Anxiety - Why you should face fears, and when not to.

[binary suns]

A general discussion, but very important for trans folk in our difficult situations. And when it boils down to it, gender dysphoria is anxiety, anxiety is fear. 

 

There will be many parts to my posting full guidance and commentary. More is to come, for now I have two parts. 

 

 

Part one - intro, and how to identify unnecessary fear. 

 

 

 

Something gives you a strong negative emotional response? Our instincts are to defend ourselves against them. Attack them, run away from them. 

 

But a stranger walking the same direction as us 20 feet behind us, is not a leopard. The reason we fear him is coming from the part of our brain that recognizes threats. It is true that he could be a danger, but being able to assess that danger - and whether you need to protect yourself and when not - is exactly why we feel relief when we realize the bear is just a rock.

 

 

See this is how our negative emotions are supposed to protect us - or at least, one example anyway - we are walking down a deer path in the woods. It turns a corner, and there is an ominous shadow - it looks like a bear! We become instantly alert and our emotions not only heighten our senses and ability to run (or hide by freezing up) - but they also bring all our attention onto this potential threat. Now, we are prepared for this possibility - and we cautiously inspect the shadow. It does not really move, and its shape lacks certain traits that a bear's shadow would have.... cautiously, we move forward, and peer around the corner to see what is casting the shadow. It is a boulder! Okay great! Crisis averted - there is no threat after all! We are a little unsettled by the experience, but our emotions settle down quickly at first, and fully over time, slowly. After a half hour usually we are already mentally in a new space, forgetting the scare we had before - or perhaps we are alert with our fear during the entire gathering endeavor, not safe until we return home to the community cave. 

 

 

 

So in the modern day - we can't go with a hunter who knows how to react to a bear, and learn from both his example and experience on how to determine safe situations on our own. But we can learn from others' examples and assistance, and we can also learn on our own too! 

 

 

When we are feeling able to, if we look to notice our boundaries, what gives our strong negative emotions... this is great. If we can challenge that boundary a little bit.. that is great! If we are able to safely cross that boundary... wow! doing these over and over again, and looking for these opportunities, will strongly help us to grow our ability to assess what is true danger and what isn't. 

 

 

This is the essential for why we want to face our fears - because facing them will help us to better understand it, and to learn how to assess the threat it represents, or instead when there is actually no threat - and create opportunity that running from the fear would deny us. 

 

 

 

when not to push ourselves to face the fear? any time we don't feel up to it. We avoid the fear trigger to protect ourselves. So keep doing that. Just be careful to challenge that happen when you can - because that is another way to protect ourselves - protect ourselves by building up our strength against it, so that we can afford to be with it more often. 

[binary suns]

Part 2 - what anxiety really is and how it works in our mind

 

The unfortunate truth of anxiety is... it is thoughts and emotions that stick with you for a long time and disrupt your life, when they should not exist. Fear-response to things that aren't real threats to our livelihood. 

 

This is important to recognize, because it helps us to realize that it is our own mind that is being difficult. It is likely something we will have a hard time to remove from our life - perhaps we will, and I believe it is possible - but at the very least, we can learn how to notice when our mind is treating us poorly, and learn strategies to be strong despite it. 

 

The other reason why this is important - is because as long as we project those inflated fears onto the cause external to us, we actually reward that fear!

 

 

See, the brain has a lot of plasticity - it is how the brain learns. Neurons are a network, and that's how they understand things - and keep track of association. To many levels, this is very much exactly what pavlov's dog example represents - what is consistent becomes learned. 

 

 

Most people's anxiety in part or in full come from negative-feedback pavlovian-learning. I was bullied heavily as a kid, and my role models were uncommunicative and anxious themselves. Because of this, I grew up at the most important time of my life with conditioning of paranoia and self-muting, repression - it negatively affects my life in many ways. As far as I know, there could be other reason for my anxiety - and likely, after the bad behavior of my firing neurons started, less problematic things were exaggerated by what anxiousness was already there - and more irrational paranoia was introduced, aggravating my general learned trauma. 

 

 

Even if your anxiety comes from something less responsive and more permanent - your ability to learn that is essential to the brain enables you to cheat that permanency on enough of a level that you can still build strength.  But also - if your anxiety does in part come from things that were not learned, the pre-existence of sensitivity to anxiety actually intrinsically creates that negative learning. But learning how to respond to difficulty will help strengthen yourself against that threat - and for us anxious people, even if it is learned, it is a threat to our emotional and mental health - strengthening against that threat will help curb its effect on our life, and over time builds up. 

