August 28, 2024 • 21 mins
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Are you struggling to identify whether your behaviors are forms of avoidance in your anxiety recovery journey? This episode of The Anxious Truth addresses the often murky and uncertain nature of avoidance habits, emphasizing that nobody navigates these waters flawlessly. We'll share insights on how distinguishing between necessary avoidance for safety and avoidance driven by anxiety can help you better understand your reactions and improve your recovery process.
This episode looks at key avoidance concepts based on:
Intent
Motivation
Emotion
Feelings of Urgency
We'll also break down the difference between macro and micro avoidance patterns and uncover how even subtle avoidance habits can silently hinder your progress. Through manageable exposure work and by learning from your experiences, this episode offers practical advice for building tolerance and resilience.
For full show notes on this episode:
https://theanxioustruth.com/299
Relevant podcast episodes:
The Anxious Truth Episode 266
https://theanxioustruth.com/266
The Anxious Truth Episode 284
https://theanxioustruth.com/284
The Anxious Truth Episode 287
https://theanxioustruth.com/287
Disordered Episode 59
https://disordered.fm/59
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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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This week on the Anxious Truth, we're looking at
anxiety and avoidance habits.
Specifically, we're going totry and answer a common question
that's asked again and again byanxious people working on the
recovery process.
That question is if I do this,is that avoidance?
Because I can't really tell.
Let's get into that right now.
Welcome everybody.
This is episode 299 of theAnxious Truth podcast or on the
(00:22):
Anxious Truth YouTube channel Ifyou are new here, the Anxious
Truth podcast, or on the AnxiousTruth YouTube channel If you
are new here.
The Anxious Truth is thepodcast and YouTube channel that
talks about all things anxiety,anxiety disorders and anxiety
recovery.
So, however way you end up heretoday, if it's your first time,
welcome.
I'm glad you're here.
I hope you find what you findhere today to be useful or
applicable in your anxiety andanxiety recovery journey.
(00:42):
Of course, if you're areturning viewer or listener,
welcome back.
Glad that you're here, givingme your time and attention and
supporting the work that I do inwhatever way you do that.
Thank you very much.
I am Drew Lynn Salata.
I am creator and host of theAnxious Truth.
I am also a therapistpracticing under supervision in
the state of New York in the USof A specializing in the
treatment of anxiety and anxietydisorders.
(01:02):
I'm a three-time author on thistopic anxiety, anxiety
disorders and anxiety recovery.
I am a psychoeducator, anadvocate, social media guy and a
former sufferer of things likepanic disorder, agoraphobia, ocd
and depression for many yearsof my life on and off,
thankfully doing much better,now fully recovered.
But I don't only know what Italk about here.
From books and learning and mygraduate degree.
(01:25):
I actually live theseexperiences and I hope that
gives me a little bit of anextra edge in trying to help you
understand and ultimatelyovercome these problems.
So today we're going to talkabout avoidance, which is one of
the core concepts in anxietydisorders, chronic anxiety and
anxiety recovery.
Specifically, we're going toaddress some of the confusion
around avoidance, becausesometimes it can be a little bit
(01:46):
sneaky and a little bit tricky.
But before we get into that,just a quick reminder that the
Anxious Truth is more than justthis podcast episode.
There are way more resourcesand ways to support my work, get
more information, go intogreater depth on my website at
theanxioustruthcom.
So if especially if you are newhere today, I would urge you to
(02:06):
go check out that website Againit's the anxious truthcom and
avail yourself of all thegoodies, most of which are free,
and even the things that docarry a cost are relatively
affordable At least I'm toldthat they are, and I appreciate
that feedback from the community.
So check out my website at theanxious truthcom.
Check out all the other podcastepisodes and social media
content, the workshops, thebooks.
There's stuff there that Ithink you're going to find
helpful.
So let's get into the topic ofavoidance.
(02:28):
If we start from the premisethat avoiding triggers, or
trying to stop or instantlyprevent uncomfortable internal
experiences like feeling anxiousor experiencing panic attacks,
is a bad idea, then we wind upin a situation where we might be
wondering sometimes if or whenwe are avoiding.
Now, if this is a new conceptfor you, you're gonna wanna pop
(02:51):
back and listen to some of theolder podcast episodes in the
catalog to sort of get the layof the land.
I will specifically point youat episodes 266, 284, and 287,
all of which are less than ayear old, and do explain a bit
more why avoidance is a bad idea.
I will put those in the videodescription or the podcast
description, depending on howyou're consuming this content.
(03:12):
So I'm often asked by anxiouspeople that are interested in
doing recovery air quotes rightIf they are accidentally or
secretly avoiding anxietywithout knowing that they are
doing that.
They know that they have tobreak their avoidance habits,
but sometimes they're not reallysure whether or not they are
actually avoiding.
And so they ask me and franklyit's a really excellent question
(03:32):
the really short answer to isthis avoidance is well,
sometimes you just don't know,because you can't be totally
clear on how you feel and whatyou're thinking.
That's normal.
