Anxiety

Anxiety, whether you like it or not, is within us all.

It has helped our species get to where we are today, signalling the flight or fight response, helping us avoid dangerous and deadly situations.

But it seems today, quite often it doesn’t serve such a useful purpose, with many of us terrified to get out of bed, to go to the shops or just terrified to exist.

When anxiety attacks it can be brutal; catching you off guard, limiting your genuine potential of being happy, or of being productive in any way shape or form.

Alex portrays his experience with anxiety with this illustration, its sharp stabs, its suffocating, drowning tendencies, when you find yourself suddenly diving in head first, lost in its existence, and no longer in your own.

Unsure of what to do next, our natural instincts tell us to run away as quickly as possible; but if there is nothing to run from, where do you go?

Trying to run away only builds the tension, the fear and the dread for anything to come. The best way to reduce your anxieties power it to truly accept it, to see it as a distant entity that has come for a visit, trying to keep yourself as calm as possible.

Having a creative outlet to express your anxiety or any other difficult emotions is such an ingenious way of helping rid yourself of its tight grasp.

Talk about it, describe it, draw it.

 

– Alex Allcock