 

 

 

How this relates to gender dysphoria? well, I don't know the science fully so for the sake of being fair to that, we'll assume that gender dysphoria comes from 1) learning 2) identity contrast and 3) something else that cannot change

 

well.. pining for unicorns won't make them come into existence. But with the unicorn example, well... we can draw them, and other ways. We can also role play settings with them, or play games with them. We can also accept that there is no unicorn, but still embrace our love of them - the truth of what can't be won't stop the truth of what we experience. 

 

Hopefully that gave obvious analogies to gender dysphoria. Depending on what you want in your life, you can change your life so that you can embrace your identity. This is not meant to be a list of examples and I am sorry if you need that and it ain't here - this is meant to explain the theory behind it all. 

 

 

 

 

And most important - if you feel lost, uncertain, this is okay. It is essential to life. The baby feels very lost and uncertain... but over time we forget the instinct we had as a kid, as we find ideas and identities that distract us from it. 

 

How to embrace uncertainty... we take steps one at a time. look for a hypothesis to test, or run with, make assumptions if needed but be ready to backtrack if the assumption seems not to work. We take steps one at a time... look to the steps we can see, and take those. Follow old patterns if we have to. And, look for opportunity to use learning from another slice of life as a metaphor to help guide us with this new one here.

 

To embrace uncertainty is to accept the conditions you have, and let hope and curiosity guide you. If you feel like this is hard, have faith that with time, with practice, you will be more able to act in a positive direction despite uncertainty. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PS. I didn't really cover it full but the down-lo of our brains plasticity is - what neurons fire together, become strong together. They form memory, skill, and habit. When we let our anxiety run unchecked, it will only build itself in this way.

 

But the good thing is - dopamine receptors and other chemistries in the brain reword positive learning stronger than negative learning. So any work we do - however small - towards positive learning in our brain's network - will be a meaningful step in strengthening against anxiety. 

 

Sometimes our receptors for that dopamine get restricted - they will close up if they aren't getting enough dopamine. This makes things really challenging. 

 

 

Remember the importance of talking with a counselor and if needed a psychiatrist! My guide is only meant to help you do things on your own - in addition to looking for professional help if it is needed and wanted. (if it is not, your choice, but honest a counselor is a great assistant for anyone and everyone - ignore the inaccurate stigma that they're only for "broken" people - they aren't - they are basically a coach - even the highest golf pros have coaches) 

 

[Yep, me]

49 minutes ago, float on said:

A general discussion, but very important for trans folk in our difficult situations. And when it boils down to it, gender dysphoria is anxiety, anxiety is fear. 

 

There will be many parts to my posting full guidance and commentary. More is to come, for now I have two parts. 

 

 

Part one - intro, and how to identify unnecessary fear. 

 

 

 

Something gives you a strong negative emotional response? Our instincts are to defend ourselves against them. Attack them, run away from them. 

 

But a stranger walking the same direction as us 20 feet behind us, is not a leopard. The reason we fear him is coming from the part of our brain that recognizes threats. It is true that he could be a danger, but being able to assess that danger - and whether you need to protect yourself and when not - is exactly why we feel relief when we realize the bear is just a rock.

 

 

See this is how our negative emotions are supposed to protect us - or at least, one example anyway - we are walking down a deer path in the woods. It turns a corner, and there is an ominous shadow - it looks like a bear! We become instantly alert and our emotions not only heighten our senses and ability to run (or hide by freezing up) - but they also bring all our attention onto this potential threat. Now, we are prepared for this possibility - and we cautiously inspect the shadow. It does not really move, and its shape lacks certain traits that a bear's shadow would have.... cautiously, we move forward, and peer around the corner to see what is casting the shadow. It is a boulder! Okay great! Crisis averted - there is no threat after all! We are a little unsettled by the experience, but our emotions settle down quickly at first, and fully over time, slowly. After a half hour usually we are already mentally in a new space, forgetting the scare we had before - or perhaps we are alert with our fear during the entire gathering endeavor, not safe until we return home to the community cave. 

 

 

 

So in the modern day - we can't go with a hunter who knows how to react to a bear, and learn from both his example and experience on how to determine safe situations on our own. But we can learn from others' examples and assistance, and we can also learn on our own too! 

 

 

When we are feeling able to, if we look to notice our boundaries, what gives our strong negative emotions... this is great. If we can challenge that boundary a little bit.. that is great! If we are able to safely cross that boundary... wow! doing these over and over again, and looking for these opportunities, will strongly help us to grow our ability to assess what is true danger and what isn't. 