We don't always have perfectself-knowledge or self-awareness
because we are imperfect humans, which means that sometimes you
just won't be able to tell ifyou're tapping out because
(03:53):
you're tired or simply notinterested or something, or if
you're afraid of how you feel,which is where anxiety avoidance
comes in.
I mean, it might be acombination of multiple reasons
when you skip activities or gointo retreat mode or exit a
particular situation or context.
The first rule when it comes toidentifying avoidance is to stop
(04:13):
demanding that you do thisperfectly all the time.
Nobody does it perfectly.
Everybody winds up in grayareas where they're just unsure
about avoidance, at leastsometimes.
Now, if you don't like that,because you don't like being
unsure, or maybe not recoveringproperly or perfectly today
makes you uncomfortable.
(04:33):
Well, congratulations, you'vejust unlocked a new exposure
target.
If you will, can you work withthat discomfort today, rather
than trying over and over toeliminate it by looking for
perfect clarity on avoidance orinfallible step-by-step, perfect
black and white instructionsthat you can follow?
Well, think about that.
(04:54):
If it's hard for you torecognize that you might not
know the answer to youravoidance question, that's
something for you to work on.
Another thing that I want tomention here is that there are,
in fact, some things in lifethat we do want to avoid.
When we are being abused orharmed or manipulated or injured
or attacked, or we are inactual, real, imminent danger,
(05:14):
well, please avoid if possible.
That's my official advice.
As a mental health professional.
There is no part of recovery orexposure I cannot stress enough
that involves intentionallyputting oneself in the path of
actual harm or injury.
If your partner is abusive, forinstance and if that's true,
I'm very sorry to hear that youare not avoiding by trying to
(05:35):
leave that relationship If yourjob or your co-workers or your
boss is causing you physical ormental harm, looking for a new
job is not avoidance, of course.
If there's a hurricane or atornado bearing down on your
house.
Well, evacuation is notavoidance.
It's really important to clarifythat, because sometimes people
think things take things alittle too literally because
they're really very concernedwith doing recovery perfectly,
(05:57):
and then they think they shouldnever avoid anything.
But that's not true.
So I needed to add thatclarification here.
In this context, we're talkingabout trying to avoid internal
experiences, that is, feelings,emotions, thoughts and bodily
sensations that we insist wemust never experience because
they are too much in some way.
These are the experiences we'retalking about here.
(06:20):
That being said, it's also notrequired for anyone to
continually run at full speedtoward discomfort during every
waking moment to build characteror sort of accelerate your
recovery.
That doesn't work Ultimately.
If you try that, it'll backfireon you.
So ask yourself this Did youwork on breaking your avoidance
(06:40):
habits in some way today?
Cool.
Avoidance happens in some waytoday, cool.
Then also make sure that youtake a little time to take care
of yourself physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually or
however other way.
You need to tend to yourself.
That's okay.
In fact, you kind of got to dothat.
So resting after a long day isnot avoidance, unless, of course
(07:03):
, you've been resting air quotesall day already because you
feel like you can't take therisk of being triggered.
On some days you won't actuallybe able to clearly identify if
you're resting because you won'tbe able to clearly identify if
you've been avoiding all day ornot.
Again, that's okay.
Just do the best you can andsee if you can use this
(07:25):
confusion or uncertainty to workon tolerating the discomfort
that that creates.
There are lessons everywhere inrecovery if we just stop and
look for it.
So how can you tell if you areavoiding or not?
Well, here are five basic factsabout anxiety and avoidance
that you can kind of lean on asyou go through this process.
The first one is that intent iswhat really determines
(07:47):
avoidance.
Are you making choicesspecifically to try to not get
triggered?
Are you doing things with thespecific intent of managing or
preventing or stopping youranxiety?
Are you focusing all the timeon coping skills that are
intended to calm you down orshort circuit your anxiety or
panic?
Are you planning your daysbased on how you feel so that
(08:08):
you don't wind up doing too muchand winding up too anxious?
Again, air quotes if you'relistening and not watching, you
know.
Are you following all of thewellness instructions and
anxiety tips and tricks andhacks you can find on the
Internet because they'redesigned to stop panic or people
tell you they're good foranxiety.
Intention is the number oneindicator of anxious avoidance
(08:31):
in the context of chronic ordisordered states of anxiety.
What are your intentions whenyou try to make your choices?
Are you trying to prevent theway you feel or instantly stop
bad feelings?
That's what you're looking for.
The number two thing you got tolook at is that motivation can
help determine avoidance.
If your motivation is to notfeel bad or to feel good which,
(08:53):
by the way, are totallyunderstandable and not crimes
against recovery then you mightwant to rethink that a little
bit.
I mean, it's perfectly okay towant to feel good.
Everybody wants to feel good.
I want you to want to feel good.
It's not really okay toengineer your entire life in
ways that you ultimately kind ofhate, just to try to feel good
(09:15):
or not feel bad.
Be mindful of wants versusactions.
Want to avoid and retreat?
Well, no problem, but do youthen avoid or retreat?
That's an issue you'd want topay attention to.
You can actually be motivatedin two directions at the same
time comfort and progress.
The thing here is which actionpath will you choose based on
(09:38):
which of those two motivations.
