Understanding Anxiety: Why It Happens and How It Takes Hold
You know the fear doesn’t make sense. But your body does it anyway.
You may understand your anxiety perfectly well. You know the flight is safe. You know the presentation is not dangerous. You know the thought is irrational. You know you are probably overthinking.
And yet your body still reacts. Your heart races. Your stomach drops. Your chest tightens. Your mind scans for what might go wrong. You avoid, rehearse, check, control or seek reassurance.
This is the frustrating part of anxiety: you can know something consciously and still feel something completely different.
I work with people who are often capable, thoughtful and highly self-aware, but find themselves stuck in fear, hypervigilance or anxious patterns they cannot simply think their way out of.
My approach goes beyond managing anxious thoughts. I look at what may be driving the anxiety — psychologically, emotionally, unconsciously and in the body.
Because anxiety has unconscious drivers, I calm the body first and then work on identifying and neutralising the drivers. I use a combination of hypnotherapy, EMDR, NLP, Somatic therapy, imaginal exposure, parts work and cognitive awareness — depending on you, your history and what appears to be keeping the anxiety active.
Anxiety can look like overthinking, but often there is much more happening underneath.
Your nervous system may be reacting before your logical mind has had time to catch up. An old experience may have created an association between a particular situation and danger. A protective part of you may be constantly scanning for risk. Your body may have become used to living in a state of high alert. This can create a strange split:
One part of you knows you are safe. Another part does not believe it. That is why reassurance does not always work.
It is also why you can be highly rational and emotionally aware — and still experience irrational anxiety.
It can be a learned response involving the brain, body, nervous system, past experiences and unconscious patterns. And when anxiety has become automatic, logic alone may not be enough to change it. That's why my approach to anxiety therapy is integrative and why I believe you have to calm the body to calm the mind.
Anxiety may also be caused by a medical condition - hormones (change of life), thyroid disorder, pyrroles or SIBO overgrowth in the gut. There are literally many medical conditions that can cause anxiety. If your anxiety seems to come out of nowhere for no reason, no increase in stress, no trauma, nothing that may have contributed to nervous system dysregulation, then you should see a doctor. Ask them to test for any medical cause for the increase in anxiety.
Anxiety is not always a thinking problem
Change is Possible
I have worked with thousands of clients with anxiety. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to anxiety because no two people arrive there in quite the same way. Each person has their own structure of anxiety — shaped by temperament, life experience, learned patterns, stress, trauma, biology, beliefs and the way their nervous system has adapted over time.
This is why different tools work for different people, and why getting better often involves finding the right combination rather than searching for one magic answer.
A lot of my work is about spotting patterns - linking cause and effect. Once the we have established your internal anxiety structure then we can work on that inner critic or the perfectionist, or grow confidence or help you re-wire a trauma experience that is being triggered.
I draw on many therapies; hypnotherapy, because much of what drives anxiety is unconscious and hypnotherapy works on the unconscious, EMDR for trauma or past experiences that are wired into the nervous system, Somatic work to help move the trauma or anxious 'freeze' and hyper vigilance, out of your system and create deep calm, Parts Therapy for working with inner conflicted parts. For example you may have a part that thinks you should be confident you will get a good job review and another part that fears being judged and who throws you into an anxious spin.
Sleep, diet, exercise and calming rituals shouldn't be underestimated and part of my therapy teaches you how to genuinely relax in your body, daily. Some people don't know what that feels like. Working with anxiety is a journey of profound change - we may go deep into your past or it may simply mean changing priorities so you are less stressed in your daily life.
Whatever we do, you can be assured that anxiety and a dysregulated nervous system can change and I can help get comfortable in your own skin.
Anxiety Is Designed To Protect you
Anxiety is designed to protect you.
Your brain and body are constantly making predictions about what is safe and what might be dangerous. Sometimes that alarm system becomes overprotective.
A situation, sensation, memory or thought may trigger anxiety before you have consciously worked out why.
You might know you are safe — but some deeper part of you does not feel safe.
This is often why people become frustrated with themselves. They think:
Why am I still anxious when I know there is nothing to worry about?
The answer may be that the anxiety is happening faster and deeper than conscious thought.
I find anxiety has deep triggers and when we find and neutralise these triggers as well as teaching your body how to calm down - that' when you start to improve.
What Is Keeping Your Anxiety Active?
Before trying to simply “get rid of” anxiety, I want to understand what is driving it.
Is there a past trauma that has never been fully processed?
Did you grow up around criticism, unpredictability, conflict or emotional insecurity?
