When I struggled with anxiety I struggled with outcomes. I believed that certain things would embarrass me or humiliate me and I was terrified that I would look like a fool or be made fun of. This was one way that my anxiety manifested itself. Another way was that I had disturbing thoughts about hurting someone else and I also got anxious thinking about death and finally I thought that something bad might happen to me. I would think about these things and I would become anxious to the point of having panic attacks. And I would deal with anxiety by retreating to my apartment where I would sit by myself sometimes drinking alcohol. Does this sound familiar to any of you? I struggled with social anxiety and every other form and it was absolutely crippling. However I did some research on how to deal with anxiety and started to take advice. What I learned was very disappointing. I did not overcome my anxiety by following the so-called experts advice. It simply didn’t help and I believe it is a complete sham of an industry the so-called anxiety cure industry. The anxiety experts recommend that you overcome anxiety by correcting your thinking errors and using DBT techniques like distraction or relaxation to diminish distress. In my opinion these techniques are a complete joke and not only do they not work but they are dangerous because they are so ineffective.

Overcoming your anxiety requires that you regulate the release of chemicals in your brain. If you think you are going to be able to achieve this by reading the Feeling Good Handbook or some other such tripe, I have some bad news for you. You are never going to overcome your anxiety. Folks, things have to get worse before they will get better. Whatever you are afraid of, whatever it is that gives you anxiety, you are going to have to come around and face it if you ever want to get over it. How do you face it and start overcoming anxiety. It is not complicated but at the same time it is not easy. It will be among the most distressing things that you ever do because your anxiety (if it is like my anxiety which it probably is) is caused by fear of outcomes or consequences. Now, you don’t need to go and experience the outcome that you are terrified to get over your anxiety concerning it. That is simply a terrible idea. But what you do need to do is to get the point that you simply don’t care if that outcome does happen or not. How do you do that. This is very important and the most important thing I can ever tell you regarding overcoming anxiety.

You start overcoming anxiety by not caring!

Let me say that again in case you aren’t with me thus far.

You start overcoming anxiety by not caring!

So, let’s look at that statement and see what I mean. In my case I was afraid of many things. But let’s just take one. I had anxiety in social situations because I felt like other people were in some way superior to me and that in any interaction I would only embarrass myself which was simply terrifying so I had awful anxiety symptoms when being around people, especially strangers or people I did not know that well. Well, first let me say, that today I simply do not have the anxiety around people that I used to in those situations. I don’t have it all. Now, have I found some sort of anxiety cure? In a way yes, but it’s not a pill or anything like that. Let’s return to my example and I will show you what I did to overcome anxiety in that circumstance.

So, I’ve got to interact with someone socially and I’m terrified. I don’t want them to see that I am anxious. I want to do a good job in this interaction because let’s face it having social anxiety is embarrassing. But the problem is that by fearing the outcome or consequence my anxiety only gets worse. So, what I started to do, is simply not care about my anxiety. Now, what does that mean. I realized that life was short, the universe was large and by and large nobody really cared that I had anxiety. So, I came to conclusion that I wouldn’t care either. And when I would interact with that stranger I would still be anxious as hell but I just wouldn’t care. So what. I embarrassed myself, well life is too short to worry about that. I just realized that my anxiety is not that important. And the thing is I stopped caring about embarrassing myself. And do you know what happened? Nothing at first, I still had all the anxiety that I ever had. I still embarrassed myself in social situations but I just didn’t care. I didn’t see it as embarrassing. But, for a while, because I was still having anxiety, I didn’t see this as a breakthrough. However, as the months went by and I still did not care that I had anxiety, I noticed that my anxiety began to diminish. I realized that I was getting better, not caring was diminishing my anxiety. I suffered less and less anxiety each time, and I realized that I was overcoming anxiety. It was a remarkable feeling, that I was able to breathe free and easy for the first time.

