Anxiety Is An Alarm: What Is It Telling You?

When our alarm clock goes off, it is unpleasant and we want it to stop but it is telling us something very important–get up. When a smoke detector goes off, we cover our ears because the sound is so loud and annoying, but we act. Why is it that we act upon all the alarms in our life but when we are experiencing anxiety we suppress it and move on with life? We don’t take out the smoke detector batteries and ignore the fire. We don’t hit the snooze button and ignore the important meeting at work (at least not all the time). We need to learn to become aware of what our body’s alarm is telling us about our health. Yes, there are medications that can help treat anxiety but are they a necessity or are they helping you ignore the anxiety?

Your anxiety alarm goes off to call you to action. This can either be saying you need to do more or do less. Here is what I mean by that, you may have a test coming up that is causing much stress. Your anxiety alarm sounds telling you to do more- study more. This is a positive call to action that benefits you by making you choose to study to calm the anxiety.

On the other hand, your anxiety may be telling you that you need to do less. Each person has their limit even though we do not want to admit it. This is also a positive call to action because your body is informing you that you are taking on too much responsibility and to chill out. When cutting back on responsibilities, this anxiety will be calmed.

Anxiety is unpleasant but it is meant to be. In the same way, a sore throat, a broken foot, and headaches are all unpleasant to tell you that something is wrong and to seek help. I write this not to deter each of you from the route of medication and further treatment, but to help you examine yourself and see if there is a lifestyle change that can impact you for the better.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/making-change/201504/your-anxiety-might-be-healthy-sign