Have you learned to constantly scan for what might go wrong?
Is there a particular trigger your brain now associates with danger?
Do you fear the physical sensations of anxiety itself?
Is perfectionism or harsh self-criticism keeping your body under constant pressure?
Are you avoiding situations that frighten you, unintentionally teaching the brain that they really are dangerous?
Or have you simply been stressed for so long that tension now feels normal?
Sometimes it's a gut imbalance causing the anxiety, an overgrowth of SIBO can be the trigger. An overactive thyroid and other medical symptoms may also be the cause and you need a doctor or naturopath.
There is rarely one answer for everyone. This is why I do not believe in treating every case uniquely. I see my job as helping find the old patterns that are keeping you stuck s then helping you adjust into new patterns.
Is Hypnotherapy For Anxiety Evidenced?
Research suggests hypnotherapy can reduce anxiety and physiological arousal and can influence the autonomic nervous system, including activity associated with the body's stress and relaxation responses.
And:
Studies have found that hypnosis can reduce sympathetic activation and increase parasympathetic activity, supporting its use as a tool for helping the body move into a calmer physiological state
Papers:
“Hypnotic Modulation of Autonomic Nervous System (ANS) Activity”
Author:
-
Giuseppe De Benedittis
Published in 2024. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10968788/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
“Close your eyes and relax”: the role of hypnosis in reducing anxiety, and its implications for the prevention of cardiovascular diseases
Authors:
-
Donato Giuseppe Leo
-
Simon S. Keller
-
Riccardo Proietti
Published in Frontiers in Psychology, 2024. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39035095/
How does my anxiety
develop?
How are my
triggers wired? The Science.
The part of the brain that controls anxiety and fear is call the amygdala. Any signal that is perceived as a possible threat is processed in the thalamus (brain's switchboard) which divides into two and sent along two different pathways. Both lead to the amygdala. One triggers fight, flight or freeze which triggers all the nasty symptoms of anxiety such as an increased heart rate, nausea, sweating and a feeling that you are doing to die. The other signal goes via the cortex to the amygdala. The cortex is where rational thought takes place and your brain is determining whether there really is danger.
So for example if you hear a mechanical noise while in a plane, that sound goes straight to the amygdala and produces a rush of fear. About half a second later the other signal arrives from the cortex and determines that it is the sound of the wheels coming down and therefore you are not in danger and your amygdala calms you down. However the fear activated automatically before you were able to ascertain whether you were in danger. You are experiencing anxiety via an automatic process which can make you feel helpless as well as in terrible fear.
If you are sensitised and triggered by something such as flying or being in social groups, the trigger can become stuck and cannot be overridden by signals from the cortex telling you that you are safe. That is why you stay in fear and anxiety. The triggers have become ingrained or you may describe it as a neural loop.
In neurology there is a saying, "what fires together wires together", so we have to teach your brain a new pattern, which we do through the imagination, while in a trance state. We can also disrupt the pattern through NLP techniques, or use EMDR to break the emotion from the event. We can also understand the triggers and use mindful thinking. In addition we can work with the body/mind connection and the unconscious to bring about change.
There are some experiences or traits I find regularly in clients suffering from anxiety:
A trauma or multiple traumas in childhood or adult life that has switched the system into fight or flight and a dysregulated nervous system
Long term stress.
A tough inner critic.
High achieving with a lack of work/life balance.
Frequently asked questions
Can everyone be hypnotised?
Most people can experience hypnosis. A small number respond very little. A good first session helps you find out how you respond.
Will I be asleep?
No. Most people feel deeply relaxed and focused but aware of what's happening.
How many sessions will I need?
It depends on what you're working on. I usually recommends a 90-minute first session, so there's time to talk through what's happening, do the therapy itself and plan next steps (for a habit such as smoking, drinking or nail biting, an hour is usually enough). Most people then book one-hour sessions weekly or fortnightly until the work is done.
Can hypnotherapy be done online?
Yes. Diana sees clients online as well as in person in Balmain, and the fees are the same for both. The difference is you are limited to hypnotherapy only, if we do an online session. If you do an in-person session we have the full range of tools available including EMDR.
By Diana Joy
Clinical Hypnotherapist
Advanced Diploma Clinical Hypnotherapy, Psychotherapy & NLP 1050NAT
Learn about the therapies I use to work with anxiety:
https://www.dianajoy.com.au/anxiety-therapy-sydney
Want to understand about the fear of your own anxiety leading to more anxiety?
https://www.dianajoy.com.au/fear-of-anxiety