Stop fighting anxiety (and start changing the pattern)

If you have taken my anxiety test and it showed that you fight anxiety, don’t worry, most of us automatically fight it—we try to force it to stop. That might look like tightening and bracing your body, urgently controlling your breathing to make the feeling go away, using distraction like an emergency exit, mentally arguing with thoughts, or telling yourself you must calm down right now. It’s completely understandable. But in CBT terms, this struggle often becomes a maintainer, because it sends your brain a danger message: “This feeling is unsafe—get rid of it.” And when the brain believes a feeling is dangerous, it keeps the alarm switched on. For people with body-first or panic-style anxiety, fighting can turn a normal anxiety rise into a much bigger wave.

What “fighting anxiety” looks like

You might recognise some of these:

• Bracing/tensing (jaw, shoulders, chest, stomach)
• Holding your breath or forcing deep breaths to “fix” the feeling
• Scanning for improvement (“Am I calmer yet?”)
• Urgent distraction (“I need this gone now”)
• Mentally battling thoughts (arguing, proving, reassuring, debating)
• Self-pressure (“I must calm down or I won’t cope”)

These are safety moves. They’re aimed at relief—and they often work briefly. The problem is what they teach the brain.

Why fighting anxiety keeps it going (the CBT explanation)

Anxiety is an alarm response. When you fight it, your brain learns:

“This feeling is dangerous and intolerable.”

That message keeps the alarm system active.

The struggle loop

1. Sensation or worry (tight chest, racing heart, “what if…?”)
2. “I must stop this” (urgency, intolerance, pressure to feel different)
3. Control/struggle (bracing, forced breathing, mental arguing, escape/distraction)
4. Short-term relief or rebound
   • sometimes anxiety drops briefly
   • or it rebounds because the struggle adds fuel (more adrenaline, more monitoring)
5. The brain learns: “Anxiety was intolerable. Next time, fight faster.”
6. Next time: fear of fear rises sooner, and the alarm triggers more easily

This is why people often say: “It’s not just the anxiety—it’s the panic about the anxiety.”

The alternative: change the response, not the feeling

The goal isn’t to “like” anxiety. It’s to stop treating it like an emergency.

We’re aiming for a different message to your brain:

“This is uncomfortable, but it’s safe. I can function with it here.”

That message is what turns the alarm down over time.

What to practise instead

• Allow the wave: let anxiety rise and fall like a wave rather than trying to win against it
• Drop the struggle by small percentages: you don’t have to go from 100% fighting to 0% overnight
• Soften the body: loosen jaw, drop shoulders, unclench belly, release the “brace”
• Let sensations be present: stop checking whether they’re changing
• Choose one small action while anxious: keep living your life with anxiety in the passenger seat

Success here is new learning, not perfect calm.

First experiment: “Soften + outward focus + next step” (30–60 seconds)

Next time anxiety spikes, try this:

1. Soften (10–20 seconds)
   • unclench jaw
   • drop shoulders
   • loosen belly
   • let your hands rest open
     Say (silently): “I’m going to stop fighting by 10%.”
2. Outward attention (20–30 seconds)
   • name 5 things you can see
   • notice 3 sounds
   • feel your feet on the floor
     (You’re not trying to erase anxiety—just moving attention out of “emergency mode.”)
3. Continue the next small step (10–30 seconds)
   • stay in the conversation
   • keep walking
   • keep typing the message
   • remain in the queue
     Choose one tiny action that says: “I can do life while anxious.”

How to measure success

Not “Did I get calm?” but:

• “Did I fight it a bit less?”
• “Did I stay with it long enough for my brain to learn it’s not dangerous?”
• “Did I take a step forward even with anxiety present?”

That’s the shift that changes the pattern over time.