Last update: April 10, 2017
The manifestations of anxiety are numerous and there are so many people who go to the psychologist because of this feeling, that several experts have already classified it as a real epidemic. Anguish is manifested through various symptoms: difficulty in falling asleep, panic attacks, various phobias, etc. All these manifestations have in common the insidious fear that affects those who are victims of them every day.
Faced with this phenomenon, the world of health has developed various responses. There is a wide range of medicines, for example. On the one hand, the traditional ones: a huge array of anxiolytics developed by pharmaceutical laboratories that promise to reduce the feeling of anguish. However, these drugs, in addition to having terrible side effects, usually only guarantee a temporary solution. That is, they only take effect during the intake period.
"Drown more people in a glass of water than in rivers."
-Georg Christoph Lichtenberg-
On the other hand, the offer of alternative medicines is also very wide: from naturist medicine and homeopathy to bioenergetic solutions. And all this, of course, without counting all the grandmother's remedies for anxiety: from valerian or lemon balm water, to hot baths, and so on with the more traditional tricks. However, none of these remedies seem to work entirely.
The epidemic of anxiety arises in the collective mind
All phenomena that develop in the mind are also reflected in the body. Most of the time, in this same order: first the mind and then the body. Only on rare occasions does the opposite happen, first in the body and then in the mind. For example, this is the case of very high fever or when we ingest substances that alter our perception of reality.
For this reason, intervention with psychiatric drugs is rarely successful. These drugs reduce the symptoms, sure, but they don't solve the underlying cause. Medicines of any kind should only be seen as temporary and limited help, not as a permanent solution.
The real solution can only be to fight the real cause of distress. The problem is that, according to many experts, the historical period in which we live is generating in society aanxiety really rampant. Everything happens at dizzying speeds and the psychological tools we have at our disposal are not enough to process reality with the same speed. For this reason, anxiety is no longer an individual problem, but a real epidemic.
Why is it said to be a "silent" epidemic?
One of the most complex aspects of this epidemic of distress is that it is very difficult to describe in words. Each of us feels within himself that daily restlessness that does not let him sleep, leads him to be in a bad mood or to sink into routine. At the same time, however, each of us has a hard time telling what we are feeling.
We all feel that there is something too much within us. A weight that we would like to get rid of, but which we cannot fully identify. Where does that feeling of weight, of excess, come from? Where is that burden hiding? Maybe I do a job that doesn't make me happy? Is my relationship with others too negative? What path do I have to take to feel better? These are just some of the questions that invade our heads without being invited.
It is as if our existence has been saturated with something it does not need. A sensation similar to the one we experience when we enter a room overflowing with useless objects, knick-knacks and decorations. We know we should tidy up, but there are so many things to do that we don't know where to start and how to get out of it.
From the epidemic to the individual
Science has often been involved in devising generic, standardized solutions that work for everyone. Ultimately, this is his goal: to extract universal solutions for individual problems. However, in the realm of human subjectivity, this type of approach is often not the best. Because, in the end, it solves nothing.
For this reason, there is an epidemic of anguish, and it is an epidemic that extends with the complicity of silence that arises from the drama of each of us. The answer to that restlessness can only be given by each of us, individually. There is no one solution applicable to all cases. There is no universal magic formula that is effective for everyone. Everyone has to find their own way to resolve that insomnia, that feeling of oppression and suffocation, that recurring annoyance ...
And everyone must understand that, to chase away the anguish, the first thing to do is to face the novelty, the emptiness. It is absolutely necessary to break the ties with habit: it is the only way to start emptying that mental room so full of useless objects, leaving room to breathe. Another good idea may be to resort to a therapy that frees expression, as well as relaxation exercises that help open that window in an overly full and burdened mind.