So the number three thing thatI want to point out that you can
sort of lean on when you'retrying to suss out like that
suss out that's sort of like myAustralian and British slang
coming through.
Number three principle that youcan sort of rely on here is that
emotions can drive avoidance.
If fear is the dominant emotionin any situation, then you are
either in harm's way for real,legitimately, like the tornado
(10:02):
or the abusive partner and youshould listen to that.
We would sort of call thatregular or externally generated
anxiety or you are afraid of howyou feel and might be making
avoidant choices to get aroundthose feelings.
Sometimes it's hard to tellwhich emotions we are
experiencing.
That's okay.
Again, human beings do notalways have perfect clarity and
(10:24):
self-awareness.
Do the best you can to see ifyou can identify what you're
feeling when you're trying tomake activity and life choices.
Fear-based choices in theabsence of actual threat move us
away from recovery.
Values-based choices, actingbased on what's actually
important to you in life, moveus closer to recovery.
(10:45):
Now for more on values andrecovery.
I would urge you to see episode59 of the Disordered podcast,
which is the second podcast I dowith my friend Josh Fletcher.
There's more on values inepisode 59 of Disordered, which
you can find at disorderedfm.
The next thing I want to pointout is that a sense of urgency
often signals possible avoidance.
(11:06):
Sometimes in life we are facedwith situations that are, in
fact, urgent and worthy ofimmediate action to find
solutions or safety.
How we feel is not usually oneof those situations.
Are your thoughts, bodilysensations and emotions feeling
urgent, like you are in anemergency situation because how
(11:27):
you feel inside?
Are you feeling frantic or outof control, trying to manage or
fix how you feel?
Well, this is a sign that youmight be primed for avoidance or
escape habits.
Be mindful of that.
And the last thing that I wantto mention, when it comes to
sort of important facts andguidelines about anxious
(11:47):
avoidance in the case of chronicand distorted anxiety recovery,
is that there is more than onekind of avoidance.
There is a difference betweenmacro avoidance and micro
avoidance.
What does that mean?
Macro avoidance is theavoidance that most anxious
people can sort of instantlyrecognize.
We know when we're doing that.
You get invited for lunch withyour friends but you say no
(12:09):
because you're feeling tooanxious today or you're afraid
that you might panic.
During lunch you quit your jobbecause driving that far to get
to the job makes you anxious ortriggers panic attacks.
You refuse to stay home alonefor even a few minutes because
you don't want to feel tooanxious or heaven forbid panic.
While you're alone you mightspend hours immersed in
(12:30):
behavioral or mental compulsionloops that your OCD or your GAD
tells you are good ideas, so youcan avoid the bad feelings and
scary thoughts that you mighthave.
Now, special note to my GADpeople, generalized anxiety
disorder.
You know the excessive planning, problem solving, analyzing,
worrying, ruminating andoverthinking that comes with GAD
(12:52):
.
That's the avoidance.
You do that to avoid feeling acertain way, even when doing
that often makes you wind upfeeling the very way you're
trying to avoid feeling.
It's okay to stop engaging inactive worry or rumination.
You're not avoiding yourproblems if you do that and for
(13:12):
more on that you can check outthe past episodes that I've done
here on the Anxious Truth, ongeneralized anxiety disorder,
and we also did one of those onthe Disorder Podcast.
So check that out.
Now, now that we've seen youknow sort of macro avoidances
that we can all recognize andreally kind of clearly call out.
Let's talk about micro avoidance.
Micro avoidance, on the otherhand, is often hidden and it can
(13:34):
be really sneaky.
So examples of micro avoidancemight be sticking to very rigid
rules about sleep or nutritionor self-care so that you can try
to minimize the odds thatyou'll feel things that you are
afraid to feel.
Getting glued to routines andtightly managed schedules to try
to manage your anxiety orprevent it from ever happening
(13:55):
can be a sneaky form of microavoidance.
Only choosing to shower or goto bed or leave the house when
specific conditions are met cansignal micro avoidances.
When specific conditions aremet can signal micro avoidances.
Only consuming mental health,personal growth or wellness
(14:15):
content in books or videos orpodcasts or on social media
platforms can be a form of microavoidance, because, after all,
I can't read a fun book becauseI might risk missing out on a
magic anxiety tip.
Right, I must be managing myanxiety at all times.
Right?
And when you are trying to obeythose very rigid rules to make
sure that you feel okay andyou're recovering perfectly, you
can wind up in a bunch oflittle micro avoidances that you
(14:39):
don't even really recognize butcan be really impactful.
The life of an anxious person,and by that I mean a person
who's struggling with chronic ordistorted states of anxiety is
usually very heavily sprinkledwith microavoidances that have
become habits or rituals and areoften not even noticed by that
person.
I know I had a ton of them.
I didn't even know I was doingthem.
(15:00):
Start working on breaking youravoidance habit because you
recognize that it's causing youproblems in your recovery.
See if you could start to lookat your daily rituals and
routines and sort of the way youlive day by day to find micro
avoidances.
This is a perfectly acceptableplace to start and in some cases
it's even the preferred way tostart because working on micro
(15:22):
avoidances leads us to maybeeasier to conceptualize or
understand exposure work.
