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* Featured in the New York Times: “6 Podcasts to Soothe An Anxious Mind” (April 27, 2024)
* Featured in Vogue Magazine: “The 15 Best Mental Health Podcasts Recommended by Therapists” (October 2023)
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Copyright: © 2025 Drew Linsalata
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Worry and worrying are problems that many people struggle with along road to recovering from an anxiety disorder. I'm asked to cover this topic again and again. So ... a few words about worry and worrying.
Full notes for this episode can be found at https://theanxioustruth.com/91
Worry is simply thinking. Thinking by itself has absolutely no impact on the real world. Worry, therefore is not protective, predictive or proactive. Worry does not keep you safe from disaster. It does not keep bad things from happening. It does not prepare you for when they do. Worry is just thinking, and its not terribly useful.
Worry is related to planning. Planning is thinking accompanied by action. When planning, we take our thoughts and transform them into real world actions required to respond to and react to real world events. Planning is useful. Planning is helpful. We all plan in some way. Worry, on the other hand, is thinking WITHOUT action. Worry is half a plan and has no worth or purpose.
Worry is not a life sentence. Being a "worrier" isn't your fate for the rest of your life. You can change this.
Being a "worrier" is often a self-applied label that we secretly wear as a badge of honor. This is also not helpful. Worry is not a substitute for love and caring, nor does it prove that you are loving or caring. Worry matters only to the person worrying. No matter how much you worry about someone, that person can never experience it because worry exists only in your head. You can love and care for someone without engaging in worry about them. You can drop the "worrier" label and still be a kind, loving and caring person.
We can get off the worry train two ways:
1. Some worries can be transformed into actual plans. By adding action, we can convert a worry into a plan. Once you've created a plan, you can remove this item from your worry bucket and move along. This sometimes involve recognizing that you are simply skipping the action part, or dropping the belief that you are incapable of action.
2. Worries for which there is no plan can be dropped on the floor. This is done by learning how to not engage with worrisome thoughts. Learning to relax and refocus away from worry is a skill that can be developed through practice and repetition. This can be difficult because you may be confusing worry with action and safety. Disengaging with your worry thoughts may make you feel vulnerable to disaster. Through repetition you will learn that you are just as safe when not worrying as you are while worrying. Learning the skills of refocus and relaxation will help you break the link between worry and safety that perpetuates the habit.
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Find me on the web, my podcast, and all my social media accounts:
https://theanxioustruth.com/links
Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website. None of this is never required, but always appreciated!
Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.
Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
Send in a question or comment via text.
One of the common worries while recovering from an anxiety disorder is the fear that it might "come back" after recovery. This is something I hear from many many people. It's also pretty common in the community surrounding the podcast to see people arrive that have been through these issues before. They thought had it all solved, but find themselves back in the grips of panic, anxiety and associated nastiness.
This is closely related to what I've been calling the "acceptable bubble". This is the bubble we build when we do the "recovery things", but we engineer them to do them without anxiety. Often this means that someone has found a panic-free way to do all the required basic life things, then kinda stopped doing the work. The hallmark of the "acceptable bubble" is the existence of limits and limitations in one's life.
If you feel like you've recovered, but you still "can't" do things that outside your normal daily experiences, you may be in an acceptable bubble. When are rely on safe people or safety mechanisms to get the bigger tasks done, there's a chance that you're in an acceptable bubble. If you are enduring your days, pushing through anxiety and trying desperately to just get through, you've built an acceptable bubble.
When we build a panic free acceptable bubble, we never reach the ultimate goal of recovery. The real end game of recovery is to learn to not be afraid of our own bodies and minds. We must learn to experience fear and discomfort without being afraid of being afraid. This is what recovery is all about. Going to work, or the supermarket, or on a family vacation are the happy results of achieving this goal. They are not the goal itself.
In the end, avoiding the dreaded acceptable bubble is a personal thing. You must be able to look in the mirror and know that you are truly not afraid of panic or anxiety any longer. You don't have to love it, but you can't be afraid of it, in any circumstance. When the day comes that you can honestly say that a level 10 panic attack while alone 200 miles from home isn't a scary thought any longer, you've achieved your goal. When you work toward that, you never have to worry about it "coming back" again. Reach that goal, and this recovery journey will be the last one you'll ever have to embark on.
Join The Discussion Group
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https://facebook.com/groups/TAGForum
My Links (social media, podcasts, etc.)
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https://theanxioustruth.com/links
Intro and outro music - Afterglow by Ben Drake (with permission)
Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website. None of this is never required, but always appreciated!
Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.
Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
Send in a question or comment via text.
"What if I forget how to breathe?"
"What if I just stop breathing?"
"I can't get enough air in my lungs."
"I can't take a deep breath."
Breath and breathing focused anxiety is quite common among people that suffer from anxiety disorders like panic disorder and agoraphobia. In this episode I discuss the two most common forms of this anxiety.
For full show notes: https://theanxioustruth.com/89
[1:30] "I Am Afraid That I Will Forget How To Breathe"
The first is an obsession with the thought that you have to actively, manually breathe, or your body will somehow forget to breathe or you will stop breathing. This obsessive, irrational thought may grip you during every waking moment, tricking you into thinking that you must stay involved in the process of breathing to avoid some horrible fate.
[12:19] "It Feels Like I Can't Breathe. I Can't Take a Deep Breath!"
This is the second common form of breath and breathing focused anxiety. You may walk around all day suffering from "air hunger", feeling like you can't breathe or that you can't get a deep enough breath. You may feel like there is a tight band around your chest, which causes you to attempt to expand your ribcage and "fill" your lungs to maximum capacity to relieve that sensation.
