Could anxiety be trying to tell us something?
We usually treat anxiety like an unwelcome guest. We distract ourselves. We tell ourselves: don’t think about it. Stay positive. Hope for the best.
But what if anxiety isn’t just something to silence? What if it’s trying to show us something deeper?
Sometimes anxiety feels like a collapse from the inside. It can feel as though the thing we’ve been leaning on — for our sense of safety, identity, or hope — has suddenly said to us:
“I can’t hold you up.
I can’t promise you the future you’re imagining.
You’re not as safe with me as you thought.”
That “thing” can be different for each of us — a career, a relationship, our health, the approval of others. When we’ve built our deepest sense of security on something that can be lost, every threat to it feels like a threat to us.
What if, instead of trying to think less about the things that scare us, we tried thinking more — but in a different way? What’s the worst that could happen? And if that happened, would my life still have meaning? Would I still be whole?
These are uncomfortable questions. But they can be clarifying ones.
If my greatest good is something fragile, I’ll always feel fragile too.But if my greatest good is something I can receive — not earn, not achieve, not lose — I can rest secure.
You will be able to endure hardships in life in proportion to where you derive worth from.
So the question becomes:What is the source of my worth that will always let me in and never let me down?
Imagine if your worth was based not on your notoriety, figure, net worth, or relationship status. A sense of self that was granted to you simply by existing as a unique and unrepeatable human being. If your worth was already defined and not contingent upon what you have or haven’t done.
In the words of musician, John Mark McMillan:
“The universe is mostly empty. Most of it is an uninhabitable wasteland in every direction for millions of lightyears. Still, against all odds, you’re here.”
This leads me to my real question: What, in the world, are you doing with your miracle?
You know it’s well within your rights to spend it bitterly. The laws of nature have no rule against that, and you’ll always find a reason if you need one. Or, with so much pain in the world, no one would blame you for numbing out. You could sleep through your miracle. You could simply disengage, fade into the scenery, and ghost away into the pages of history with no regard for the fact that you’ve won the cosmic lottery.
Of course, there are some people (though I’m sure you’ve never been one of these) who are so anxious about their situation that they ignore the other wandering miracles who walk in and out of their lives. Let me tell you from experience, while these creatures are problematic and exhausting, they’re what you’re actually looking for in all of this.
It is not good for a person to be alone. Everybody learns this — just don’t learn it late.
They don’t always hang around as long as you think. You blink and sometimes they vanish.
Finally, please don’t think for a minute that I’m trying to belittle your experience. I understand life is painful for everyone (and unfortunately more painful for some), but you’ve got to know that even pain is a privilege reserved only for those precious few souls who ever get to actually exist.
Only living things hurt, and unlike most of the universe, you’re alive.
So with this in mind — and without ignoring the suffering of the world — I implore you to be awake.
Be awake inside the precious, glorious, miraculous — even painful — reality that is your life.
Against all odds, you’re here. In a universe that is mostly empty wasteland — you exist.