That is often a better way tostart the whole.
Face what you fear.
Experiment.
If you're agoraphobic, forinstance, you're not going to
start recovery by driving acrossthe US from coast to coast on a
3,000 mile cannibal run.
Targeting microavoidances is abetter way to start.
(15:45):
That can be a great andperfectly acceptable and useful
first step.
So remember that the opposite ofavoidance is tolerance and
navigation.
When we avoid, we learn that weare incapable of allowing our
own feelings, thoughts andbodily sensations.
But when we tolerate andnavigate through those things,
(16:06):
we learn that we've been wrongabout that all along and that
feeling things is really safe.
Even the things we feel arequite uncomfortable, scary,
disturbing and difficult to feelat times.
So in the end, if you'rereading or listening to this
because you're trying to breakthe avoidance cycle, good for
you.
You get credit for that Goodstep.
But how do you know for sure ifyou are avoiding in any given
(16:29):
circumstance?
Well, often you can't, andthat's okay.
But see if you can use theframework that I've sort of
presented you here to help youmake your choices.
But if you wind up making achoice that seems perfectly
legit on Tuesday but then byWednesday you could clearly see
was avoidance, so what?
Every experience gives us anopportunity to learn and grow.
(16:52):
If you blew it and you avoided,guess what?
You didn't actually blow it.
You're learning to improve youravoidance detection skills.
That's a thing.
So take what you can from theexperience and do the best you
can going forward.
There's literally nothing wrongwith that at all.
So that is your like 17 minuteshere on the anxious truth,
(17:15):
episode 299, on whether or notyou're avoiding or not.
When you can't tell, there's noblack and white answer to that,
but you can try and use some ofthese guidelines to look at
what you're doing, what you'reconsidering, what choices you're
going to make or not make, andthat might help you clarify
things a little bit.
But again, if you don't reallyknow, if this doesn't help you
get clarity, do the best you canmake, the best decision you can
(17:38):
in the moment trying to, youknow, incorporate the principles
of recovery as you know them.
And if it turns out that youstart to look back and say, oh
boy, I've really been avoidingall along, okay, take those
lessons and modify it.
That's totally okay.
Anyway, I hope you have foundepisode 299 helpful in some way.
That's a really big topic.
It's almost impossible in aone-to-many context like a
(18:01):
podcast or a YouTube channel ora social media feed, for me to
literally answer your specificquestion about your avoidance
habits, because I don't know you, I don't know what you're doing
, I can't see it.
That's a question that youwould tend to bring into therapy
.
I can answer that question withmuch more clarity and with
greater precision with mytherapy clients than I can here,
but at least we can look atgeneral concepts and how you
(18:22):
might apply them.
Try to clear things up a littlebit.
So I'm going to ask you, asalways, for a little favor if
you enjoyed this podcast episodeor this video, or you enjoy the
work in general and you find awant to find an easy way to
support it.
If you're listening on Applepodcasts or Spotify or any
podcast platform where you canrate and review this podcast
well, I don't know, maybe leavea five-star rating if you think
(18:44):
I warrant it and if you reallydig it, take a moment and write
a nice review to say why youlike the podcast, because that
does help me out and it helpsother people find the anxious
truth, and then other people getthe help that they might need,
which is why I started doingthis crazy thing.
To begin with.
And, of course, if you'rewatching on YouTube, welcome
YouTube.
If you want to leave a commenton the video, I promise
sometimes now, as I'm finishingup my graduate program and
(19:07):
working with clients, it takesme a little longer to comment,
to answer comments on YouTube,but I promise at least once or
twice a month I will get in todo that.
So if you have a question, byall means leave them in the
comment section of this video.
Be nice, don't fight with eachother.
And you might considersubscribing to the channel if
you didn't already liking thevideo, and maybe hitting that
notification bell in yourYouTube app so that you know
(19:27):
when, in fact, I upload newcontent, because the YouTube
algorithm just sucks and it'snot going to show you my stuff
half the time.
But this is the deal that wehave, so we have to work, work
at it as best we can and thankyou however way you choose to
support this work or spread theword.
If you are so inclined to dothat, I appreciate it.
So that's episode 299 of theAnxious Truth in the books.
We'll be back again in twoweeks, because we publish the
(19:48):
Anxious Truth every two weekswith another topic.
I'm not really sure what itwill be, but I will certainly be
here to do a topic of some kind, and I'll remind you, as always
, to wrap this up, that nomatter how small the steps are
that you take today toward thethings that matter to you and
away from your anxious,magnified, distorted, irrational
fear, those steps count.
(20:09):
If you're at the very beginningof this and you cannot even
imagine how you might disobeyyour fear and do the things that
you really want to do, eventhough you're too afraid to do
them.
Any tiny step you can take inthat direction matters.
It helps you get started.
We learn lessons in everyexperience, no matter how small
they may be.
So try not to get discouraged.
Take those little steps day byday.
(20:30):
Little by little, they do addup.
Every recovered person in theworld, including me and I am
bold enough to call myself afully recovered person for many,
many years did that by takinglittle steps again and again and
again and letting them add up.
