People With High-Functioning Anxiety May Appear To Have It All Together, But Here Are Three Key Ways It’s Actually Holding You Back From Achieving Your Goals
Millions of people live with anxiety, and thankfully, we’re learning more about it and the better ways to cope with it.
For many of us who suffer from anxiety, our anxiousness is debilitating and prevents us from doing anything productive or being social. For others, they have high-functioning anxiety, which can often look like the opposite of that.
People with high-functioning anxiety often look like they have everything together. They hardly show any of the typical outer signals of anxiety like panic attacks, or at least not in public. While they may seem calm and super focused on the outside, they could be suffering from major anxiety on the inside.
Some people with high-functioning anxiety often have a hard time asking for help and try to cope with their feelings by working harder or getting a lot of things done, which eventually becomes exhausting.
If you think you may have high-functioning anxiety but aren’t sure, here are three ways it holds you back from living a more laid-back, happy lifestyle and achieving your goals.
It makes you overthink
Sometimes, anxiety makes our brains run wild. You may look fine on the outside to your peers, but your mind can be going into overdrive, overthinking, and replaying bad moments in your head anytime you start feeling insecure.
Before you let you’re overthinking make you feel sick with worry, take a deep breath and collect yourself. If you’re constantly replaying something you did or said in your head, think about whether you genuinely need to do something about it or if you can let it go.
If you can let it go, imagine all those negative thoughts have been scribbled on a piece of paper. Crumple up that paper and toss it in the trash. You don’t need anxiety-driven overthinking clouding your brain.
vladteodor – stock.adobe.com – illustrative purposes only, not the actual person
You only thrive off the validation of others
When you’re dealing with high-functioning anxiety, you often can’t convince yourself you’re doing a good job with work, school, your relationships, your hobbies, etc., unless someone else tells you that you are.
This is often because people with anxiety often deal with a lot of insecurity and self-doubt, meaning that one of the few ways to get by and not have constant breakdowns is to hear from someone else that they’re doing alright.
This can turn into something toxic and lead to you only doing what other people want you to do instead of marching to the beat of your own drum. How can you achieve your goals if you only focus on pleasing other people?
You struggle to see the big picture
People with high-functioning anxiety often force themselves to only look down a certain path. For instance, they think too much about what they “should” have achieved by now and all the things they haven’t achieved versus taking time to appreciate all the good they’ve done.
Changing your perspective and mindset is key to getting out of this habit. Sure, you can stay focused on something you want but don’t discredit any of the work you’ve done to get it when something goes wrong.
Acknowledge your small victories along with your failures, and remember that you’ve got your entire life to live. Stop stressing the small stuff!
If you’ve had a moment to self-respect and think anxiety may bring you down, take a deep breath and seek help. Reach out to a loved one and make a game plan for how you can begin to get proper help and work through it. You’ve got this!
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