Life beyond anxiety
What's it like to live free from chronic fear and overwhelm?
There was about a decade, through my thirties and into my forties, when I was 90 per cent incapable of driving over bridges. This was inconvenient because I lived in Vancouver, a coastal city ribboned by inlets and rivers. You can’t really get into, or out of, or even around town without going over a bridge.
My phobia wasn’t about a fear of heights. I felt fine on bridges as a passenger, or walking over a bridge on foot. But if I got behind the wheel and drove a car onto a bridge, even a small one, my nervous system would go into a state of such high alarm that my arms and legs would go numb and I’d lose most of my peripheral vision. Heart jackhammering away, the rush of blood deafening my ears, the scene in front of my eyes would splinter into visual shards that danced and shuddered with the tiniest of muscle movements, as if someone had taken all the shock absorbers out of my neck. In this state, I lost the ability to sense distances between my car and the others on the road. Time slowed to a crawl, and forward motion felt like falling.
Yikes. Would you want to be on the road with that driver? Me neither!
What I’ve just described is a panic attack. It’s the most physical manifestation of anxiety, but far from the only variety I’ve lived with. Midnight rumination. Social paranoia. Catastrophic future-casting. Existential dread. These ailments have been such a significant part of my life, you could say they’re a defining feature. My name is Maggie. I have green eyes, yellow hair, and chronic, severe anxiety.
This is not the same thing as good, clean fear. I’m actually pretty great in an emergency: calm, focused, decisive, swift, courageous, and strong. But the anxiety that compromised my life for many years had little to do with bona fide disasters. Instead, it was linked to vague, unsolvable problems that mostly fell into two broad categories:
Someone is, or might be, mad at me.
I’m juggling much more than I can competently handle.
I felt a lot of shame about this problem, which only made it worse, because, for me, shame is a major precursor to anxiety. My shame and anxiety relentlessly wound each other up like bickering siblings, leaving me exhausted from managing these twin burdens and their disruptive side-effects: relationship problems, decision paralysis (or impulsivity), failing to speak up or stand up for myself, or over-explaining myself.
But a few years ago, something happened to my anxiety. Something magical and miraculous that largely cured me of it.
That something was Martha Beck.
Her book The Way of Integrity came along when my life was at DEFCON 1, with clear and present dangers all around me, including inside the mutinous cells of my body. With humor, logic, and boundless compassion, she dismantled my lifelong defense structures brick by brick, leaving me not exactly unguarded, but without the need for such guardedness in the first place.
If that sounds good to you, just wait; it gets better.
With the quieting of that blaring alarm system, my life became a playground of delights. What kind of work would I love to do, now that I’m liberated from self-imposed, fear-based rules? What quality of connection is possible now that I’m no longer banging my heart against people who don’t get me, or who aren’t in a position to meet my needs?
Friend, it is no exaggeration to say that I now live with a level of joy and tranquility I did not know was possible. I have more time and energy because I’m not overworking myself out of fear or obligation. I feel freer to write, speak, and act from my truth, every day and in every way.
Not that I always get what I want; far from it. The world is still a risky place, and I live with plenty of uncertainty. But with a peaceful, well-resourced brain and body, I can meet life’s challenges on an even keel, and am better able to find pleasure and kinship along the way. This, I think, is as good as life on earth gets.
The book I’ve been waiting for
Imagine my delight when I learned that my favorite teacher’s new book is ALL ABOUT my favorite problem! Martha Beck’s Beyond Anxiety: Curiosity, Creativity, and Finding Your Life’s Purpose dropped last week. My preordered copy arrived Friday, just as wildfires were rampaging across my city. Timely.
I’m only on page six, so I won’t try to write a book review. But I can give you the gist.
The TLDR: Creativity is the magic switch you’ve been praying for.
We are innately creative creatures, Beck says. Our unique capacity to invent elaborate stories, live inside our imagination, and manifest our dreamscapes in the world around us is what gives us our evolutionary edge. But just as this creativity has given us millions of man-made wonders and has the potential to lead us to self-actualization and enlightenment, it can also bind us in a hell of our own making.
Meditation and relaxation exercises can help soothe our jangled nerves in the short term, but to really break free from the mental torment of anxiety, she writes, we need to learn how to get our brain out of an anxiety spiral and into a “creativity spiral” instead.
I haven’t read enough of the book to know exactly how this works, but it already makes so much sense to me. It explains why my first impulse in the face of bad news is to fix myself a nice meal or snack. Cooking is my favorite and most accessible creative pastime. The meditative washing and chopping of vegetables, carefully balancing the tartness and sweetness and creaminess in a sauce, getting that golden brown caramelization just right… it’s so satisfying, and always, always calms me. (Plus, a full belly signals safety to my inner cavewoman.)
I also saw this phenomenon in action this time last year as I was moving through a mountain of rather daunting legal and administrative matters. All through January and February, I kept a large paint-by-numbers picture on my dining table, and every time I felt overwhelmed, I took a break from my email-writing and spreadsheet-making to dip a brush in a baby paint pot and daub some color into a numbered shape. The painting won’t be winning any art prizes, but that was never the point. As a mood regulator, it was better than Prozac.
The world is not about to stop giving us things to fret about. As the heartbreaking wildfires in Los Angeles have shown, all that we hold dear could go up in smoke at any time. And there are plenty of other very big threats on the horizon, from the rise of authoritarianism and right wing terrorism, to environmental devastation, to social and economic collapse driven by the greed of tech titans and oligarchs.
No wonder we are in an age of unprecedented anxiety.
Perhaps together we can turn that into an age of unprecedented creativity and joy.
Join Wilder to take a deep dive with Martha Beck
There’s much more to the book, and as I said, I’m only on page six, so that’s as far as I’ll go in my attempt to summarize her message.
But why not have it explained by Martha Beck herself?
She’s offering a year-long deep dive into the twelve chapters of Beyond Anxiety, including monthly videos, live Q&As and group discussions, all provided at no extra charge to members of the wonderful Wilder community that she co-hosts with Rowan Mangan.
I’m in there every week. If you sign up, ping me to say hi!
Are you anxious about your writing? I can help!
Are you paralyzed by the fear of writing badly, so you never give yourself a chance to practice and improve your skills? Do you worry you have no ideas worth exploring, or simply find it impossible to sit still long enough to get the words out? If so, I would love to work with you.
This is the essence of my creativity coaching practice. It’s not traditional book coaching (although I do some of that, too). But I’m much more interested in the barriers to creativity: Where they came from, the true toll they take on our lives, and how we can dismantle them.
Think of it as life coaching with a writing focus, or writing coaching that may transform your life.
You do not need to have a manuscript or even a defined project to work with me. Your fears are welcome. Bring your meanest head gremlins, your chronic procrastination, your sensitivity to criticism, your shaky voice, your embarrassment about your lack of progress, your audacious ambition, and your back burner of abandoned projects.
Please know that I was once lost in the sauce like you are now. Recovering my creativity has transformed my entire life. As an ICF-certified Wayfinder Life Coach, what I want most is to share the gift of creative liberation with you.
Apply through the link below, and we’ll start with a quick call to make sure it’s a fit.
Publish your book with Wonderwell Press
Do you have a finished manuscript or work-in-progress that you want to get published? Looking for editorial and marketing support from smart, experienced publishing professionals? Submit your project to Wonderwell Press below, and your book could be in stores before the end of this year.
Oh Maggie Get a grip.