I wish there was a magic wandthat I could wave and give you
10 hacks that instantly stopyour anxiety forever.
That's nonsense, and be wary ofpeople that promise you that,
(20:52):
because they will leave youfeeling discouraged or more
broken when you can't seem tomake it work that way.
Just take the little steps asbest you can every day, let them
add up.
Nice to yourself, be patientwhile you do it and you can get
there.
Anyway, I hope you found alittle encouragement in that.
Thank you for stopping by tolisten and or watch this week,
and I will see you in episode302 weeks.
Take care.
This week on the Anxious Truth, we're looking at
anxiety and avoidance habits.
Specifically, we're going totry and answer a common question
that's asked again and again byanxious people working on the
recovery process.
That question is if I do this,is that avoidance?
Because I can't really tell.
Let's get into that right now.
Welcome everybody.
This is episode 299 of theAnxious Truth podcast or on the
(00:22):
Anxious Truth YouTube channel Ifyou are new here, the Anxious
Truth podcast, or on the AnxiousTruth YouTube channel If you
are new here.
The Anxious Truth is thepodcast and YouTube channel that
talks about all things anxiety,anxiety disorders and anxiety
recovery.
So, however way you end up heretoday, if it's your first time,
welcome.
I'm glad you're here.
I hope you find what you findhere today to be useful or
applicable in your anxiety andanxiety recovery journey.
(00:42):
Of course, if you're areturning viewer or listener,
welcome back.
Glad that you're here, givingme your time and attention and
supporting the work that I do inwhatever way you do that.
Thank you very much.
I am Drew Lynn Salata.
I am creator and host of theAnxious Truth.
I am also a therapistpracticing under supervision in
the state of New York in the USof A specializing in the
treatment of anxiety and anxietydisorders.
(01:02):
I'm a three-time author on thistopic anxiety, anxiety
disorders and anxiety recovery.
I am a psychoeducator, anadvocate, social media guy and a
former sufferer of things likepanic disorder, agoraphobia, ocd
and depression for many yearsof my life on and off,
thankfully doing much better,now fully recovered.
But I don't only know what Italk about here.
From books and learning and mygraduate degree.
(01:25):
I actually live theseexperiences and I hope that
gives me a little bit of anextra edge in trying to help you
understand and ultimatelyovercome these problems.
So today we're going to talkabout avoidance, which is one of
the core concepts in anxietydisorders, chronic anxiety and
anxiety recovery.
Specifically, we're going toaddress some of the confusion
around avoidance, becausesometimes it can be a little bit
(01:46):
sneaky and a little bit tricky.
But before we get into that,just a quick reminder that the
Anxious Truth is more than justthis podcast episode.
There are way more resourcesand ways to support my work, get
more information, go intogreater depth on my website at
theanxioustruthcom.
So if especially if you are newhere today, I would urge you to
(02:06):
go check out that website Againit's the anxious truthcom and
avail yourself of all thegoodies, most of which are free,
and even the things that docarry a cost are relatively
affordable At least I'm toldthat they are, and I appreciate
that feedback from the community.
So check out my website at theanxious truthcom.
Check out all the other podcastepisodes and social media
content, the workshops, thebooks.
There's stuff there that Ithink you're going to find
helpful.
So let's get into the topic ofavoidance.
(02:28):
If we start from the premisethat avoiding triggers, or
trying to stop or instantlyprevent uncomfortable internal
experiences like feeling anxiousor experiencing panic attacks,
is a bad idea, then we wind upin a situation where we might be
wondering sometimes if or whenwe are avoiding.
Now, if this is a new conceptfor you, you're gonna wanna pop
(02:51):
back and listen to some of theolder podcast episodes in the
catalog to sort of get the layof the land.
I will specifically point youat episodes 266, 284, and 287,
all of which are less than ayear old, and do explain a bit
more why avoidance is a bad idea.
I will put those in the videodescription or the podcast
description, depending on howyou're consuming this content.
(03:12):
So I'm often asked by anxiouspeople that are interested in
doing recovery air quotes rightIf they are accidentally or
secretly avoiding anxietywithout knowing that they are
doing that.
They know that they have tobreak their avoidance habits,
but sometimes they're not reallysure whether or not they are
actually avoiding.
And so they ask me and franklyit's a really excellent question
(03:32):
the really short answer to isthis avoidance is well,
sometimes you just don't know,because you can't be totally
clear on how you feel and whatyou're thinking.
That's normal.
We don't always have perfectself-knowledge or self-awareness
because we are imperfect humans, which means that sometimes you
just won't be able to tell ifyou're tapping out because
(03:53):
you're tired or simply notinterested or something, or if
you're afraid of how you feel,which is where anxiety avoidance
comes in.
I mean, it might be acombination of multiple reasons
when you skip activities or gointo retreat mode or exit a
particular situation or context.
The first rule when it comes toidentifying avoidance is to stop
(04:13):
demanding that you do thisperfectly all the time.
Nobody does it perfectly.
Everybody winds up in grayareas where they're just unsure
about avoidance, at leastsometimes.
