Sitting with our-selves LEarning from anxiety

“In any given moment,” Catherine Steiner-Adair writes, “with a buzz or a ping, our devices summon us and we are likely to respond, allowing ourselves to be pulled away from our immediate surroundings and anyone in them, into the waiting world or elsewhere and others.” 

 

A common reality may be that living in an increasingly technical world and the demands and nuances that it brings has us feeling so disconnected from others, that we seek that same disconnection with ourselves. It seems for many of us simply being with ourselves can provoke anxieties we seek to remedy.

Uncomfortable feelings, thoughts, experiences from our past can make many of us subconsciously look for ways of distracting ourselves and subsequently removing us from experiencing present moments. The experience of stillness can evoke anxieties that are temporarily warded off by seemingly harmless behaviours like watching netflix, scanning the internet or moments of overindulgence in sugar or caffeine, but for others the anxieties may elicit more destructive vices such as gambling or drug and alcohol misuse.

Although there are different levels of disfunction when it comes to distracting behaviours, it seems a shame for the majority of us to go through our days seeking ways of removing ourselves from our present experiences.

After all, wouldn't we all like to live more meaningful lives? Don't we all want to be better able to feel deep joy in connecting with others and comfort in our own company?

Looking at different types of therapies, it strikes me that what many people are gravitating towards these days are therapies that help them feel connected and better able to regulate their emotions. Interestingly many of these involve learning to tolerate the discomfort that stillness can bring.

Alicia Muñoz, LPC, has written an interesting article on this very topic for goodtherapy.org.

If interested check it out here :)

Feeling the Warmth: Attachment Anxiety and Temperature

For some of us the winter months can be a cozy time of introspection and for others it can be an uncomfortable period we can't wait to get through. While pondering these differences in peoples experiences of cold weather, we began to think about the differences that exist in peoples sensitivity to interpersonal connections. 

Enter Dr. Gary Lewandowski's aricle for the Science of Relationships articles entitles " Feeling the Warmth: Attachment Anxiety and Temperature". In this article he describes studies that support the notion "that those with greater attachment anxiety may make [greater] associations between warm temperatures and interpersonal warmth". He proposes that there is a reason we use temperature words such as cold or warm when describing our perceptions of peoples personalities and that there may be a correlations between those who are more sensitive to physical temperature changes and sensitivity to interpersonal temperature changes.


If we go by these studies, then it may be that relationship break-ups or loss during the winter months may feel especially cold and difficult for those who experience greater attachment anxiety. Perhaps then we can conclude that a tangible remedy for this type of emotional pain could therefore be the addition of saunas or warm yoga classes or even sunny holidays not to mention close social support like friends and family.