Join The Discussion Group
——————————————–
https://facebook.com/groups/TAGForum
My Links (social media, podcasts, etc.)
——————————————–
https://theanxioustruth.com/links
Intro and outro music - Afterglow by Ben Drake (with permission)
Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website. None of this is never required, but always appreciated!
Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.
Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
Send in a question or comment via text.
My friend Joyce joined me to talk about her slide into severe panic disorder and agoraphobia, which was followed by an aggressive recovery and rebuilding of her life. Listen to Joyce describe her journey from being frozen in fear on her sofa to being back at work and feeling limitless. Of particular note is the way Joyce used anger and frustration to fuel her recovery efforts. For many, this can be an excellent strategy and I really appreciate Joyce being so open and honest about how she was feeling and how it helped to propel her forward. As always, comments and questions are welcomed. I will do my best to relay any questions or messages to Joyce as they are asked.
My Links (website, podcast, social. mailing list, etc.)
----------------------
https://theanxioustruth.com/links
Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website. None of this is never required, but always appreciated!
Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.
Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
Send in a question or comment via text.
Holly and I discuss chapter 9 of Claire Weekes' "Hope And Help For Your Nerves". This chapter discusses the nature of recovery and the road to being yourself again. Some of the highlights:
You can buy Hope and Help From Your Nerves by following the Amazon links from my website:
https://theanxioustruth.com/shop/
Join The Discussion Group
——————————————–
https://facebook.com/groups/TAGForum
My Links (social media, podcasts, etc.)
——————————————–
https://theanxioustruth.com/links
Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website. None of this is never required, but always appreciated!
Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.
Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
Send in a question or comment via text.
When confronted with uncomfortable and scary feelings of anxiety, panic or emotions based on past trauma, the immediate response is to "talk yourself down". Trying convince yourself that you are OK using words, phrases and thoughts often does not work. When this happens, you are at a fork in the road. You can enlist the aid of your support system to argue with your anxiety or trauma for you, or you can resign yourself to just feel everything without resistance to let it pass through you and end naturally.
Spoiler alert ... you want option two. Facing and accepting anxiety, panic, and feelings based on your past is harder, but its the path that leads to long term change and lasting recovery. Continuing to argue, or using your support team to argue by proxy for you, may be an attractive option because it's the "easier" option and may seem like the fast path to feeling better in the moment, but there's no learning or changing to found there.
Joe and I speak about this process, the need to face and feel what's in front of you, and how this leads to a deeper understanding of the reality of being capable, competent and safe. This is the direction you want to go. Trust us.
Thanks to Joe for taking the time to chat!
Comments and questions are always welcomed.
Join The Discussion Group
——————————————–
https://facebook.com/groups/TAGForum
My Links (social media, podcasts, etc.)
——————————————–
https://theanxioustruth.com/links
Find Joe at https://joeryan.com or on Instagram at @joeryan.
Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website. None of this is never required, but always appreciated!
Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.
Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
Send in a question or comment via text.
If you are a regular listener of the podcast, odds are that you've had anxiety, worry and fear focused on your heart at least once or twice. This is quite common. Heart-centered anxiety generally involves being afraid of a rapid, strong, or irregular (flutters/palpitations) heartbeat. This is either due to an underlying fear that something is wrong with your heart or will go wrong, or due to the link between a rapid/strong heartbeat and a panic attack. In either case, the way out, as always, is through. We can use interoceptive exposure techniques to intentionally create the rapid or strong heartbeat we fear in order to desensitize and learn that there is no reason to fear your heartbeat. Yes, this involves intentionally experiencing that which you fear, but this is almost always the case when solving these problems.
Comments and questions always welcomed.
Find this episode on my website:
https://theanxioustruth.com/85
My Links:
https://theanxioustruth.com/links
Music - Afterglow by Ben Drake (with permission)
https://facebook.com/BenDrakeMusic
Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website. None of this is never required, but always appreciated!
Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.
Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
Send in a question or comment via text.
Today I chatted with Christa Holmans about some of the overlapping issues found in both anxiety disorders and autism and other neurodivesity conditions such as ADHD. Christa had so much excellent insight on how autism influences how one may deal with anxiety issues! I really enjoyed this discussion and I hope you will too!
My Links (Website, podcast, social media, etc.)
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https://theanxioustruth.com/links
Find Christa Online
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https://neurodivergentrebel.com
Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website. None of this is never required, but always appreciated!
Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.
Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
Send in a question or comment via text.
Today I was fortunate to spend about 30 minutes with Dr. Martin Seif, a psychologist and author specializing in anxiety disorders. Dr. Seif and I talked about intrusive, obsessive and unwanted thoughts. What are they? How do they become so troublesome? How should we approach this problem?
For the full notes on this episode and all links, go to https://theanxioustruth.com/83
Find all my links at https://theanxioustruth.com/links
Find Dr. Martin Seif at http://drmartinseif.com
Find the Anxiety And Depression Association of America at https://aada.org
Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website. None of this is never required, but always appreciated!
Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.
Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
Send in a question or comment via text.
Reading, listening to podcasts, watching videos, and otherwise educating yourself about your anxiety disorder is a good idea ...until its becomes a safety and avoidance behavior Ultimately, overcoming an anxiety disorder only happens by DOING, not by reading. So after you've read the book for the fifth time, or you've read 10 anxiety books and want to read an 11th, you must realize that its time to actually put what you've learned into action. There is no lasting progress without action. There's hard, scary stuff to do here, but its so worth doing, so put down the book and lets actually do the things you've been reading about!
My Links
---------------
https://theanxioustruth.com/links
Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website. None of this is never required, but always appreciated!
Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.
Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
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