More and more people are asking the question, “Can anxiety be cured?” It’s a reasonable question, because if you suffer from anxiety and depression then what you really want to know is, “Is there hope for me?” You’re not alone in asking this question. Before my life improved, I used to wonder about this all of the time, and I even wrote about it in my post “Does Therapy Really Work?”
Well, if you’re wondering, “Can anxiety be cured?” I have good news and bad news.
The bad news is that anxiety can’t be cured. Anxiety is your body’s way of protecting you from danger. If you have ever felt butterflies in your stomach before giving a speech or felt nervous about a date, you know what it’s like to feel anxious. But when those feelings become constant and begin interfering with your everyday life, you may have an anxiety disorder.
While there is no cure for generalized anxiety, the good news is that there are many different ways to ease and overcome anxiety so that it doesn’t control your life. This post will help you understand what causes anxiety, whether anxiety disorder is permanent, how long it takes to learn to manage anxiety, and how to start taking action to relieve anxiety.
What Causes Anxiety?
As I stated, anxiety is your brain’s natural way of protecting you from perceived danger. It’s likely the reason you’re here reading this today. Anxiety helped our ancestors stay alive in an environment where eating the wrong berry, or fighting a tiger could kill you. But, in modern society anxiety isn’t always helpful.
It’s normal to feel anxious from time to time, but if you’re often overly worried about every aspect of your life, your anxiety prevents you from doing things you want to do, or you’re constantly “waiting for the other shoe to drop,” then you likely have a generalized anxiety disorder. If this describes you then anxiety isn’t your problem, the disorder is.
Is Generalized Anxiety Disorder Permanent?
I’m not a psychiatrist, and this is a medical question, so I can’t concretely answer it for you, but I can offer some perspective from a patient. If you search for an answer to this question, or even if you ask a professional the answer you will likely get is that generalized anxiety disorder is treatable. Cutting through the B.S., this basically means that your struggle with anxiety can get better, but to what degree depends on the person.
There’s a reason this blog is called Not Quite Zen, it’s because even though I’ve gotten significantly better I still struggle. Sometimes my anxiety gets the best of me. Sometimes it doesn’t. But that reality used to be different for me. My anxiety would always win out. I would fuse with anxious thoughts and believe them. This would prevent me from attempting anything that I perceived as anxiety-inducing, and “I can’t do that,” was my common belief. While this still happens, it’s something I can overcome if the action is truly important to me. Or, if it’s something I must do I learned how to ease my anxiety and calm myself down.
So, in my opinion, is generalized anxiety disorder permanent? Yes, but it’s something you can manage, and it doesn’t have to control your life.
How Long Does It Take To Cure Anxiety?
The title for this should probably be “How Long Does It Take to Ease Anxiety?” But the answer is that it depends.
Every person is different. It took me many years of different types of therapy and medications before I finally got significantly better. Everything I learned along the way helped me build up my mental resilience, but it took Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for it all to really click. That’s my story; yours could be completely different.
Some people can go to therapy and get better within six months or a year. Sometimes learning one technique can help make your life a little bit better instantly.
This question of how long it takes is another common one that people who suffer from anxiety ask. While there isn’t a one size fits all answer, I have covered this in more detail in my post, “How to Quickly Improve Your Mental Health.” In it, I share the knowledge I’ve gained from my experience and the experience of others I’ve talked to on my podcast about how to shortcut improving mental health. It basically comes down to five steps:
1. Find the right therapy.
2. Find the right therapist.
3. Consider a psychiatrist.
4. Do the work.
5. Practice self-care.
However, if I were to say what’s the most important factor in “curing” anxiety? Then the answer would be persistence. If you keep trying you will eventually get better.
How To Start Easing Anxiety
If you’re currently feeling anxious, or you’re looking for tips on how to calm down an anxious mind there’s a lot you can do. Here are a few tips:
1. Connect to the present.
When you’re ruminating about the past or worried about the future, one of the best ways to calm down is by grounding in the present. Think of it like a ship near a harbor with an approaching storm. To find safety the ship can sail into the harbor and “drop anchor.”
