Understanding Anxiety

When the nervous system interprets something as unsafe, it activates a fear response — it’s like the alarm bell going off in our bodies. And when the alarm sounds, you might kick into action; run away; or feel stuck in high alert, too frozen to do anything at all (our fight/flight/freeze response). 

When we’re actually in danger, this fear response is super helpful. It does a good job at keeping us safe. But for many people, especially those who have been affected by chronic stress, emotional unpredictability, or trauma, the body’s alarm bell can get stuck in the “on” position. This always-sounding warning is how we experience anxiety. You may find yourself constantly on high alert, worrying about messing up or what could go wrong, overthinking every decision, or feeling tension in your body that never truly settles.

Why Anxiety Feels So Overwhelming

Anxiety isn’t driven by logic. It usually comes from deeper beliefs about safety and danger that live in the body, not the thinking mind. Because assessing danger is imperative for our survival, we use a faster-than-thinking system for this: our implicit memory, which is comprised of our emotions, sensations, and physical impulses related to our past experiences.

If those experiences taught your nervous system that the world is unpredictable or that you had to stay hypervigilant to be okay, your alarm system may be reacting to things that feel dangerous even when you’re objectively safe. This is why anxiety can be so intense, and why you might feel frustrated with yourself for not being able to “logic” your way out of it. Nothing about this is your fault. Anxiety makes sense on the deeper, implicit level. 

How Therapy Can Help Anxiety

In our work together, we gently explore how anxiety lives in your body and what your alarm system has been trying to protect you from. We’ll build supportive tools to help you cope in the moment, and we’ll also work at the deeper level, shifting the implicit beliefs that keep the alarm activated.

When your anxiety is a response to real-time threats, we’ll explore ways to listen to the intelligence of that signal without it overpowering you.

My approach is warm, collaborative, and paced with care. Together, we work toward helping your body feel safer, your mind feel quieter, and your life feel more spacious. So you can move through the world with more confidence, presence, and trust in yourself.