How Do I Stop Disliking My Anxiety Symptoms?

Video Transcript

I understand it’s important to stop fearing and disliking anxiety symptoms if we want to eliminate them. Since anxiety symptoms are just symptoms of stress that will subside when we reduce stress, I can stop fearing them. I’m working on that now.

But do I really need to “like” my anxiety symptoms to overcome disliking them? And if so, how can I “like” my anxiety symptoms since they can feel so powerful and debilitating at times?

Since anxiety symptoms are temporary symptoms of acute and chronic stress that will subside when we reduce stress, we don’t have to fear them. Since anxiety symptoms are temporary and don’t cause physical harm, there’s no reason to think they are dangerous.

And if your doctor has attributed your symptoms solely to anxiety or stress, you aren’t in any danger. So again, there is no reason to fear anxiety symptoms. They will subside when you reduce stress and give your body sufficient time to recover.

As for the question, do I have to “like” anxiety symptoms to overcome disliking them? No, you don’t have to like your anxiety symptoms to overcome disliking them. But you do need to at least tolerate your anxiety symptoms so you aren’t creating stress by disliking them.

Since anxiety symptoms are symptoms of stress, and disliking anxiety symptoms creates stress, not reacting to anxiety symptoms is another important ingredient that can accelerate recovery.

So, while we don’t have to “like” anxiety symptoms, we at least have to tolerate and stop reacting to them with dislike.

To assist with that, we want to remember that many people go to great lengths to create the strong feelings of fear and anxiety because they like the exhilaration of fear.

For instance, thrill seekers like bungee jumpers, skydivers, racecar drivers, and those who love scary and horror movies have grown to love the strong feelings of fear and anxiety. The difference is that they know the strong feelings of fear and anxiety are temporary, they know the cause, and they know that those strong feelings end when they remove themselves from the activity, so they aren’t afraid of them.

We can get to the same place when we know that our anxiety symptoms are temporary symptoms of acute and chronic stress, we know the cause, which is anxious behavior, and once we learn to contain and control anxiety, the feelings of anxiety will end.
 
So again, while we don’t have to “like” our anxiety symptoms, we can at least stop reacting to them with dislike.

Learning to passively-accept and tolerate anxiety feelings and symptoms, and learning to control anxiety through containment, can eliminate the stress caused by disliking them.

Chapter 6, in the Recovery Support area of our website, explains passive acceptance and containment. Learning passive-acceptance and containment are vital to lasting success over anxiety disorder, as they are two of the Seven Principles to Conquering Anxiety Disorder.

Again, for more information, Recovery Support members can visit Chapter 6 in the Recovery Support area.