Anxiety: why trying to control it can sometimes make it worse
Estela Adamuz
4 min read
When anxiety appears, the most natural reaction is to want it to go away. We try to distract ourselves, breathe to calm down, stop thinking, avoid whatever is making us nervous, or tell ourselves, “I need to calm down.” And sometimes, that works.
The problem starts when we put so much energy into trying to control anxiety that we end up paying even more attention to it. Imagine you notice your heart beating faster and think, “Not again. I need to calm down.” Then you start checking your breathing, your pulse, your thoughts… Am I feeling better? Is it still there? What if it gets worse? Without realising it, your attention becomes completely focused on the anxiety.
Anxiety is part of our alarm system.
It prepares us to respond to situations we interpret as threatening. The problem begins when we start interpreting anxiety itself as something dangerous.
A cycle can then develop: I feel anxious, I worry about feeling anxious, I try to get rid of it, I keep checking whether it has gone away, and I end up noticing it even more.
It is also common to try to protect ourselves by avoiding whatever makes us uncomfortable. If driving on the motorway makes me anxious, I stop doing it. If a meeting makes me nervous, I try not to go. If I’m afraid of becoming anxious in front of other people, I start turning down certain plans.
In the short term, this brings relief. But our brain may also learn: “Good thing we avoided it. If we had gone, maybe something bad would have happened.”
When avoidance becomes our main way of dealing with anxiety, it can gradually begin to take up more and more space in our lives. What started as one specific situation can slowly begin to influence our decisions, plans, and routines.
So, what do we do with anxiety?
It is not about ignoring it or resigning ourselves to feeling bad. It is about gradually changing our relationship with it.
Instead of thinking, “I need this anxiety to disappear before I can do this,” we can begin to practise something different:
“I’d rather not feel anxious, but I can still do this even if anxiety is here.”
Sometimes, moving forward does not mean making anxiety disappear.
It means being able to tolerate a certain amount of discomfort without letting it make our decisions for us.
In therapy, we can learn to recognise which situations trigger our anxiety, what we do when it appears, and what we may have gradually stopped doing because we are afraid of feeling it.
The goal is not always to achieve a life completely free from anxiety, but something perhaps more realistic and also more valuable: building a life in which anxiety can show up without taking up all the space.
Because feeling anxious does not mean you are going backwards.
Sometimes, the real change is being able to say:
“Anxiety came with me, but this time it didn’t choose the path.”
When anxiety appears, the most natural reaction is to want it to go away. We try to distract ourselves, breathe to calm down, stop thinking, avoid whatever is making us nervous, or tell ourselves, “I need to calm down.” And sometimes, that works.
The problem starts when we put so much energy into trying to control anxiety that we end up paying even more attention to it. Imagine you notice your heart beating faster and think, “Not again. I need to calm down.” Then you start checking your breathing, your pulse, your thoughts… Am I feeling better? Is it still there? What if it gets worse? Without realising it, your attention becomes completely focused on the anxiety.
Anxiety is part of our alarm system.
It prepares us to respond to situations we interpret as threatening. The problem begins when we start interpreting anxiety itself as something dangerous.
A cycle can then develop: I feel anxious, I worry about feeling anxious, I try to get rid of it, I keep checking whether it has gone away, and I end up noticing it even more.
It is also common to try to protect ourselves by avoiding whatever makes us uncomfortable. If driving on the motorway makes me anxious, I stop doing it. If a meeting makes me nervous, I try not to go. If I’m afraid of becoming anxious in front of other people, I start turning down certain plans.
In the short term, this brings relief. But our brain may also learn: “Good thing we avoided it. If we had gone, maybe something bad would have happened.”
When avoidance becomes our main way of dealing with anxiety, it can gradually begin to take up more and more space in our lives. What started as one specific situation can slowly begin to influence our decisions, plans, and routines.
So, what do we do with anxiety?
It is not about ignoring it or resigning ourselves to feeling bad. It is about gradually changing our relationship with it.
Instead of thinking, “I need this anxiety to disappear before I can do this,” we can begin to practise something different:
“I’d rather not feel anxious, but I can still do this even if anxiety is here.”
Sometimes, moving forward does not mean making anxiety disappear.
It means being able to tolerate a certain amount of discomfort without letting it make our decisions for us.
In therapy, we can learn to recognise which situations trigger our anxiety, what we do when it appears, and what we may have gradually stopped doing because we are afraid of feeling it.
The goal is not always to achieve a life completely free from anxiety, but something perhaps more realistic and also more valuable: building a life in which anxiety can show up without taking up all the space.
Because feeling anxious does not mean you are going backwards.
Sometimes, the real change is being able to say:
“Anxiety came with me, but this time it didn’t choose the path.”