Healthy And Unhealthy Anxiety - Quality Of Life, Self-development

It is not easy to explain the difference between healthy and unhealthy anxiety. Few emotions generate as much uncertainty as worry. Anxiety is a psychopathology class involving over 25 diagnoses. It is almost 100 pages of the DSM5 Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, a diagnostic tool for measuring psychological disorders

Measure the degree of your normality

The best way to measure the "degree of normality" of anxiety is to measure it against the following three variables:

1. Influence

Excessive anxiety tends to indicate an unhealthy sensation, while a little anxiety can be beneficial. The DSM5 uses a threshold model to define pathology: when symptoms begin to cause a deterioration in your quality of life. The degree of impact, not the level of intensity of anxiety, is an important key to assessing its role in your life.

2. Understanding

As we learn more about anxiety and stress, our understanding develops. The negative impact of symptoms is largely determined by how we think about it. The bodily symptoms of anxiety are consistent with modern stress science.

If you think your anxiety is overwhelming, you may be. And not only because you are too self-aware. Sometimes your fear of anxiety makes it unhealthy.

3. Usage

This is perhaps the most important part - occupation. Anxiety can alert you to what you need. She can push your motivation to take action or warn you that you can't control your fears.

Anxiety as a motivator

When we let anxiety fester and scare us with more fear, we turn it against ourselves and turn it into something harmful.

Knowing that anxiety prompts us to solve problems and take protective action can help us channel our energies into solutions.

If you are unhappy with the way anxiety is manifesting in your life, pay attention to what does not work from the above mechanisms. Use your anxiety to stimulate problem solving.

The good news is that paying close attention to your anxiety - healthy or unhealthy - is the first step in dealing with it and ultimately using it to your advantage

Based on the article: psychcentral.com/blog/healthy-and-unhealthy-anxiety-there-is-a-difference/

Author: Dr. Alicia H. Clark