The following text is an unedited, stream of consciousness account of my personal process to reveal the nature of the anxiety and fear that lives inside me. It was written with the intent to shed light on this universal experience in the hope of helping individuals better understand what lives in all of us, and how to free ourselves from its grip.

It begins at the pit of the stomach, and then it spreads to the rest of the body. There is a sense of restlessness, agitation, and an inability to concentrate. At times, it would actually paralyze me. I felt a strong desire to flee it somehow, a desire to stop the discomfort. Yet it won’t leave me. In the past I would have found ways to distract myself, call someone, listen to music, eat something, watch TV, anything to keep me from feeling this disturbing energy living inside of me. Sometimes, I would actually stop and listen to it. I would go inside and attempt to get to the source of these experiences. Other times, just redirecting my attention to them would alleviate their intensity. Most of the time though, they would get more severe and cause me to flee again. However, I discovered that avoiding, or distracting myself from them clearly did not diminish or make them disappear, on the contrary, the faster I ran, the stronger they got. The pain became so unbearable that I could no longer avoid the simple truth; there is no place to run. It finally dawned on me-these feelings are mine. They live in me. They are part of me. Running away from them only meant running away from myself.

I made the decision not to run anymore. It was time to take responsibility for all of my experiences, external and internal. It was time for me to become acquainted with these feelings and understand why they were there. They were mine, and I needed to learn about them. I needed to learn about myself. Let me be perfectly clear, this was not an easy decision. I arrived at it only when I became aware that the pain of avoiding these feelings was worse than the feelings themselves. Owning them though, was a huge breakthrough for me. Understanding and accepting that the source of these feelings was inside of me and that I need to go within rather than outside of me in order to relieve them, was my first step toward appreciating their value.

The process was and remains uneven. It is a constant challenge for me to go into this discomfort zone. When the feelings arise, my first inclination is still to flee, and sometimes I do, though not for long. It takes great effort, but I am now able to remind myself to stop and listen. I force myself to sit still and quiet. Using my consciousness, I enter my body and sweep over it. I notice where I am tight, where I am jittery, where I am confused, and how every part of my being wants to distract me. Over time, as I began to listen more intently, I started hearing the fear. My mind would be chattering about some possible failure, some horrible mistake, or some potential wrongdoing. The content could be about something that happened in the past or something related to a future decision or event. Feelings of insecurities, judgments about what I am doing VS what I should be doing, or worries about how things may turn out, bombard my mind. Initially, this lead to my feeling more overwhelmed and confused, intensifying the desire to escape them. But my commitment to be with everything inside me inspires me to stay put and continue the process.