I learned about this technique from world-renowned psychotherapist Russ Harris, and you can do it by using the acronym ACE.
A – Acknowledge your thoughts and feelings.
C – Come back into your body.
E – Engage in what you’re doing.
Here’s what it would be like in practice:
Acknowledge – Silently note what’s showing up for you at the moment. For example, if you’re anxious about giving a speech you could be noticing anxiety about going on stage and worry about failing.
Come back to your body – Press your fingertips together, push your feet into the floor, and straighten your posture.
Engage – Notice what’s in the room around you. What five things can you see? What can you hear? What can you smell?
You can run through this a few times, and then use it to return to whatever you’re supposed to be focused on at the time so that you’re not blocked by anxiety.
2. Use breathing exercises.
Calm breathing can help ease anxious feelings. Here are a couple of techniques you can try:
Anchor Breathing
- Set a timer for three minutes.
- Find an anchor on your body by placing your hand on your heart or your belly.
- Take a deep breath in and focus on your chest or belly expanding.
- As you exhale pay attention to how the ribs or stomach fall back down.
- Continue like this until the timer ends paying attention to the rising and falling of the air entering and exiting your body.
Box Breathing
- Breathe in slowly letting the air fill and expand your lungs as you count to four.
- Hold your breath for four.
- Exhale for four.
- Repeat this for two minutes.
3. Take a Walk Outside
Exercise and nature are two very powerful tools for combating anxiety. Both can lower stress hormones and release endorphins. Even just 10 to 20 minutes can be enough to turn down the volume on anxious emotions.
For more tips, read my post, “14 Ways to Ease Anxiety When You’re Overwhelmed.”
How To Start Overcoming Anxiety
Easing anxiety can help you calm down when you feel overwhelmed, but when you need to get past anxiety to take action in your life you need a way to overcome it. I covered this in detail in my post “How to Conquer Your Anxiety With Brute Force,” but to distill it down for you the main driver to overcome anxiety is values-based committed action.
You see, values are incredibly important. They are like a compass for your life. If you live by your values, then your life is probably fulfilling. If you don’t then you’re likely unhappy. The first step in values work is identifying which ones are most important to you. I have created an interactive tool that will walk you through several questions designed to surface your values. The tool is below, you won’t have to leave this page. If you’re on a mobile device, and you have trouble with the embedded tool, please use this direct link.
Once you understand your values, you can take action toward them. For me, this looked like coaching my son’s soccer team, even though I had a ton of anxiety about it. The value of being a good dad, was stronger than my anxiety so I committed to doing it. That’s how I used values-based committed action to conquer my anxiety. The byproduct of that action was most importantly living by my core values, and secondly, I became a lot less anxious in other areas of my life.
So, if you want to overcome anxiety, you need a strong value to motivate you. But keep in mind, the point of this is not actually to overcome anxiety, it’s to live a life of value, which can lead you to happiness. Reducing anxiety is just a happy side effect of this type of behavior. You can learn more about values in my post, “How Do Values Affect Behavior.”
Anxiety Really Can’t Be Cured?
In my experience, I’ve never met anyone who fully cured their anxiety. If you’re out there, I would love to meet you. But, I’m not the end-all-be-all authority on this question, and the truth is the question should probably be, “Can anxiety be cured for me?”
My advice is to worry less about curing anxiety and focus on treating it so you can live the life you want to live. Seek professional help, find support from friends and loved ones, and keep reading articles like this to learn more about managing anxiety.
If I can improve, I promise you can too. And if it makes you feel any better, I don’t ever wonder if anxiety can be cured anymore because anxiety no longer rules my life. It’s just a smaller part of it.
Be sure to subscribe to the newsletter by entering your email below. No spam, just life-changing and uplifting mental health content delivered every Tuesday.
Enjoyed this post? Please consider, buying me a cup of coffee to show your appreciation. Every little donation helps me continue to create great mental health content.
