of the ways anxiety maintains itself. Psychologists call it negative reinforcement: a behaviour becomes more likely because it removes something unpleasant.
The important thing is that the behaviour isn't necessarily irrational or foolish. It has a job. It's trying to protect you.
The problem is what you may be missing out on while it does that job.
You don't get to discover that you can handle it
Imagine you keep checking your work because you're worried about making a mistake. Each time you check, you get a little more reassurance.
But you also get less opportunity to discover something else: that you might be able to make a mistake and handle it.
Or perhaps you're worried about a difficult conversation, so you rehearse it repeatedly before you have it. You imagine every possible response and prepare what you'll say in return.
You may feel more prepared, but you also haven't had much opportunity to discover that you can walk into an uncertain conversation, respond as things unfold and trust yourself to cope.
This is the part of anxiety that can be easy to miss.
The problem isn't simply that you're checking, avoiding or overthinking too much. It's that these behaviours can stop you from developing confidence in your ability to cope without them.
That confidence is very different from certainty.
Certainty says, I know this will be okay.
Confidence says, I don't know exactly what will happen, but I'll handle whatever comes.
Anxiety tends to want the first one.
A more flexible life comes from developing the second.
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The cost of trying to make sure nothing goes wrong
Those qualities can be wonderful strengths.
But anxiety can quietly turn them into a full-time job.
You might spend your evening going over a conversation from earlier in the day. You might keep checking your phone because you're worried about what someone's silence means. You might delay a decision because you haven't worked out every possible consequence.
Nothing particularly dramatic may be happening on the outside, but your mind is rarely off duty.
And that is a cost worth noticing.
Because the question isn't only “Is this behaviour making my anxiety worse?”
It's also:
“What is all this effort costing me?”
How much mental space is being taken up by trying to prevent something going wrong? How much time is spent preparing for conversations that haven't happened, solving problems that may never occur or trying to feel completely certain before you move forward?
Sometimes the cost of anxiety isn't one big restriction.
It's the accumulation of all those little moments when your attention could have been somewhere else.
What might life look like without all that certainty?
This doesn't mean you would suddenly stop caring, become carefree or never worry again.
It might look much more ordinary than that.
You send the email and trust yourself to leave it there.
You make the decision without knowing for certain that it's the perfect one.
You have the conversation without rehearsing every possible version beforehand.
You notice that someone hasn't replied to your message, feel the little flicker of uncertainty and carry on with your afternoon rather than trying to work out what it means.
You have an anxious thought and don't automatically treat it as something that needs your attention.
And perhaps most importantly, you start to trust yourself a little more.
Not because you've finally worked out how to prevent bad things from happening, but because you've begun to discover that you can cope when they do.
The goal isn't to make life completely safe
This is an important part of working with anxiety.
There is no amount of checking, planning, thinking or reassurance that can guarantee that nothing difficult will happen. Life contains uncertainty. People disappoint us. Plans change.
We make mistakes. Sometimes things happen that we would much rather have avoided.
Anxiety can convince us that the answer is to get better and better at preventing those things.
But there is another possibility.
What if the goal isn't to become someone who can guarantee that everything will be okay?
What if it's to become someone who knows that even when everything isn't okay, you will be able to handle it?
That is a very different way of viewing yourself.
It gives you permission to stop trying to predict every outcome and start trusting your capacity to respond to whatever comes.
Breaking the anxiety cycle
This is often where counselling can help. Rather than simply trying to get rid of anxious feelings, we can slow the cycle down and look at what anxiety is asking you to do.
What are you trying to make certain? What are you trying to prevent? What happens when you resist the urge to check, avoid, reassure yourself or think something through for another hour?
Over time, you can begin to practise doing things differently. You might approach something you've been avoiding, allow some uncertainty to remain unresolved or let an anxious thought pass without treating it as an instruction.
The aim isn't to prove to yourself that nothing bad will happen.
It's to discover that you don't need that guarantee in order to live your life.
Because there is something much more freeing than knowing that everything will be okay.
It's knowing that whatever happens, you can meet it.
And perhaps that is one of the most valuable things anxiety can teach us: a life spent trying to prevent every difficult feeling or possible problem can cost far more than learning to trust yourself to handle them when they come.
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