Are Pushing At Work, Smoking, And Drinking Underlying Factors Of Anxiety Disorder?

Video Transcript

Could pushing myself at work, smoking, and drinking be some of my underlying factors?

Well, they may not be your underlying factors, per se, because your underlying factors are usually deeper than that. They're the reasons we do behaviors. Now, these aren't going to help with your physical recovery because pushing yourself at work creates stress, smoking creates stress, and drinking creates stress to the body and punishes the nervous system, so they're not going to help with your physical recovery.

But you want to identify the reasons why you have those behaviors. And that's what the underlying factor work is. And some of the examples could be people pleasing. Some of them could be drivenness. And some of them could be performance-based self-worth, and those kinds of things. Those would be more specific to your underlying factor work.

But as for the ones you mentioned, no, they are stressing your body, but they're not specifically the underlying factors.

And of course, working with an experienced anxiety disorder therapist will help you identify and address those underlying factors, which will reflect in the behavioral changes you'll be making towards recovery.