Different Views Of Anxiety & How To Decrease Related Suffering

Last weeks’ posts have been about anxiety provoking thoughts and how these can be handled to reduce experienced suffering through different techniques. These techniques are used in cognitive behavioural therapy, CBT.

In this view anxiety is triggered by the fear of experiencing different kinds of perceived dangers at the moment or in the near future – whether likely or not – as in different kinds of phobias.

But there is another school of thought that views anxiety as symptoms of stress. Typical examples of this is for example stress induced panic attacks.

Linked to this line of thinking is also some of the more modern thinking within the psychodynamic field that stems from Freud, such as ISTDP – intensive short term dynamic psychotherapy.

Here, anxiety is thought to rise within us when we experience strong mixed emotions that we in some way during childhood have learnt are dangerous.

A common example is when showing emotions challenged our emotional closeness to family members by experiencing them reacting negatively to our display of emotions.

More about what can be done the to reduce this kind of anxiety in coming posts.