THE ANXIETY-INEFFECTIVENESS SYNDROME
THE GREATEST TRAP OF ALL?
In process, though published now in order to be able to find it later to work on. (Remember one has not "finished" something in process for the moment until one has assured it will be picked up and processed correctly - part of that is making sufficient referencing in order to find it and to pick up where you left off - see Orderganizing.
Fear is the basis, of course, for the fight/flight response. Part of that response is to shut down anything that is not immediately usable to save one's life or a part of it AND, the reason for that, to maximize the ability to fight or flee. The latter means the large muscle groups will get all the energy while the first group will be less well functioning or not functioning at all during the "emergency" period. The higher brain, which is "slow" thinking relative to the faster circuits in the low brain, is diminished in its functionality.
Unfortunately, to live a good life we have to learn how to reengage that higher brain or we won't make the right conclusions.
Another way of looking at it is that we are "pre-occupied" with handling our fears, which is the priority that had us survive and for which we evolved to be better and better at (but are still not "thinking" naturally at the highest level, so we need to figure out and follow a way of proceeding that engages our higher brain instead of leaving our lives to be determined by our Monkey Minds.
Note that a person cannot handle life well if he/she doesn't engage the higher brain and do the process of gaining actual facts and putting them together into a "map of reality" (such as that of "how the brain works"). The thesis here is that we cannot or will not effectively engage our higher brain if we are in fear AND that our energies will go to fixing the danger/threat instead of being applied to creating great results (aka "effects") in life. And anxious person is operating at a very low level of effectiveness - you might note how ineffective people who are anxious, those whom you know, do not produce the results they would want in life!!!!!!!!
The process picture looks like this:
"See" something --> Interpret as threat --> signal to resolve it --> correct it
In the whole process of life, we see something, run it through our "belief" filter, label it as to whether it is a threat or what it means to our lives, and then the prmitive brain "motivates" us by causing good or bad chemicals which get us to do an action to "resolve" the situation. Remember that we are "programmed" to do what it takes to go back to a stable, good functioning condition - our mind is constantly bringing us back to that "zone", as it is that zone that provides the best odds of our surviving (or surviving "more weller"). Our primitive brain automatically seeks "safety", as #1 priority, and to be safe we must be in good operating order so that we can effectively respons to any threats in the future.
Confidence is a set of beliefs where we "think" we can handle life (or whatever area we are in). As with any belief system, we need facts to determine if the belief is true. While it is somewhat helpful, we cannot "make affirmations" and repeat them such that we will be "confident" - as confidence is based on strong beliefs it is necessary for us to have a solid foundation of true facts that we believe that cause us not to fear, for we know that we can handle life in the future - if we don't know that, we will have the doubt and anxiety that many people live in the state of. (And, yes, one can be trained to "believe" in themselves even if one is not actually competent and capable. But it is an unstable condition as the facts may cause one to "wake up" to reality. Some may sustain themselves with good, reinforcing beliefs that go unquestioned. Certainly, my father is an example where he was actually effective in many ways in the real world. He truly, as far as we can tell, had a high level of confidence, some of which was justified in actual reality and some of which was based on a useful way of thinking.
He would make such statements, that reinforced him as:
"I'm not always right, but I am never uncertain." (Think about what is underneath that, as it is important that you learn "what works" to build confidence and what doesn't. See Certainty, as one element to build up to create more confidence and reduce confidence destroying fears.)
"I only have to be right 51% of the time and I'll win." (Not totally logical but it indicates the willingness to take some losses over time but to have the confidence to know that there will be some gains. It is also a "declaration" of (purported) "fact" - declarations are tremendous for building up confidence and, in the process, for reducing fears in the area that the confidence is in.
"If lose all my money, I can always go back and make it again!"
His basic premise might be something like this: "I can handle life!!!" (Interestingly, we all have the basic equipment to handle life, but we fail to insert that information which we need in order to be effective.) And, yes, he made up some things that weren't true, but they were workable to produce confidence. He was "fortunate" in that somehow he got it together. But, I assert, most of us need to get it together in a more systematic way, as few seem to do it well by chance. Donald Trump is an excellent example of confidence (and of using certain tactics that may not be for the better) - watch is languaging of certainty and mimic it, though I'd recommend you do so only with what is true (facts).
I'd recommend you do "the build" that is necessary to construct a solid edifice of confidence. Notice that the portal to confidence is based on establishing what is true and correcting one's beliefs that are the initial cause of the whole chain of emotions and behavior!
(The road to confidence includes travelling through the fears in life that form the basis of doubt, so one might wish to look at and use The Fear Management Program.
The "road" to confidence or anything well managed in life is always:
1. Identify what is wanted (including what is not wanted, as in observing when one gets bad results)
2. Establish and/or correct the poor results producing system that causes the right result.
a. Learn how things work and how to work them.
b. Write down your conclusions and what you will do, in detail, and
3. Use, in action, the rules/beliefs that work.
4. Then just enjoy life and its (and your created) fruits.
While you may be lucky and somehow get the good results you want, I highly caution you against living based on such fairy tales. You've got to "build it" and "they will come" (the right results). See the movie Field Of Dreams. Operate your life based on The Principle Of "Building" A Life as the only sure path to gaining the great success in life that is definitely attainable.
CONSTANT BOMBARDMENT AND PREOCCUPATION
An anxious person is constantly trying to deal with perceived threats and the processing needed to deal with those uses up a large part of the available energy and processing power that we are left with little power to move ahead in life.
Basically, the
Clogs up the circuits (capacity)
A --> b -->
If one is unhappy and has tried several tips, techniques, lots of reading, etc. and still not gotten the desired results, one is approaching the "problem" (of not getting the right results) at the wrong step in the process, at C or D. Since those don't solve it the cause must be earlier on in the sequence of steps in the process.
The entry way to all of life is through beliefs. If one is experiencing anxiety before one incurs the problem, them anxiety is the cause of the problem besides being a problem (of feeling a negative emotion) then
Beliefs fear anxiety need to pay attention and fix/save/protect takes energy from elsewhere less brain capacity left over to use poorer thinking, poorer will power, less attention, less able to function as a person.
It's a self feeding downward spiral, a trap unto itself
Anxiety --> Ineffectiveness --> more anxiety --> more ineffectiveness
Unable to even keep commitments...caught in a victim syndrome (tried to do things, failed, going into helplessness...since helpless means unable to solve problems go into worse fear and more helplessness, revert to childhood
so worried about self, so preoccupied, urgent, can't concentrate...
where do we break the chain or the spiral. We must intervene somewhere strongly enough to break the chain... where do we do that????
Minor anxiety is solvable as we can deal with a series of beliefs and unravel them.
If too complex and too engrained we need lots of force and lots of experience to know what to do....