Now, if you don't like that,because you don't like being
unsure, or maybe not recoveringproperly or perfectly today
makes you uncomfortable.
(04:33):
Well, congratulations, you'vejust unlocked a new exposure
target.
If you will, can you work withthat discomfort today, rather
than trying over and over toeliminate it by looking for
perfect clarity on avoidance orinfallible step-by-step, perfect
black and white instructionsthat you can follow?
Well, think about that.
(04:54):
If it's hard for you torecognize that you might not
know the answer to youravoidance question, that's
something for you to work on.
Another thing that I want tomention here is that there are,
in fact, some things in lifethat we do want to avoid.
When we are being abused orharmed or manipulated or injured
or attacked, or we are inactual, real, imminent danger,
(05:14):
well, please avoid if possible.
That's my official advice.
As a mental health professional.
There is no part of recovery orexposure I cannot stress enough
that involves intentionallyputting oneself in the path of
actual harm or injury.
If your partner is abusive, forinstance and if that's true,
I'm very sorry to hear that youare not avoiding by trying to
(05:35):
leave that relationship If yourjob or your co-workers or your
boss is causing you physical ormental harm, looking for a new
job is not avoidance, of course.
If there's a hurricane or atornado bearing down on your
house.
Well, evacuation is notavoidance.
It's really important to clarifythat, because sometimes people
think things take things alittle too literally because
they're really very concernedwith doing recovery perfectly,
(05:57):
and then they think they shouldnever avoid anything.
But that's not true.
So I needed to add thatclarification here.
In this context, we're talkingabout trying to avoid internal
experiences, that is, feelings,emotions, thoughts and bodily
sensations that we insist wemust never experience because
they are too much in some way.
These are the experiences we'retalking about here.
(06:20):
That being said, it's also notrequired for anyone to
continually run at full speedtoward discomfort during every
waking moment to build characteror sort of accelerate your
recovery.
That doesn't work Ultimately.
If you try that, it'll backfireon you.
So ask yourself this Did youwork on breaking your avoidance
(06:40):
habits in some way today?
Cool.
Avoidance happens in some waytoday, cool.
Then also make sure that youtake a little time to take care
of yourself physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually or
however other way.
You need to tend to yourself.
That's okay.
In fact, you kind of got to dothat.
So resting after a long day isnot avoidance, unless, of course
(07:03):
, you've been resting air quotesall day already because you
feel like you can't take therisk of being triggered.
On some days you won't actuallybe able to clearly identify if
you're resting because you won'tbe able to clearly identify if
you've been avoiding all day ornot.
Again, that's okay.
Just do the best you can andsee if you can use this
(07:25):
confusion or uncertainty to workon tolerating the discomfort
that that creates.
There are lessons everywhere inrecovery if we just stop and
look for it.
So how can you tell if you areavoiding or not?
Well, here are five basic factsabout anxiety and avoidance
that you can kind of lean on asyou go through this process.
The first one is that intent iswhat really determines
(07:47):
avoidance.
Are you making choicesspecifically to try to not get
triggered?
Are you doing things with thespecific intent of managing or
preventing or stopping youranxiety?
Are you focusing all the timeon coping skills that are
intended to calm you down orshort circuit your anxiety or
panic?
Are you planning your daysbased on how you feel so that
(08:08):
you don't wind up doing too muchand winding up too anxious?
Again, air quotes if you'relistening and not watching, you
know.
Are you following all of thewellness instructions and
anxiety tips and tricks andhacks you can find on the
Internet because they'redesigned to stop panic or people
tell you they're good foranxiety.
Intention is the number oneindicator of anxious avoidance
(08:31):
in the context of chronic ordisordered states of anxiety.
What are your intentions whenyou try to make your choices?
Are you trying to prevent theway you feel or instantly stop
bad feelings?
That's what you're looking for.
The number two thing you got tolook at is that motivation can
help determine avoidance.
If your motivation is to notfeel bad or to feel good which,
(08:53):
by the way, are totallyunderstandable and not crimes
against recovery then you mightwant to rethink that a little
bit.
I mean, it's perfectly okay towant to feel good.
Everybody wants to feel good.
I want you to want to feel good.
It's not really okay toengineer your entire life in
ways that you ultimately kind ofhate, just to try to feel good
(09:15):
or not feel bad.
Be mindful of wants versusactions.
Want to avoid and retreat?
Well, no problem, but do youthen avoid or retreat?
That's an issue you'd want topay attention to.
You can actually be motivatedin two directions at the same
time comfort and progress.
The thing here is which actionpath will you choose based on
(09:38):
which of those two motivations.
So the number three thing thatI want to point out that you can
sort of lean on when you'retrying to suss out like that
suss out that's sort of like myAustralian and British slang
coming through.
Number three principle that youcan sort of rely on here is that
emotions can drive avoidance.
If fear is the dominant emotionin any situation, then you are
either in harm's way for real,legitimately, like the tornado
(10:02):
or the abusive partner and youshould listen to that.
We would sort of call thatregular or externally generated
anxiety or you are afraid of howyou feel and might be making
avoidant choices to get aroundthose feelings.
Sometimes it's hard to tellwhich emotions we are
experiencing.
