The Humanistic View of Anxiety: From Limitation to Invitation
In today’s fast-moving, always-on world, anxiety seems to be ever-present part of our lives. With a constant stream of unsettling headlines, social media comparisons, and the overwhelming pace of modern life, it’s no wonder that anxiety has become one of the most common mental health concerns of our time. But while mainstream approaches often teach us how to cope with anxiety, very few help us understand its deeper purpose—its invitation.
What if anxiety isn’t just a problem to be fixed, but a message to be heard?
What if, instead of something to silence, it is something to listen to?
Beyond Symptom Management: Meeting Anxiety with Curiosity
Traditional techniques such as breathing, cognitive reframing, and mindfulness offer relief—and they are valuable. But they often only graze the surface, focusing on managing symptoms rather than exploring the root beneath them. These tools are like umbrellas in the rain: helpful, but not the same as understanding where the storm is coming from.
From a humanistic perspective, anxiety is not an enemy—it’s a messenger. It’s a signal that something within us is disconnected and out of sync and seeking attention and care. When we meet anxiety with curiosity rather than fear, we open the door to profound healing and transformation.
True mastery over the complex emotional states comes not just from managing them but from fundamentally understanding them. By cultivating the attention, intention, and inner connection, we strengthen our ability to identify the source of anxiety and then work towards integration, transforming the energy of threat and alarm into the drive toward resilience and harmony.
Photo credit to Ivana Cajina
Anxiety vs. Fear: Understanding the Terrain
While often used interchangeably, anxiety and fear are not the same. Fear is the body’s response to a existent, immediate danger—it’s oriented outward, toward a real threat and activates organismic survival response of flight, fight or freeze. Anxiety, on the other hand, arises from within. It’s an internal alarm in response to uncertainty or perceived danger—often rooted in the belief that we won’t be able to cope if “something” happens.
This distinction reminds us that anxiety is often personal—it reflects how we relate to ourselves, not just our environment.
Anxiety as a Bodily Signal: Listening to Our Inner Alarms
Anxiety isn’t always a sign that something is wrong—it can also be a sign that something is missing.
Just like a flashing fuel light in your car, your body may be trying to tell you it needs something: rest, hydration, nourishment, connection, slowing down, stillness. When we’re running on empty—emotionally, physically, or spiritually—anxiety often shows up as a call to recalibrate and more self-care.
Too often, we misread these signals, labelling them as a problem, weakness, or disorder. We push through, numb out, or avoid. Over time, avoidance becomes a habit—and the body gets louder. Any form of distraction or avoidance provide a very short lived relief, but makes the experience of anxiety worse over time - what was once a whisper, becomes a roar.
Besides that, the uncertainty of living situations and the frequent local and global changes are all part of being human and can create transitory anxiety that is a part of human existence. We all have felt it in times of intensified stress or at the crossroads in our lives. With developed self-soothing capacity and help from our supportive relationships, we can go through these transitory periods in our life without being debilitated with more intense anxiety or developing a disorder. However, some people would need help to do so.
The Roots of Anxiety: A Deeper Look
While life events, trauma, and even physical imbalances (like poor nutrition, blood sugar fluctuations, or thyroid issues) can all contribute to anxiety, there’s often a deeper, more subtle pattern at play: self-abandonment.
This is the experience of being cut off from our true selves—our needs, desires, and inner knowing. We become overly focused on others’ expectations, societal norms, and external validation. We reduce ourselves, forget who we are, and anxiety comes to remind us.
In this light, anxiety is not your enemy. It’s your inner self waving a flag, saying:
“Come back. I need you.”
Common Features of Anxiety (And What They’re Telling You)
Anxiety often shares a familiar pattern, including:
Future orientation – losing connection with what is happening in the present moment
Inner conflict – being torn between different parts of yourself (e.g., needing rest vs. feeling the need to keep going/ doing more)
Self-monitoring – overanalysing how you're perceived or how you're doing
Fear of loss of control – a sense of helplessness or impending collapse
Anticipation of inadequacy – “If that happens, I won’t be able to cope.”
Catastrophic thinking – interpreting body signals or external events as signs of doom
Avoidance of feelings – avoiding the anxiety itself, which creates even more of it
These patterns become self-perpetuating if left unexamined, gradually narrowing our lives and limiting our possibilities. The more we avoid, the smaller our world becomes.
From Paralysis to Possibility: Using Anxiety as Fuel
What if anxiety isn’t just the presence of “fantom fear”, but the absence of connection?
When we understand this, we can begin to work with anxiety instead of against it. We can begin to see its energy—not just as something to manage—but something to channel. Anxiety holds tremendous power: it sharpens our focus, fuels our thinking, and heightens our awareness. When not distorted by fear, it can feel similar to excitement or readiness.
That’s why movement helps. Not just physical movement, but emotional, relational, and spiritual movement—toward yourself.
The Real Invitation: Returning to Wholeness
Working with anxiety often uncovers something deeper: a longing to return to our true self. Underneath the noise, the tension, and the urgency lies a disconnection from who we really are. We’ve become entangled in who we think we should be, losing sight of our essence.
Trying to “control” anxiety without addressing the root is like trying to catch and control smoke without looking where the fire is. Real freedom begins when we stop running from discomfort and start listening to what it’s trying to show us.
To Sum Up: Anxiety May Speak the Language of the Soul
Anxiety is often a response to:
Disconnection – from self, others, or meaning
Anticipation of danger and threat – physical, emotional, or existential
Inner conflict – between personal truth and external expectations
Physiological imbalance – due to lifestyle, nutrition, or illness
Fear of fear (or uncertainty) itself – creating a cycle of avoidance and limitation
When we see anxiety this way—not as a flaw, but as feedback—we reclaim our agency. We begin to respond with self-inquiry instead of self-judgment, curiosity instead of criticism.
Your Invitation: Reframing Anxiety and Other Feelings as a Pathway to Growth
Whether you're a mental health professional, caregiver, or simply someone seeking more peace in a noisy world, the FOT Applications workshop is for you. This transformative workshop invites you to explore anxiety and other emotions not as something to eliminate, but as something to understand—and ultimately, to befriend. Rooted in the humanistic tradition and depth psychology, this empowering approach sees all emotions and feelings not as a block, but as a gateway to wholeness. It provides practical tools and insights to help you navigate emotions in a way that fosters growth, resilience, and transformation—both for yourself and your clients.
Join us in reframing anxiety and other feelings—not as a burden, but as a bridge. Not as a problem, but as a powerful guide back to yourself.