 

 

This is the essential for why we want to face our fears - because facing them will help us to better understand it, and to learn how to assess the threat it represents, or instead when there is actually no threat - and create opportunity that running from the fear would deny us. 

 

 

 

when not to push ourselves to face the fear? any time we don't feel up to it. We avoid the fear trigger to protect ourselves. So keep doing that. Just be careful to challenge that happen when you can - because that is another way to protect ourselves - protect ourselves by building up our strength against it, so that we can afford to be with it more often. 

Anxiety is not the same as fear, anxiety can come from sadness, anxiety can come from worry, anxiety can come from confusion, anxiety can come from loneliness, anxiety can come from depression, anxiety can come from many, many, things, including fear; yet is not the same thing.

[Yatogami]

1 hour ago, Zenzencat104 said:

Anxiety is not the same as fear, anxiety can come from sadness, anxiety can come from worry, anxiety can come from confusion, anxiety can come from loneliness, anxiety can come from depression, anxiety can come from many, many, things, including fear; yet is not the same thing.

Anxiety is fear in the biochemistry sense, a very constant mild feeling of fear. The over activation of the amygdala is what creates anxiety if I recall correctly. The amygdala is in charge of the fight and flight response, which functions in life threatening situations. People with anxiety, have the amygdala activate in non-life threatening situations. Resulting in things like panic attacks with the release of Adrenalin etc. 

 

You are mistaking the stimulus, as the anxiety itself. The stimulus, can and will be different for everyone. But the brain chemistry response is the same in everyone in varying degrees. 

[binary suns]

11 hours ago, Zenzencat104 said:

Anxiety is not the same as fear, anxiety can come from sadness, anxiety can come from worry, anxiety can come from confusion, anxiety can come from loneliness, anxiety can come from depression, anxiety can come from many, many, things, including fear; yet is not the same thing.

Fear can be fight or flight and this is one way anxiety manifests. Fear is also resistance to doing something challenging or unwanted or risky. Fear is also strong emotional concern about the risk of unwanted outcomes. Fear is also avoidance or paralyzation. 

 

 

 

I don’t count sadness as anxiety, I see them as two separate things. Sadness is often a part of anxiety, or vice verse, but anxiety itself is one thing, and sadness is another. Even if they are often associated.  While I frame my recommendation of what to do about and how to understand anxiety, a lot of it can bring parallels to handling sadness too; helping one will also involve strategies that help the other. But they are different and have some strategies that don’t apply to each other, so I target fear to keep a focus on that aspect, the aspect of resistance to trusting one’s ability to take action. 

 

 

Worry is the fear of how things can turn out negatively. One good start for worry is to take time to think, ask for advice, research, and prepare:  identify what you fear will happen; identify also what you do want to happen; prepare plans for how to respond to what you fear if it happens; think about what you can do to help decrease the chance it will happen. 

 

Confusion is basically the fear of not knowing; one example of how to handle being confused is to spend dedicated time to ask oneself “what is it” or “what can I do” and brainstorm ideas and writing them down. Working towards embracing uncertainty also is good; as having ideas of what you can do both emotionally but also in action can help give you something to do when afraid of the unknown/aka uncertainty

 

Loneliness tends to lean more on sadness and hopelessness, as well as some anxiety, but also has its own nature outside of those three. Like sadness, loneliness has aspects to it I don’t directly target with my suggestions for anxiety. While it can be a part of anxiety, it is not the same as what anxiety is, we are not limited to experiencing one emotion at a time. 

Loneliness is something I personally haven’t figured out yet. My experience if it is not a pressing threat to my livelihood so I prioritize emotional work elsewhere. 

 

Anxiety can come from depression but behaviorally and physiologically they are not the same. Anxiety’s physiology is very comparable to fear; and depression’s physiology has more to do with lack of reward and happiness feedback. Behaviorally anxiety is fight or flight, worry, avoidance, or paralyzation; behaviorally depression is tiredness, sadness, apathy, hopelessness, dulled  passion or dulled enjoyment, and lack of interest or motivation. 

 

Both anxiety and depression can be a result of lack of success, undeserving negative feedback, learned helplessness, self-image struggles, and other triggers. 

 

 

For me it it has been very important to identify and separate my anxiety from my depression. 

 

 

[binary suns]

9 hours ago, Malum said:

The over activation of the amygdala is what creates anxiety if I recall correctly. 

 

Yes I believe it is the amygdala. What I know is that anxiety is when the emotional aspect of our brain dwarfs the logical aspect of our brain, which is the prefrontal cortex  if I recall the keyword correctly. 

