What are Anxiety and Worry?

“What if…” or “What will I do if…”—everyone has had these thoughts. Thinking this way is a natural human process; in fact, without this ability, we might find ourselves in dangerous situations. However, when these thoughts become excessive, it may be a sign of a mental health concern.

An Ancient Survival Skill

Anxiety is an evolutionary ability to imagine the future. It is because of this trait that humans have been able to survive for so long. In ancient times, when survival was a day-to-day struggle, the capacity for “anxiety and worry” was constantly necessary. It allowed us to face threats, such as encountering a bear, by instantly choosing between “Fight, Flight, or Freeze” to protect ourselves.

Excessive Anxiety = A Brain Malfunction

The part of the brain responsible for feelings of anxiety and worry is the amygdala.

When we encounter a dangerous situation, the amygdala reacts faster than any other part of the brain, commanding the body to fight, flee, or freeze. As a result, the body undergoes various physical changes:

• Increased heart rate

• Sweating

• Shallow breathing

These reactions prepare the body to respond to a crisis. While this is a normal response, for some individuals, the amygdala begins to overreact due to various factors. This overactivity is what leads to clinical mental health issues.

In modern times, we rarely face life-or-death situations daily. However, without the capacity for anxiety, we would recklessly engage in dangerous behavior. In fact, there is a documented case of a woman whose amygdala ceased to function; despite being told repeatedly, she could not understand the danger of walking alone at night.

Causes of Amygdala Malfunction

1. Thinking Patterns

One reason the amygdala malfunctions is the influence of the prefrontal cortex. This is the part of the brain responsible for logical thinking, and it is strongly connected to the amygdala. If the prefrontal cortex engages in patterns of thought that generate anxiety, the amygdala may trigger a “false alarm” even when no danger is present.

2. Lifestyle

The amygdala is also heavily influenced by lifestyle. For example, research shows that a lack of adequate sleep reduces the frequency of REM sleep, making the amygdala more prone to malfunctioning.

3. Trauma

Another potential cause is past trauma. When we encounter objects, places, or sounds that remind us of a traumatic event, the amygdala can misfire, triggering a stress response.

Diagnostic Criteria for Anxiety Disorders

One of the mental health conditions resulting from these malfunctions is Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD). Below are the general diagnostic criteria:

1. Excessive anxiety and worry occurring more days than not for at least 6 months.

2. Finding it difficult to control the worry.

3. The anxiety and worry are associated with at least three of the following symptoms:

   • Restlessness or feeling keyed up

   • Being easily fatigued

   • Difficulty concentrating or mind going blank

   • Irritability

   • Muscle tension

   • Sleep disturbance (difficulty falling or staying asleep, or restless sleep)

For an anxiety disorder self-assessment, please click here.

Note: A formal diagnosis must be made by a mental health professional. Please use these criteria for reference only. If a screening suggests you should seek help, please feel free to contact me.

In my next blog post, I will discuss coping strategies for managing excessive anxiety and worry.

Tatsuya Arakawa, LMFT Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (California)

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1. Understanding the Causes of Anxiety

As human beings, we have a natural desire to understand why things happen the way they do. If we don’t have an explanation, it can be difficult to reach that moment of clarity— the “Oh, I get it now” feeling. Understanding the causes of anxiety can be incredibly helpful, as this awareness alone can contribute to reducing anxiety suffering.

Most of the time, anxiety arises from multiple factors. However, when you’re caught up in your own thoughts, everything can feel tangled—like a pair of knotted earphones—making it difficult to sort things out on your own.

In therapy, I provide a judgment-free space where clients can openly express whatever their heart and mind lead them to discuss. (Even though this might sound cliché, finding a space like this is surprisingly rare these days.) Through this process, you can discover for yourself what has been contributing to your anxiety.

2. Seeing Reality from Different Perspectives

During therapy, as you openly discuss your anxiety, I listen to how you perceive reality. This is important because people often get stuck in a single way of viewing a situation, making it difficult to see things from a different perspective.

Gaining a new perspective can help deepen your understanding of reality. This shift in perception can lead to an “Oh, I get it now” moment, ultimately reducing anxiety.

3. Learning Helpful Tools

As I mentioned in a previous blog, there are countless online resources—blogs, YouTube videos, and self-help guides—offering advice on managing anxiety. However, when I ask my clients to demonstrate how they practice techniques such as deep breathing, 95% of the time, they are doing it incorrectly. If coping skills are not used properly, they may not help at all—in fact, they could even worsen anxiety.

In therapy, I offer hands-on guidance, ensuring that you learn and apply coping techniques correctly. I provide real-time feedback to help you refine your skills, making them truly effective in managing anxiety.

It’s important to note that I don’t believe in suppressing anxiety—because that approach simply doesn’t work. Instead, therapy helps you understand, process, and manage anxiety in a way that fosters long-term relief.

