Understanding Anxiety
Anxiety isn’t always a bad thing. That nervous feeling we get when we’re about to do something new or unfamiliar can actually be helpful. It helps us focus, prepare, and shows us that something matters to us.
Our bodies have an alarm system designed to keep us safe. When there’s real danger, that alarm does exactly what it’s meant to do.
Sometimes though, the alarm becomes too sensitive.
It’s like a smoke alarm that goes off not only when there’s a fire, but when someone burns toast or when a leaf blows past the window. Nothing dangerous is happening, but the alarm reacts as if it is.
When this happens in the body, we notice physical changes. The heart beats faster, breathing shifts, muscles tense, thoughts race. The body feels anxious and quickly decides, “I feel anxious, so I must be in danger.” The alarm gets louder, and the body reacts, sometimes more strongly than the situation needs.
When the alarm sounds, the body automatically tries to protect us. It might get ready to run away, fight back, freeze and shut down, or try to keep others calm to stay safe. This is called the fight, flight, freeze, flop, fawn response. These responses helped humans survive real danger long before modern life existed.
The difficulty is that this system doesn’t always get it right. The same protective responses can switch on during everyday stress, change, or emotional overwhelm. The body reacts as if something is wrong, even when it isn’t. In that sense, anxiety isn’t a sign that something is broken; it’s a system that’s overreacting.
Anxiety becomes a problem when the alarm is going off so often that it starts to take over daily life, stopping us or our children from doing things that matter, or keeping the body on edge much of the time.
The aim isn’t to get rid of anxiety altogether. We don’t want to remove the alarm. We want to help it learn the difference between real danger and false alerts, and to settle more quickly when it’s been triggered by something small.
If this feels familiar, you’re not alone. Many people, adults and children alike, live with sensitive alarm systems.
The resources like box breathing, body scan, belly breathing, starfish breathing and my Spotify playlists may help calm the alarm when it’s going off too much.