Anxiety: Being Lost in the Supermarket of our Heads

Do you remember it? That feeling when an adult you trust, whose leg is as long as you are tall, is walking next to you; your bastion of comfort you take it for granted for your, let's say, 5 years. You are ruminating over something crucial to your developing brain, like why bull's like Chinese food or what the word 'fuck' means, and wondering how, and if, you can broach the subject. Mid-contemplation you look up. The leg you had in the corner of your eye is not attached to your mum or dad. You look wildly, and none of the nearby faces walking past you giving you little notice are either.

Your mind does the closest 5 year old equivalent to 'SHIIIIIIIIIT!'

You look around. Mum and dad aren't there. Just a sea of random legs: jostles, chatting, no one really see's you and there is no familiarity anywhere. What is the first thing that happens? Panic.

At this age you start crying and walk around, looking wildly into the faces of people around you, a blind irrational hope that each next face will take away this feeling of being disconnected, unsafe; a dread that you will never be safe again, that you will be lost forever. You keep running, and looking, shouting out for them. The problem is you didn't listen when people told you to stay put, so you search harder, and further, and in the process just become more lost twisting and turning. While the people looking for you are looking just as hard, but you are simply less likely to find someone if you are both moving in random paths. Now lucky for this child there are police, conscientious passers by, an instinct to protect children and understand they are mostly wailing bundles of confusion and we as adults must make sure they are ok. There are mobile phones, annoy's and there are adults trying to find us and bring us back and will make us safe.

Lucky wee buggers. With anxiety the adult that goes wandering off is our sense of comfort, self-worth and place in the world. And it wants to find you, really it does. Not as much as an entity, but as a state where we are at our optimum: as state when our system is more functional. Unless of course we literally stumble across a bengal tiger after our bath in elk blood and, in hindsight rather regrettably, we left the house with a rare bit of steak in our pocket. The supermarket is our minds, it is busy, lots of things telling us:

THIS WAY! NO, THIS WAY! BUY THIS! DON'T BY THAT IT'S UNETHICAL! DON'T BUY THINGS THAT ARE ETHICAL THEY'RE ALSO UNETHICAL!! 2 FOR 1! 1 FOR 2?! BACON! LETTUCE! PUDDING! HEALTH FOOD! YOU CALL THIS MARJORAM! I WANT A REFUND ON MY PICKLES! MY HAIR IS CAUGHT IN THE CONVEYOR BELT YOU ASSHOLE! And so on... We are like this child. We think we are doing fine, but we follow the wrong thing for comfort, it felt so right but we were just not aware of the consequence of that path, we weren't looking properly, in innocence. The beginning of all suffering is done out of innocence, and often we repeat it because of the denial which comes from shame at admitting we are doing something irrational, and even childish. We realise we lost our way only when we are lost. So we panic. We run, we look in every face, we are more likely to read every sign, listen to every voice for any sign that sense will recur. Yet, the more desperate we try and find that one thing that's going to bring back our sense of comfort, just wanting that voice of ineffable reason to chime in with: 'It's ok, everything is and will be fine, you are ok and you are going to be safe. Everything is fine now.' The more lost we become.

In adult life we have to be that voice, and there is no singular moment. Still, we should follow the advice for children. Stand still, in the open, in our vulnerable state, and breathe, fight the instinct to run and search, fight the panic. The instinct is no longer applicable, and that is the point of our cerebral cortex. It is the part of our brain able to use reason and can be trained to exert control on the more deep-set primitive mechanisms. The problem is we think we are our unconscious automatic responses and with many anxious habits, such as vice, self-criticism, addiction, compulsions and so forth we listen to a part of our brain that doesn't know what is best (and often justify excessively, for fear of the shame of admitting that we aren't behaving rationally). And it's no surprise we listen to it, it's really bloody forceful, and very convincing in that it changes the way we process information so much that rational thought is less likely...but not impossible. The reason it is hard is because a sizeable portion of our brain still thinks that we are living in the jungle and surrounded by danger all the time. To condemn ourselves for it is like yelling at a spade because it's not a JCB. We need to do what we tell children, and need to tell that nugget of our awareness buried by panic and fear, that though it might feel like a good idea to search; to look hard, to actively and consciously pursue that comfort and peace of mind - to run about the supermarket of life and thought. If you look hard it is easy to become more lost, going into deeper and more complex circles. However, all therapy and mindfulness and whatever it is you do is fundamentally, in a myriad of ways, teaching people to do what we would tell the lost child. If you stand still, breathe, quieten that mind then there is a better you will find yourself, be able to reason with yourself, and each time it works you build a sense of trust to the authority of your brain - the cerebral cortex - and feel more strong and competent. Eventually, peace of mind finds you. And that is not the absence of anxiety, it is through consistent proof to our unconscious that everything is ok, which eventually stops the panic button being hit so readily. Ride it out, stay calm, don't condemn, it will pass and reason will come back. Sometimes it really is as simple as in and out breath's. It isn't easy, but with practice, it get's easier.