I hope this blog helps you better understand how therapy can support you in overcoming anxiety suffering.

Tatsuya Arakawa, LMFT 82425

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What is mindfulness

Mindfulness is the practice of bringing one’s attention to the present moment in a non-judgmental manner. It involves being fully aware of one’s thoughts, feelings, and sensations without getting caught up in them. This state of awareness allows individuals to observe their experiences without labeling them as good or bad. Instead, they simply acknowledge what is happening and let it be.

What it means to live with anxiety

As I discussed in the last blog post, a lot of people try doing something that does not actually help such as trying to think positively, suppressing anxiety and disputing anxiety. What I mean by “living with anxiety” is not any of them.

I want you to take time to think about how anxiety has been actually helping you ever since you are born! For instance, before you take tests at school, you study because you are anxious if you can get a good score. When you drive, you drive carefully to make sure that you do not get into an accident and such because your anxiety is helping you. The point here is that your anxiety has been a best friend at certain times. ALSO, there can be times when your anxiety has been enemy.

How mindfulness can help you live with anxiety

One important thing I want you to understand is that as aforementioned, some anxieties are helpful, so you need to respond to them. However, some anxieties are not really helpful for you, so you do not have to respond to them. That is the time Mindfulness can be a great resource.

When you are anxious and let’s just say they are not helpful anxieties, you are basically caught up thinking too much about the future. This means you are not in touch with the present. When you engage in anything you are doing mindfully, you are basically back to the present moment. However, I am sure that anxieties pop up in your head again because feeling is supposed to come and go. Yet, if you are mindful of the fact that your anxieties come back, and continue to be mindful of anything and everything, you can come back to the present moment. If you keep doing this, usually you do not have to suffer from anxieties and can focus on whatever things you want to focus on.

I hope this was helpful for you.

Tatsuya Arakawa, LMFT (82425)

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As a therapist specializing in anxiety issues, I have seen so many people engaging in what does not help anxiety issues. In this blog, I would like to list what does not help your anxiety and explain why.

1. Trying to think positively

This is the number 1 strategy a lot of people attempt without success. Why? Because what they are trying to do is to suppress negative feelings including anxieties. This can be temporally solution because you feel “better” momentarily.

However, we, humans, are not designed to have ability to control what we think. For instance, if I ask you not to think sushi, you did think about sushi now while you are reading it. Right?

Thoughts are designed to flow. They are supposed to come and go. Yet, if we try not to think about what we do not want to think about, what ended up happening is unwanted thoughts stay in your head (just like you try not to think about sushi!); they will continue to be there and continue to bother you.

2. Denial of anxiety

Very similar to suppressing negative feelings, denying anxiety is a common way to deal with unwanted thought that makes you anxious. Just like number 1, it is a temporally fix. By trying not to think about anything that makes you feel anxious, it works momentarily. However, by the time you move on to do something else, the anxiety is there welcoming you to suffer more. Because you do not want it again, you might try to deny it. This vicious cycle can lead to severe mental health issue such as Generalized Anxiety Disorder and Depression.

Have you ever met people who claim that they are always positive and do not think about negative? Well, they tend to use this tactic. They seem positive outside, yet they master not  thinking about negative things so much that they are not ever aware that they think about something negative and suffer from negative feelings.

3. Disputing anxiety

Anxiety usually goes like the following: “what if….” “If I……” It almost always involves with “IF.” Anxiety is a thought about the future. Unfortunately, we do not have any ways to foresee our future. Therefore, disputing your anxiety in your head is a never-ending process because we just cannot find out what will happen in the future. But when we dispute, what we really want is solid proof that things will turn out to be what we want. However, again, we do not know that. Therefore, this is very similar to “trying to think positively” and you are trapping yourself into the vicious cycle of anxiety because a minute you thought you “win” over anxiety, your brain is whispering you to something else that makes you feel anxious. You get my point.

4. Looking for confirmation

Those who try to “fight” anxiety tends to use this strategy; they want to make sure that unwanted future will not come to them. For instance, if they are worried about not passing exams, they will study as much as possible to the point where some may see it excessive. However, from their perspective, they are decreasing the possibility of not passing the exam. There are a few issues with this. First, there is no way to make sure that unwanted future will not occur because we just cannot see the future. Two, if you are doing something excessively, there might be some impairment in your life. For instance, you might be sleeping less because you are so anxious about not passing the exam; or you are purposely sleeping less to create more time to study.
Just like other strategies, looking for confirmation is designed not to work because there is no way to confirm with 100% accuracy that unwanted future will not come. However, as long as we are listening too much to anxiety, we will try to look for 100% confirmation. At the end, again, the vicious cycle is created.

So, what can we do now then?
I would like to talk about the actual solution for this anxiety issue in the next blog.

Tatsuya Arakawa, LMFT 82425

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