Anxiety is a sign of intelligence because only a thinking mind could experience such a thing. In nature, there are creatures that don’t think about danger; they simply react. Perhaps they detect danger through their limbs and release a toxin into the air or water, make their escape, and move on. However, there’s no free will decision making process for other creatures—it’s just an automatic mechanism.
We are fortunate to have this mechanism, as it’s probably one of our best survival skills—to fret and worry about what’s going on, up to a point. But just as too much sunlight can become harmful, or too much water can drown us, even oxygen, which gives us life, can degrade cells in excess. Likewise, too much anxiety, too much thought, and too much worry without enough discipline and focus can become the problem.
Our task is to understand our deepest fears and work to reduce natural and over-inflated anxiety, prevent it from spiraling out of control, and use it to our advantage to survive as long as possible.
I want to choose the experiences that bring me relaxation because I know it’s impossible to avoid stress entirely. I am, after all, a human being on this planet. Life is challenging, and my daily focus is to keep my thoughts on the blessings I have in my life, first and foremost.
We are blessed to be alive in this moment, and we accept that there will be anxieties and struggles we must face. This is how we learn and increase our awareness. The question is how to find a way to stop thinking that we are anything more than pure consciousness observing this world through our bodies. We often make the mistake of believing that we are just our bodies and that the world was simply happening before we arrived. Perhaps that’s true, but maybe none of this actually exists, and it requires an observer to make it real. If the observer is gone, does reality persist?
There are dedicated practices—meditation, positive thinking, exercise, service (karma work), writing, exploring childhood difficulties, road mapping our history, psychological research, lifestyle and diet changes, moving away from addiction, and more—that we must embark on.
We delay our awakening if we seek shortcuts that don’t include focusing the mind, seeking relaxation, stopping our reactivity, and sticking to our daily routines. These routines will degrade into negative obsessions if we don’t actively maintain them every day. Life requires effort—an exertion of energy and discipline.