I overcame anxiety by simply not caring that I had it. Now, I don’t know how clear this point is and I know I haven’t explained the exact technique that I used to overcome anxiety however I just really want to bang home the key point: I overcame anxiety by not caring that I had it.

We will be coming back to this point again and again because it is the key point in dealing with anxiety and I don’t care what the so-called experts who have never overcame anxiety (and I mean severe crippling anxiety) in their life. Well, I have overcome it and I am simply going to continue to tell you how I did it. So, things will become more clear in time, and I hope you will continue to visit this site while I develop these ideas. Just remember that even with my techniques you will not overcome anxiety quickly. It will take time I can assure you. However, in time, you can overcome your anxiety completely and never have to deal with it again.

So, first what do you hope to find in an anxiety cure? Are you looking for a new anxiety pill to pop or a new therapy technique to experience? If you are looking for those kind of cures then I may have some bad news. I am not entirely certain that there are cures to be found in those two areas, but before we go further let us just address those two questions individually.

First, is there a pill that functions as a cure for anxiety? The answer to this question is simple, it is no, and the question also illustrates a lack of quality thinking on the subject. The type of pills and medications that are commonly marketed as anxiety cures are called benzodiazepines. There are nearly two dozen different benzo medications and some of the more common are sold under the trade names of ativan, zanax, klonopin, and valium. I have been on this class of medications and even went to a mental health treatment center as a result of being on them. Here’s what I know about them.

First, benzodiazepines are not a miracle cure for anxiety. What they are are extremely addicting medicines that cause horrible and profound side effects when you miss a dose and they have a terrible withdrawal syndrome. Now, on the plus side, they do relieve many of the most acute forms of anxiety symptoms, the sweating palms, the rapid heart beat, the cognitive disorientation and the flushing of the face. These meds will decrease such anxiety symptoms. However, they only work in the short term. If your problems persist you will have to keep taking the benzos, maybe indefinitely. And there is the problem.

If you start to take, let’s say Xanax or Klonopin, every day you will develop a certain dependency to that medicine and therefore if and when you are not feeling anxious you will not be able to stop taking them. Rather than cure your anxiety they only ameliorate your symptoms. It is like putting a blanket on when you’re cold, you might not be cold anymore but if you take the blanket off you are once again cold. It does not “cure” your coldness.

But it is a whole lot worse than that. You see, benzodiazepines are effective in the short term but are nearly useless for chronic anxiety. Your body delivers a tolerance to them so even if you take 5mg of klonopin a day, within six months your anxiety symptoms will return as your body adjusts to the medication. You will only experience short term relief. For maybe six months or a year will be able to handle your symptoms but then what happens? I’ll tell you, your anxiety comes back. And then you have two options: You can increase the dosage of your medication or simply continue to suffer. Eventually, you will reach a point where no doctor will increase your medication any further. But, the really awful thing about these medications is that they are terrifically addicting. You will need to take them to avoid horrible withdrawal. And I don’t mean a little discomfort. I mean life-threatening withdrawal. Read that again if it is unclear. If you become addicted to benzos you will need to be medically detoxed off of them so that you avoid a life-threatening seizure. That’s a tough pill to swallow but it’s the truth.

So medicines are really not cures for anxiety.

So, just quickly, let me address curing anxiety through therapy as well. A good therapist can help you tremendously. They are an invaluable resource that shouldn’t be diminished. I believe that therapists can really get you thinking about ways to attack your anxiety and ways to decrease it. But, they will not be able to offer an anxiety cure. This is simple enough, for a psychologist treats the symptoms of the anxiety attacks.

He does not treat the underlying assumptions that are causing you to become anxious in the first place. So, a therapist can be very helpful in an ongoing treatment program for severe anxiety, but he is simply not going to be helpful in eliminating your anxiety. In many ways a therapist or psychiatrist is similar to an anxiety medication. They are helpful, in the moment, for alleviating anxiety symptoms, however as soon as the pill wears off, you leave his office, you are right back where you started off. It isn’t really the answer after all.

