Anxiety is stronger than you think

I believe that anxiety fundamentally underlies many human interactions. And different people have learned their own individual coping mechanisms. Which manifest as avoidance or hyperactivation.

All these coping mechanisms serve to minimize anxiety, which is perceived as threatening.

Possibly anxiety is the body’s mapping to threats which it perceives as potentially lethal. It is it’s representation of the inherent risks in life, risks which need to be dealt with.

A dismissive avoidant might withdraw, not reply to messages … not engage with you on a deeper level. Because doing this would bring forth a lot of anxiety – which they do not have any other coping mechanisms to deal with.

In return, when the dismissive avoidant withdraws, the anxiously attached partner (if there is such a partner in the picture), will feel anxiety arise within them. This way they will pursue – which in turn will cause more anxiety and more withdrawal on the dismissive avoidant’s part.

Which is why we should not chase the dismissive avoidant, but let them withdraw, until they’re ready.

How strong is this anxiety?

It is very strong.

As an example, I know a person whose wife cheated on him (= slept with another man) and left him. This person started cutting himself.

Recently I saw him with a bandaged arm (and he had not been around for a couple of days). I asked a friend of his what had happened. “He had an accident – he had cut himself and had to go to the hospital for three days.”

That, my friends, is how strong anxiety is – it can draw people to cutting themselves hard, so hard that they are hospitalized – in order to not feel the pain of anxiety. This, by the way, is a destructive way of dealing with anxiety. But it might be the only way this person discovered this.

I took blood from myself once – by putting a needle into my own arm. It was a sort of test of my limits, and I have to say it was indeed somewhat hard to do this psychologically. So I can testify that, indeed, people must be quite desperate if they cut themselves.

In other words – people will “sacrifice” and sabotage themselves (in a way), in order to avoid this anxiety – which to them equates to destruction / annihilation / death. They will allow themselves to be damaged in another way. It is instinctual, and very strong.

The next time a dismissive avoidant withdraws, keep this in mind and be gentle with them.

Narcissists, controlling people and anxiety

I believe that similarly for narcissists and other controlling people, anxiety is a key driver behind their (negative) behaviors.

It is not personal – far from it. It is the result of an incapability of dealing with their own emotions in a productive way.

This way, when they feel a loss of control (which creates anxiety), they will fight the anxiety by humiliating other people / sarcasm / other behaviors. This serves to “restore control” (or rather, a feeling of control). Similarly if their self-image is attacked, this will create anxiety.

And, by the way if people don’t want to hear about something, and block it – this might be related, and a desire to reduce anxiety. Because they know that hearing what you have to share might increase their levels of anxiety.

People become quite irrational when reduction of anxiety is at stake.

People are not logical

Remember, people are not logical. They are driven by emotions. Logic is not a perfect adoptation to the outer world – we do not run “perfect decision trees”. We use many heuristics and shortcuts in order to maximize energy efficiency when dealing with the other world.

This causes artefacts, which turn up on psychiatrists couches.

It’s the price of freedom, the price of knowing ourselves.

Otherwise evolution might have needed another billion years …