Fear of losing control: when anxiety thinks for me

When anxiety thinks for us everything begins to blur. The fear of losing control grips us because it is our most adverse emotions that are in control, while intrusive thoughts paint a threatening scenario for us to defend ourselves from. These are moments where we fear hurting someone, limit moments that we must know how to manage.

No one will be surprised to know that this is one of the most common fears that human beings usually experience. For example, someone who lives in a situation of continuous wear and tear in their work environment suffers from it and fears that from one moment to the next, all that contained and long-silenced tension will end up exploding in the worst way.

The father or mother of a family who carries on their shoulders multiple responsibilities, infinite problems and the distressing knot of their worries also suffers from it. These are situations where we live with the fear of losing control at any moment. and react with a bad word or a bad gesture towards the people one loves the most.

No one is immune to this type of reality. And so Although it is normal for the “fear” factor to be present in some small aspect in our daily lives, it is not permissible for us to give it all the power. It’s like living with another “I” inside us, a Mr. Hyde who at the slightest bit can bring the worst version of ourselves to the surface.

When you give your anxiety all control

Roberto is going through a time of ups and downs and a lot of anxiety. After almost a year of unemployment he feels trapped in any area of ​​his life. His parents, for his part, are concerned about his situation and try to cheer him up and suggest that he go home to eat every day. However, at the last meal Roberto was aware that he was beginning to be afraid of losing control at any moment.

During lunch last weekend, his brother made a small comment about his situation that he interpreted in the worst way possible. Her emotional response was excessive, she reacted with anger, raised her voice and said a series of words that she now regrets. The meal ended with her mother’s tears and her brother slamming the door. Our protagonist knows that he has a problem, but he lacks the resources to manage it properly…

It is possible that this situation is familiar to us, therefore, something that we should understand first is the way in which anxiety itself alters our behavior, our thoughts and our response style towards certain stimuli. Let’s see it below.

The demon of anxiety and its mechanism of action

When people carry an excess of worries, fears and uncertainties, our brain makes a somewhat Spartan interpretation: be careful, everything that surrounds you is threatening. After that conclusion, it determines that there is only one way out, to defend ourselves from everything and everyone.

Our judgment stops being rational and we hand over the control to that more instinctive autopilot.less reflective and of course not at all logical. We experience a very uncomfortable feeling of unreality, as if everything that happened was not authentic and as if, in turn, everything was foreign to us (depersonalization).We fall into a state of hypervigilance continues, we are always on the defensive, reacting excessively to the smallest things, generating obsessive, negative thoughts and anticipating things that have not yet happened.

How to manage the fear of losing control

Information that we tend to see very often in many self-help books is the idea that “In any situation, we all have the opportunity to react in one way or another. Choosing the best path is our responsibility.” Well, it must be said that as a message it can be very inspiring, but When a person suffers from anxiety it is very difficult for them to discern which is the correct path.

An anxious mind doesn’t think, it reacts. An anxious mind does not have full control over itself and therefore will not always make the best choices.. All of this forces us to understand that managing these situations is not an easy task, good intentions alone are not enough when what is inside us is a knot that prevents us from breathing and thinking clearly.

Let’s reflect below on what strategies are usually the most suitable for resolving the fear of losing control.

Steps to prevent our anxiety from taking control

First step: don’t control. Let’s think about it for a moment: we spend a lot of our time controlling our frustration, hiding thoughts, swallowing emotions, disguising moods… Let’s end so much containment and do something cathartic and liberating to start. Let us be able to put on the table what is inside us, let us express out loud how we feel, without fear.Let’s talk about our fears, let’s reason with them. One way to deactivate the power of fear is to give it a name and talk to it -> “I am afraid of losing my family because I am aware that lately I am losing control of my emotions, I say things that I later regret.”Control your thoughts to control your emotions. This objective is the premise of cognitive-behavioral therapy, one of the most suitable for these cases characterized by the fear of losing control over ourselves.

The last step requires freeing our body to give freedom to our mind.. This goal can be achieved through multiple therapies such as Jacobson’s progressive muscle relaxation, mindfulness, yoga or any physical exercise. With these types of strategies we will release physical tension and our brain will gradually acquire a more relaxed approach.

Regaining control over ourselves is possible, let’s work on it.

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