That's okay.
Again, human beings do notalways have perfect clarity and
(10:24):
self-awareness.
Do the best you can to see ifyou can identify what you're
feeling when you're trying tomake activity and life choices.
Fear-based choices in theabsence of actual threat move us
away from recovery.
Values-based choices, actingbased on what's actually
important to you in life, moveus closer to recovery.
(10:45):
Now for more on values andrecovery.
I would urge you to see episode59 of the Disordered podcast,
which is the second podcast I dowith my friend Josh Fletcher.
There's more on values inepisode 59 of Disordered, which
you can find at disorderedfm.
The next thing I want to pointout is that a sense of urgency
often signals possible avoidance.
(11:06):
Sometimes in life we are facedwith situations that are, in
fact, urgent and worthy ofimmediate action to find
solutions or safety.
How we feel is not usually oneof those situations.
Are your thoughts, bodilysensations and emotions feeling
urgent, like you are in anemergency situation because how
(11:27):
you feel inside?
Are you feeling frantic or outof control, trying to manage or
fix how you feel?
Well, this is a sign that youmight be primed for avoidance or
escape habits.
Be mindful of that.
And the last thing that I wantto mention, when it comes to
sort of important facts andguidelines about anxious
(11:47):
avoidance in the case of chronicand distorted anxiety recovery,
is that there is more than onekind of avoidance.
There is a difference betweenmacro avoidance and micro
avoidance.
What does that mean?
Macro avoidance is theavoidance that most anxious
people can sort of instantlyrecognize.
We know when we're doing that.
You get invited for lunch withyour friends but you say no
(12:09):
because you're feeling tooanxious today or you're afraid
that you might panic.
During lunch you quit your jobbecause driving that far to get
to the job makes you anxious ortriggers panic attacks.
You refuse to stay home alonefor even a few minutes because
you don't want to feel tooanxious or heaven forbid panic.
While you're alone you mightspend hours immersed in
(12:30):
behavioral or mental compulsionloops that your OCD or your GAD
tells you are good ideas, so youcan avoid the bad feelings and
scary thoughts that you mighthave.
Now, special note to my GADpeople, generalized anxiety
disorder.
You know the excessive planning, problem solving, analyzing,
worrying, ruminating andoverthinking that comes with GAD
(12:52):
.
That's the avoidance.
You do that to avoid feeling acertain way, even when doing
that often makes you wind upfeeling the very way you're
trying to avoid feeling.
It's okay to stop engaging inactive worry or rumination.
You're not avoiding yourproblems if you do that and for
(13:12):
more on that you can check outthe past episodes that I've done
here on the Anxious Truth, ongeneralized anxiety disorder,
and we also did one of those onthe Disorder Podcast.
So check that out.
Now, now that we've seen youknow sort of macro avoidances
that we can all recognize andreally kind of clearly call out.
Let's talk about micro avoidance.
Micro avoidance, on the otherhand, is often hidden and it can
(13:34):
be really sneaky.
So examples of micro avoidancemight be sticking to very rigid
rules about sleep or nutritionor self-care so that you can try
to minimize the odds thatyou'll feel things that you are
afraid to feel.
Getting glued to routines andtightly managed schedules to try
to manage your anxiety orprevent it from ever happening
(13:55):
can be a sneaky form of microavoidance.
Only choosing to shower or goto bed or leave the house when
specific conditions are met cansignal micro avoidances.
When specific conditions aremet can signal micro avoidances.
Only consuming mental health,personal growth or wellness
(14:15):
content in books or videos orpodcasts or on social media
platforms can be a form of microavoidance, because, after all,
I can't read a fun book becauseI might risk missing out on a
magic anxiety tip.
Right, I must be managing myanxiety at all times.
Right?
And when you are trying to obeythose very rigid rules to make
sure that you feel okay andyou're recovering perfectly, you
can wind up in a bunch oflittle micro avoidances that you
(14:39):
don't even really recognize butcan be really impactful.
The life of an anxious person,and by that I mean a person
who's struggling with chronic ordistorted states of anxiety is
usually very heavily sprinkledwith microavoidances that have
become habits or rituals and areoften not even noticed by that
person.
I know I had a ton of them.
I didn't even know I was doingthem.
(15:00):
Start working on breaking youravoidance habit because you
recognize that it's causing youproblems in your recovery.
See if you could start to lookat your daily rituals and
routines and sort of the way youlive day by day to find micro
avoidances.
This is a perfectly acceptableplace to start and in some cases
it's even the preferred way tostart because working on micro
(15:22):
avoidances leads us to maybeeasier to conceptualize or
understand exposure work.
That is often a better way tostart the whole.
Face what you fear.
Experiment.
If you're agoraphobic, forinstance, you're not going to
start recovery by driving acrossthe US from coast to coast on a
3,000 mile cannibal run.
Targeting microavoidances is abetter way to start.
(15:45):
That can be a great andperfectly acceptable and useful
first step.
So remember that the opposite ofavoidance is tolerance and
navigation.
When we avoid, we learn that weare incapable of allowing our
own feelings, thoughts andbodily sensations.
