Anxiety cure – do we have one? Can anxiety be cured?

Many people suffer from anxiety, and to find an anxiety cure we need to look at both the medical and psychological worlds.

Anxiety cure comes in different ways

The medical world thinks that chemical imbalance in the brain causes anxiety. The cure to anxiety is, therefore, a series of drugs that re-establish the right balance.

These drugs can have a quick effect and are extremely useful to relieve anxiety when it is too strong, but do they really “cure” it? The answer is that, unfortunately, drugs take the edge off anxiety while you take them, but they are not a cure. Anxiety is more complex than a series of chemical problems, and its cure needs a complex and holistic approach.

Psychotherapy offers a holistic approach to anxiety

Psychotherapy tries to find an anxiety cure by understanding the psychological causes of it. This means that we need to take a step back and understand how the psyche of the anxious person works. It is a very personal approach that takes into consideration all aspects of a human being.

Anxiety can be cured if we understand what is happening in life that causes it. To do this, psychotherapy focusses both on the present and on the past. According to psychotherapy, the best anxiety cure lies in living a life that meets all our emotional and physical needs.

Anxiety cure step 1: physical needs

We all need to feel safe and healthy. Eating healthy food, having a safe place to stay and being in a reasonably stable situation with money are basic human needs that, if not met, generate anxiety. There is no point trying to cure anxiety without looking after these basic aspects of life.

Anxiety cure step 2: emotional needs

This is where psychotherapy helps the most. We, as human beings, have got strong emotional needs for intimate connection, family and belonging to a community. While we all understand physical needs, we easily forget about our emotional ones.

If we feel lonely because we do not have any meaningful connection to other people, we are bound to feel anxious. If we grew up in a difficult family we are very vulnerable to anxiety. In the present, we might struggle to create stable relationships.

At times we might not have a sense of community. For example we believe we are different to everybody else and that, if we really show who we are, we will lose our community.

What to do next?

Going to a GP is always a good starting point to find out what you can do about anxiety. A good website to read are Mind.org or you can read more of my articles on anxiety.