Mind Optimization Part 5: Anxiety

Why are we anxious? Because we are pushed out of our comfort zones, by technology, work, and the overall business of a 24/7 pace of life. It is the result of the departure from nature, and our heart, into the ever-busy mind, for which we are rewarded.

This video is part five of twenty-six excerpts from a presentation hosted by SOUL Food Salon in March 2019.

You may check out the full playlist of this video series on The Art and Science on Mind Optimization here. Alternatively, you can also click here to watch the previous video and here for the next one.

Video Transcript

If you look at anxiety, my understanding of anxiety is that there’s fundamentally a disconnect between the heart and mind. I think society increasingly pushes us and rewards us for our cognitive excellence, our accomplishments. But I think all too often we find ourselves in situations where the heart says, “No,” and the mind says, “Yes.” You could be stuck in a marriage where you’re not happy. You could be going to a job that really rubs you the wrong way. In my opinion, anxiety is what results when you keep pushing that forward.

Fatigue is a big marker of anxiety, and the question always is, “Why?” Fatigue becomes a marker of anxiety because you have to resist impulses all day. If you are not happy with the given situation, throughout the day, you could basically envision that you are sort of resisting an urge to leave. Resisting an urge to get up and quit. Resisting an urge to tell your boss that they’re an idiot. But that level of resisting impulses all day has actually been documented in the literature, it’s been called ego-fatigue. People that are exhausted like that all day are more likely to come home and binge-eat. More likely to come home and drink. And more likely to come home and just do anything to sort of not resist impulse any longer. So I think its important to kind of realize, as we go forward, that’s there’s also this relationship between heart and mind that plays a fundamental role. The question then becomes, “How did we get so in our minds? How did this happen?” The answer is that society rewards it.

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