But What About ...? Applying General Principles in Anxiety Recovery (EP 69)
Disordered: Anxiety Help
Josh Fletcher and Drew Linsalata
4.9 • 665 Ratings
🗓️ 5 July 2024
⏱️ 43 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
If you've ever listened to an episode of Disordered and felt the need to ask "Yes, but what about when ...?", then this episode is for you.
A common struggle among people trying to overcome chronic and disordered anxiety is gaining the ability to generalize the principles of recovery and apply them in an individual context. Anxious people will often hear advice aimed at different types of anxious presentations, then ask for specific advice aimed at their specific fears or thoughts or symptoms.
That's a reasonable thing to ask of course, but what if the advice you're hearing for panic attacks also applies to GAD or OCD or health anxiety? Can you see how the principles of eliminating avoidance and doing the opposite of what your fear wants to you do might apply in your situation?
Recovery isn't necessarily about learning how to eradicate your specific symptom or worry. It's about learning that avoiding and struggling against your internal experiences is making things worse instead of better. This general principle is applicable regardless of the specific struggle in any given moment.
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https://bit.ly/worryrumination
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Unless you specifically speak about my specific thing, does it apply to me? |
| 0:08.3 | The principles always apply, but they look different depending on how your anxiety presents. |
| 0:14.5 | If you've got anxiety, you can have infinite thoughts and infinite fears. |
| 0:17.9 | But when you stick to the principles, you've got something to latch on to. |
| 0:21.6 | But if you can learn to generalize the principles and connect to them, you'd have an easier |
| 0:26.6 | time applying them to your own particular struggle. |
| 0:28.6 | I'm trying to fix my feeling. |
| 0:30.6 | I got to not fix it. |
| 0:32.6 | Whatever way you're doing that, I get to start to drop that fixing thing. |
| 0:35.6 | I am trying to not feel a certain way. |
| 0:38.1 | I need to get away from these feelings, be the physical or thoughts or emotions. |
| 0:41.9 | Then that gives you the principle to apply. |
| 0:44.6 | Do the opposite of what the misfiring threat response wants you to do. |
| 0:52.4 | Welcome to Disordered. |
| 0:53.6 | This is episode 69 of the podcast entitled, But What About? |
| 0:58.1 | I'm Drew Lin Salata. I am a therapist in training, specializing in anxiety and anxiety disorders. |
| 1:03.0 | In New York, I am clearly a podcaster because I'm co-hosting this one. |
| 1:06.9 | I'm an author on the topic of anxiety and anxiety disorders, social media guy, advocate, educator, |
| 1:11.9 | former sufferer of panic disorder, gorophobia, OCD, depression for many years in my life on |
| 1:16.6 | and off, but doing better now and co-hosting with this guy. |
| 1:20.4 | Hi, I'm Joshua Fletcher, also known as Anxiety Josh. |
| 1:24.0 | I'm a psychotherapist who specializes in the world of anxiety and anxiety disorders. |
... |
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