But when we tolerate andnavigate through those things,
(16:06):
we learn that we've been wrongabout that all along and that
feeling things is really safe.
Even the things we feel arequite uncomfortable, scary,
disturbing and difficult to feelat times.
So in the end, if you'rereading or listening to this
because you're trying to breakthe avoidance cycle, good for
you.
You get credit for that Goodstep.
But how do you know for sure ifyou are avoiding in any given
(16:29):
circumstance?
Well, often you can't, andthat's okay.
But see if you can use theframework that I've sort of
presented you here to help youmake your choices.
But if you wind up making achoice that seems perfectly
legit on Tuesday but then byWednesday you could clearly see
was avoidance, so what?
Every experience gives us anopportunity to learn and grow.
(16:52):
If you blew it and you avoided,guess what?
You didn't actually blow it.
You're learning to improve youravoidance detection skills.
That's a thing.
So take what you can from theexperience and do the best you
can going forward.
There's literally nothing wrongwith that at all.
So that is your like 17 minuteshere on the anxious truth,
(17:15):
episode 299, on whether or notyou're avoiding or not.
When you can't tell, there's noblack and white answer to that,
but you can try and use some ofthese guidelines to look at
what you're doing, what you'reconsidering, what choices you're
going to make or not make, andthat might help you clarify
things a little bit.
But again, if you don't reallyknow, if this doesn't help you
get clarity, do the best you canmake, the best decision you can
(17:38):
in the moment trying to, youknow, incorporate the principles
of recovery as you know them.
And if it turns out that youstart to look back and say, oh
boy, I've really been avoidingall along, okay, take those
lessons and modify it.
That's totally okay.
Anyway, I hope you have foundepisode 299 helpful in some way.
That's a really big topic.
It's almost impossible in aone-to-many context like a
(18:01):
podcast or a YouTube channel ora social media feed, for me to
literally answer your specificquestion about your avoidance
habits, because I don't know you, I don't know what you're doing
, I can't see it.
That's a question that youwould tend to bring into therapy
.
I can answer that question withmuch more clarity and with
greater precision with mytherapy clients than I can here,
but at least we can look atgeneral concepts and how you
(18:22):
might apply them.
Try to clear things up a littlebit.
So I'm going to ask you, asalways, for a little favor if
you enjoyed this podcast episodeor this video, or you enjoy the
work in general and you find awant to find an easy way to
support it.
If you're listening on Applepodcasts or Spotify or any
podcast platform where you canrate and review this podcast
well, I don't know, maybe leavea five-star rating if you think
(18:44):
I warrant it and if you reallydig it, take a moment and write
a nice review to say why youlike the podcast, because that
does help me out and it helpsother people find the anxious
truth, and then other people getthe help that they might need,
which is why I started doingthis crazy thing.
To begin with.
And, of course, if you'rewatching on YouTube, welcome
YouTube.
If you want to leave a commenton the video, I promise
sometimes now, as I'm finishingup my graduate program and
(19:07):
working with clients, it takesme a little longer to comment,
to answer comments on YouTube,but I promise at least once or
twice a month I will get in todo that.
So if you have a question, byall means leave them in the
comment section of this video.
Be nice, don't fight with eachother.
And you might considersubscribing to the channel if
you didn't already liking thevideo, and maybe hitting that
notification bell in yourYouTube app so that you know
(19:27):
when, in fact, I upload newcontent, because the YouTube
algorithm just sucks and it'snot going to show you my stuff
half the time.
But this is the deal that wehave, so we have to work, work
at it as best we can and thankyou however way you choose to
support this work or spread theword.
If you are so inclined to dothat, I appreciate it.
So that's episode 299 of theAnxious Truth in the books.
We'll be back again in twoweeks, because we publish the
(19:48):
Anxious Truth every two weekswith another topic.
I'm not really sure what itwill be, but I will certainly be
here to do a topic of some kind, and I'll remind you, as always
, to wrap this up, that nomatter how small the steps are
that you take today toward thethings that matter to you and
away from your anxious,magnified, distorted, irrational
fear, those steps count.
(20:09):
If you're at the very beginningof this and you cannot even
imagine how you might disobeyyour fear and do the things that
you really want to do, eventhough you're too afraid to do
them.
Any tiny step you can take inthat direction matters.
It helps you get started.
We learn lessons in everyexperience, no matter how small
they may be.
So try not to get discouraged.
Take those little steps day byday.
(20:30):
Little by little, they do addup.
Every recovered person in theworld, including me and I am
bold enough to call myself afully recovered person for many,
many years did that by takinglittle steps again and again and
again and letting them add up.
I wish there was a magic wandthat I could wave and give you
10 hacks that instantly stopyour anxiety forever.
That's nonsense, and be wary ofpeople that promise you that,
(20:52):
because they will leave youfeeling discouraged or more
broken when you can't seem tomake it work that way.
Just take the little steps asbest you can every day, let them
add up.
Nice to yourself, be patientwhile you do it and you can get
there.
Anyway, I hope you found alittle encouragement in that.
Thank you for stopping by tolisten and or watch this week,
and I will see you in episode302 weeks.
Take care.
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