The other thing you need to think about is the fact that most psychologists want to work on something rational. They, in general, don’t do so well treating anxiety because anxiety is really not something that you can “talk” your way out of. When you are having an anxiety attack, and you have no doubt felt this, your brain is being flooded with tons of chemicals that are causing a powerful reaction in your mind. You are under the spell of the panic attack. You are not thinking logically and rationally and you can not simply think your way out of it. And remember what a therapist is going to do is try to teach you to think your way out of it. That isn’t an anxiety cure, it is an anxiety delusion.

So, while both anxiety medication and individual appointments with a therapist can be helpful, neither is a cure for anxiety. And what we are looking for are anxiety cures. If you’re like me you are sick of simply masking the unpleasantness or trying to suffer through an attack more quickly you want to eliminate the anxiety from you life. You want to cure your anxiety. I understand exactly where you are coming from. And I do believe there is such a thing as an anxiety cure. In fact, I am about to share the cure for anxiety with you.

First, and this is important, read my earlier article about the mind shift technique. Seriously, go read it. Ok, so you’re back. First, welcome back. I hope you were able to internalize the type of change in thinking I was talking about in that article because we are going to talk about it here. if you need to go ahead and reread it because we are going to be talking about it in depth here…

The key to an everlasting anxiety cure is your mind. You see, I know why you are having anxiety attacks in the first place because I was there myself. You’re having anxiety attacks because you are worried about some consequence. Now the consequence could be embarrassment or it could be pain or it could be death or it could be misfortune. Whatever, you are obsessing about some consequence and that is causing your panic attacks. Simply put you are afraid, afraid about this consequence. You are so deathly afraid of it that you are literally causing your brain to spasm with toxins and chemicals just by thinking about the possibility of this consequence coming to fruition. Terrifying isn’t it.

So, take a moment and think about the consequence that causes you the most extreme anxiety. It’s probably some pretty unpleasant consequence that scares you to death. Don’t worry that’s natural. It has to be a pretty scary consequence to cause the type of reaction that it does in your brain. And, naturally, as a result of this you get a terrible anxiety attack.

So, what do we need to do to cure you of this pattern of thinking? Well, we’ll get to that in a moment. Now, remember the consequence that you were thinking about just a moment ago. Well, you are going to have to confront it. Here’s how. You need to decide, however, which is more important to you, avoiding the consequence or eliminating your anxiety. Because sometimes the anxiety, however unpleasant, is actually more appealing than facing the consequence that you are dreading.

Do you follow. You need to decide. Which is worse, the anxiety or the consequence. If you would prefer not to face this consequence then you will remain in a panic ridden, anxious state — possibly forever. If you want the anxiety cure, you are going to need to face this consequence head on. But I do not mean “face the fear” as some describe it. For instance, if you are terrified about driving in the rain, I’m not recommending that you “face” that fear by driving in a monsoon. No, not at all. Because your fight or flight reflex is very real. Simply traumatizing yourself does NOT alleviate the fear.

So, what am I recommending? It’s simple. Acceptance. Whatever you fear might actually happen, but you know what, that will be okay. The earth will continue to rotate around the sun if you get caught behind the wheel during a hurricane. Life will go on.

So, the way to cure anxiety is to accept that that might happen. Overcoming anxiety depends on your ability to be OK with the nightmare that is your consequence. Whatever you fear… it might happen. I can’t tell you otherwise and naturally you fear this outcome terribly. But what if it did come true. Do you know what…

The universe would continue to go on. Life as we know it would probably not cease to exist. Sure, it would be terrible and that’s why you fear it, but ask yourself this: Is this fear, this overwhelming anxiety worth it? is it worth it to you to continue to live in this terrible fear?

