Why am I anxious all the time?

Do you wake up with a knot in your stomach before the day has even started or find yourself replaying things in your mind long after you were supposed to go to sleep? When you feel anxious most of the time, it’s exhausting. It might feel like everyone else has figured out how to relax and you’re the only one who hasn’t. 

If you’re wondering ‘Why am I always so anxious and how could counselling help?’ here’s the analogy I often use.

Anxiety is like a smoke alarm.

It’s main job is to alert us to a risk as quickly and loudly as possible so that we can take action to stay safe.

For some people, their smoke alarm is currently above the toaster. Not the most helpful place for it because it goes off all the time. Whenever there’s a hint of smoke, even if there isn’t any real risk or danger, the alarm sounds. It has a frequent, frustrating impact on daily life.

You might be asking: How did my alarm get to be above the toaster in the first place? It’s not that anything is wrong with you. Our alarm learns where to sit based on a whole range of things. If you’ve experienced difficult things that meant you’ve had to be more alert, or you’ve spent a long time under stress, or you’ve learned to doubt yourself, your alarm system might have learned to go off early to keep you safe. It’s been doing its job. It just hasn’t realised that the danger has passed.

Lots of people have been taught to “wave a tea towel” in front of the smoke alarm to try to switch it off. They use strategies to manage a constant feeling of anxiety, such as distraction techniques, keeping busy, breathing exercises or grounding techniques. These can absolutely be useful in the short term and are helpful to have on hand. But many people are understandably exhausted from constantly waving a tea towel at an alarm that keeps going off.

Here’s the thing about smoke alarms: we wouldn’t want to take the batteries out or throw them away completely because they still keep us safe. In the same way, we can’t make anxiety go away altogether because it has a job to do.

So instead of trying to make it disappear entirely, or focusing only on ways to manage it, in counselling we look at moving the smoke alarm away from the toaster. We help anxiety learn how to do its job well, so it’s there when it’s actually needed, without the constant impact on day to day life.

Some of the ways we might do this include:

• Exploring where and when anxiety started. We do this at your pace and only as far as feels right for you.
• Reflecting on the beliefs and narratives that keep it stuck e.g. “If I don’t plan for the worst, something bad will happen.”
• Understanding the context around you and how life might be affecting how you feel. Take a look at ‘The Spoon Theory’ blog for a bit of an example of this.
• Putting in place the sustainable changes you’d like to make. One step at a time and with lots of support.

The goal isn’t a life with no smoke alarm, it’s one where the alarm keeps you safe when it’s needed and also gives you the time and space to enjoy the toast!