How Bad Is It?
The truth is, anxiety is such a commonplace experience that we often feel like there is something wrong with us when we aren’t feeling anxious. We wonder what new threat to our security or peace we are missing and concern ourselves with what “fresh hell” (as Dorothy Parker put it) is waiting just around the corner, or in the next email.
But how do you know whether you are experiencing normal, garden-variety stress and anxiety or whether you are struggling with something more serious? When does anxiety become a disorder?
To be honest, if you have been asking yourself this question, it’s probably time to at least seek a professional evaluation. People often wait for years (some research suggests an average of six years) before getting appropriate, professional counseling help. By then, the problem has been allowed to grow into something that has had a serious impact on the person’s life, career, and relationships. Anxiety disorders, even serious ones, are very responsive to treatment. The vast majority of people who seek counseling for anxiety experience significant relief. By getting appropriate, professional help early, even before you’re sure you “really” need it, you increase the chances of a shorter course of treatment and a quicker and fuller recovery.
That said, there are a few unmistakable signs that anxiety could be becoming a particularly serious issue for you. The quiz at the end of this chapter can help you decide if you are experiencing “normal” levels of anxiety or if you should seek an evaluation of your anxiety by a professional counselor.
The Good News
Regardless of the level of anxiety you are experiencing, the good news is that with proper help, you can find ways to stop worrying and significantly increase your peace. Better still, as a Christian, you can be comforted by realizing that whatever worry or anxiety you are feeling in this moment, it was never God’s will that you be anxious. Neither are you destined to live in your anxiety.
In his Theology of the Body, Pope Saint John Paul the Great reminded us that to really understand God’s plan for our life and relationships, we need to go back to the beginning. Saint John Paul proposed that there are three phases of human existence in the Divine Plan. Original Man is the first phase of human life before the Fall, when our first parents were still in total communion with God and each other and before God’s plan was disrupted by sin. Historical Man is the post-Fall, sinful age we are living in now. Eschatological Man refers to our destiny at the end of time, when God creates the New Heaven and the New Earth and we are raised up in glory to become everything we were created to be and live in complete union with him for all of eternity.
“Great, Greg,” you say. “What does any of this have to do with anxiety?” I’m glad you asked.
To figure out how things are supposed to be, and understand what God really intends for us, Saint John Paul II argued that it wasn’t enough to see how things are now. We have to look at both God’s intentions for us at the beginning of creation and what he intends us to become through his grace at the end of time. Too often, we are tempted to think that “what we see is what we get.” It is too easy to believe that the anxiety-choked world we live in is all there is, and any thoughts about what we could become beyond the boundaries of our present reality are just wishful thinking. But the historical phase we live in cannot accurately reflect God’s intentions for how we should live or relate or feel, any more than a defaced painting can represent the original intentions of the artist. Certainly, we can glimpse all the beauty that painting was meant to reflect, but only if we imagine what it looked like when it was first painted, or what it could look like again if it were to be restored.
Looking at the human condition from this perspective, we see that anxiety didn’t enter the scene until sin entered the world. Prior to the Fall, God, man, woman, and creation lived in harmonious union. Genesis paints a picture of Adam and Eve confident in God’s providence, safe in each other’s arms, and happy to do the productive work of tending the garden. It was, literally, paradise.
After the Fall, everything shifts. Suddenly, man and woman, separated from God for the first time, are intimately aware of how alone, how vulnerable, how tiny they are, especially in the face of the enormity of the universe. They are naked and ashamed of just how incomplete, insufficient, and incapable they are of handling anything about the events their actions have set in motion. When they hear God coming, Adam and Eve have what amounts to the first panic attack. They hide in the bushes, cowering, feeling the weight of the wreckage closing in on them and hoping against hope that it would all just … go away.
But God assures Adam and Eve, and us, that he did not intend to leave us this way. The Word would become flesh in the person of Christ, entering into the experience of historical man to tell us again and again to “be not afraid.” He reminds us that when the new heavens and new earth are created at the end of time all will be set to right and peace will reign in the world and in our hearts once again.
I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, God’s dwelling is with the human race. He will dwell with them and they will be his people and God himself will always be with them [as their God]. He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death or mourning, wailing or pain, [for] the old order has passed away.” (Rev 21:3–4).
Through all this we see that although anxiety is common enough in this present, historical phase of human existence, it is not God’s intention either for our beginning or our end. The even better news is that we don’t have to wait until the end times to be delivered from most if not all of our anxieties! God is already hard at work, healing us day by day by drawing us deeper and deeper into relationship with him, where we can encounter the perfect love that casts out all fear (cf. 1 Jn 4:18).
The “Mystery” of Anxiety
To illustrate how God is working in our present lives to free us from anxiety, let’s briefly turn to what we know about anxiety and spiritual development. Classic mystical theology teaches that there are three stages that each person moves through, by God’s grace, on his or her road to sainthood: the Purgative Way, the Illuminative Way, and the Unitive Way. Most of us could count ourselves truly blessed to make it to the end of the first stage in our lifetime, the Purgative Way, where we learn self-mastery and surrender our attachment to neurotic comforts. Some may make it to the second stage, the Illuminative Way, where the soul experiences both the practical wisdom that comes from living a well-integrated life and a special sense of zeal for proclaiming the gospel not just with our words but also in the way we live and relate to others. A small few will be graced in their lifetime to achieve the third stage, the Unitive Way, where one experiences the beginnings of total union with God this side of heaven. The Unitive Way is the realm of living saints.
In his book, Spiritual Passages, the late psychologist and spiritual director Father Benedict Groeschel studied people he encountered along each of these three stages of the spiritual walk. He observed a steady decrease in anxiety and an increase in peace and trust in God’s loving care, despite the trials a person encounters while moving through these stages and toward deeper communion with God.
This makes sense from both a psychological and spiritual standpoint. As we experience the integration that comes with self-mastery, the peace that accompanies finding healthy and godly ways to satisfy our deepest longings, the wisdom that helps us confidently discern the right thing to do at the right time and in the right way, and the all-encompassing love that comes from entering more and more deeply into the intimate presence of God, it stands to reason that anxiety would have less claim over our lives. We may have to wait until the next life for complete and total deliverance from anxiety. But it is God’s will to allow us to experience however much peace we can — the peace the world cannot give (cf. Jn 14:27) — even while we are still in this world.
Are You