Episode 98: Anxiety is Normal

We are so thankful to be able to welcome Dr. Ray Branton back to the podcast this week. If you missed it - we talked about marriage and relationships in Episode 97. You are definitely going to want to listen to that one as well!

This week we are talking about ANXIETY. Does that give you anxiety to just see the word? Well, something that you need to know is that anxiety is NORMAL. And it's beneficial. As long as it doesn't paralyze you and cause you to not be able to function properly. But we have overpathologized fear and worry, and that's why it seems like everyone is struggling with anxiety.

What many of us need is more balance in our lives. We don't need to be lawnmower parents - paving the way for our kids to have no trials or tribulation. We also shouldn't spend all of our time on social media, since that has been proven to cause users to feel less satisfied with their lives due to comparison analysis.

Instead, Dr. Branton encourages us to replace the word 'anxiety' with 'curiosity'. You may be anxious about the future, or you are curious about it. You may feel anxious about a relationship, or you are curious as to how you can improve it. Curiosity has many more positive connotations, and anxiety is negative, but the sentiments are similar.

Dr. Branton also sees anxiety as the beast we try to cage up, but that we keep on feeding. If we can find people that we trust - even if it's a licensed counselor - we will be able to keep anxiety at bay. In fact, the #1 change agent is RELATIONSHIP. This is true when someone who needs help goes to a counselor, and they trust their counselor, and the advice they are receiving. It's not the advice. It's the relationship. And so when we are in community with people that we love, trust, and are able to be vulnerable with - we will grow, we will change, we will thrive!

The Good Word of the Day

"Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed."

Proverbs 15:22

So find your community! You may have to be the person who reaches out and starts to build it! And that's great. You can hand pick the people you want to have in your inner circle. We are so thankful that people have let us into their worlds, and we are thankful for the people that we have in ours.

We hope you enjoyed today's episode. If you did, we would love for you to leave us a 5 star review on iTunes, and to subscribe! You can reach us at hello@fosteringvoices.com or on Instagram.

Have a great week and join us again next week for episode 99!