 

 

Literal all blood is cut of from the prefrontal cortex and sent to the amygdala. 

 

 

 

A good thing one can do about anxiety, is to breathe with the diaphragm, in through the nose slowly and regularly. Practice this breathe and look for its effectiveness, and naturally one will strengthen its effect.

 

breathing this way is in most bodies linked to their prefeintal cortex and grounded, realistic, wholesome, reasoning thought.

 

Not only are our nervous system usually connective from diaphragm to prefrontal cortex, (which I sense in my body to support that but don’t know the science why the link exists), but also this is a way to remind ourselves to diversify our focus away from the anxiety-stimulating thoughts and emotions, which further reward our ability to return our brain processing to collected reasoning instead of impulsive need. 

 

 Anxiety is when that sound thought process is functional (chemically) minimized as an instinct to hone the brain on heightening senses and muscle responsiveness. Often anxiety involves overstimulation, hypersensitivity, erratic muscles, bodily tension, and irrational thought, as well as intense compelling emotion. 

[Yep, me]

12 hours ago, Malum said:

Anxiety is fear in the biochemistry sense, a very constant mild feeling of fear. The over activation of the amygdala is what creates anxiety if I recall correctly. The amygdala is in charge of the fight and flight response, which functions in life threatening situations. People with anxiety, have the amygdala activate in non-life threatening situations. Resulting in things like panic attacks with the release of Adrenalin etc. 

 

You are mistaking the stimulus, as the anxiety itself. The stimulus, can and will be different for everyone. But the brain chemistry response is the same in everyone in varying degrees. 

Although it’s genetic cause is the same, the symptoms and how to solve them is different for me, perhaps the different forms of anxiety and fear are caused in different ways to the degree that it produces a different result with the amygdala, or it’s the same thing at base level, and something else is giving it distinction.

[Yep, me]

2 hours ago, float on said:

Fear can be fight or flight and this is one way anxiety manifests. Fear is also resistance to doing something challenging or unwanted or risky. Fear is also strong emotional concern about the risk of unwanted outcomes. Fear is also avoidance or paralyzation. 

 

 

 

I don’t count sadness as anxiety, I see them as two separate things. Sadness is often a part of anxiety, or vice verse, but anxiety itself is one thing, and sadness is another. Even if they are often associated.  While I frame my recommendation of what to do about and how to understand anxiety, a lot of it can bring parallels to handling sadness too; helping one will also involve strategies that help the other. But they are different and have some strategies that don’t apply to each other, so I target fear to keep a focus on that aspect, the aspect of resistance to trusting one’s ability to take action. 

 

 

Worry is the fear of how things can turn out negatively. One good start for worry is to take time to think, ask for advice, research, and prepare:  identify what you fear will happen; identify also what you do want to happen; prepare plans for how to respond to what you fear if it happens; think about what you can do to help decrease the chance it will happen. 

 

Confusion is basically the fear of not knowing; one example of how to handle being confused is to spend dedicated time to ask oneself “what is it” or “what can I do” and brainstorm ideas and writing them down. Working towards embracing uncertainty also is good; as having ideas of what you can do both emotionally but also in action can help give you something to do when afraid of the unknown/aka uncertainty

 

Loneliness tends to lean more on sadness and hopelessness, as well as some anxiety, but also has its own nature outside of those three. Like sadness, loneliness has aspects to it I don’t directly target with my suggestions for anxiety. While it can be a part of anxiety, it is not the same as what anxiety is, we are not limited to experiencing one emotion at a time. 

Loneliness is something I personally haven’t figured out yet. My experience if it is not a pressing threat to my livelihood so I prioritize emotional work elsewhere. 

 

Anxiety can come from depression but behaviorally and physiologically they are not the same. Anxiety’s physiology is very comparable to fear; and depression’s physiology has more to do with lack of reward and happiness feedback. Behaviorally anxiety is fight or flight, worry, avoidance, or paralyzation; behaviorally depression is tiredness, sadness, apathy, hopelessness, dulled  passion or dulled enjoyment, and lack of interest or motivation. 

 

Both anxiety and depression can be a result of lack of success, undeserving negative feedback, learned helplessness, self-image struggles, and other triggers. 

 

 

For me it it has been very important to identify and separate my anxiety from my depression. 

 

 

What I was saying was that those things are NOT the same, but can CAUSE anxiety for me.

[Guest]

@float on Thank you for sharing your wisdom regarding this. ❤