Simply accept that whatever you fear will come true. Or it has already. It stinks. It’s terrible. But it’s a reality. Get over it. If you accept your fear will come true you will stop worrying, obsessing and agonizing over it. In order to cure anxiety you have to be willing to say to yourself, “I don’t care.” You must be willing to say to yourself that the anxiety caused by the fear is worse than the consequence that you fear. Regardless of what you are worried about, it is controlling your life already. It is making you miserable. It is winning. Turn the tides by deciding it will come true, it has come true, or it is coming true already and you simply do not care.

Do you see now? The only anxiety cure that you need is in your mind. If you master your fear by accepting its inevitability, you will cure your anxiety. Stop worrying and just accept. That is the ultimate anxiety cure, my friends.

Is that you? I bet it is. And you probably want me to tell you that you CAN overcome your anxiety and that overcoming anxiety is easy and, even better, that I can sell you a program or book that will show you exactly how to do it. Boy, you are bound to be disappointed. You know why? Because I can’t cure your anxiety! But there are things that YOU can do to cure your anxiety but they are not easy. Working on yourself is hard. It is hard like coal mining is hard and everyday you have to hit the mines. There is no break, there is no reprieve. I know that my health is entirely contingent on the fact that I do the things it takes to maintain my mental compentency.

So, who am I? Good question. I am a fellow sufferer of anxiety. Only I had it worse than you do. After my first hospitalization my doctor remarked that I might have the most severe case of anxiety he had ever seen. I had been a wreck for sometime, though it was my social anxiety that was especially debilitating. I had taken all the normal steps, and luckily why parents had been pretty financially successful so I had access to many options and therapies that many people do not.

I saw a psychiatrist. He prescribed some benzodiazepines for my symptoms. The first few days were nothing but pleasant. My anxiety symptoms lessened. I even enjoyed the easy, relaxed feeling that the drug provided. However, it did not last. Soon my anxiety came back, first in social situations and then later full blown, and I found I had developed a new problem. Along with my anxiety, I had developed a powerful dependence on the clonazepam.

I thought that just having an anxiety disorder was unpleasant enough. It became a whole new ball game when I found myself completely addicted to benzodiazepines. This was a whole new hell, believe me. Words simply can not explain the misery brought on by benzo withdrawal symptoms. And this wasn’t a passing phenomenon. I suffered from benzodiazepine withdrawal syndrome for more than two years. It was beyond awful. It was worse, in fact, than my anxiety disorder in the first place.

Quick aside: If you doctor is putting you a regular dosing of benzos — klonopin, xanax, valium, whatever — do the research before you do damage to your body that you will have difficulty coming back from.

So anyway, I started to see a psychiatrist and my condition improved somewhat with medication. So I started to see a therapist to work on “core issues” and really get to the bottom of it. But that was a joke. Sure, my therapist was a nice guy. He had an interesting world view and he took an active interest in me. But what he did not do was help. Finally, I stopped seeing him.

Today I do not see therapists. I do not pay people to have them share their world view with me. Instead I decided to take matters into my own hands. And if I didn’t make that decision I would still be suffering from my anxiety disorder in full force. For, I discovered that therapists and doctors they can only help so much. Most of the work you have to do yourself. If you want to overcome your anxiety, you are going to have to take action.

The question I get is how do I do that. Well, let me ask, have you even looked for an answer to your solution or are you waiting for someone to solve it for you? Because there are plenty of people who will trade you false hopes for cash. Your cash. But if you take action and find the answers yourself, you will be so-much-the-better.

You see, there are sites like this and countless others where people share the exact steps that they took to overcome their anxiety disorders. Oh sure they had some help from professionals, but they learned the majority of the techniques from other anxiety sufferers. We are a great community, these people who used to suffer from anxiety disorders, and we work together to help others out of their own situation. But, the thing is, you have to be willing to do the work. You can’t be closed off. You have to devour every website on anxiety and every blog and start learning. The internet is the best source of information since the dawn of man and you can take advantage of it.

So, read this site and read other sites like it. Learn from those among us who have re-taken their lives. And, with work you can join us.