86Thousand400: Exercise and Anxiety

Anxiety sharpens your attention so you can meet the challenge. Emotionally what you feel is fear.

If you worry when there's no real threat, to the point where you can't function normally, that's an anxiety disorder. The symptoms crowd your consciousness, your brain loses perspective, and you can't think straight. Clinical anxiety affects more than forty million Americans, so it an incredibly common disorder.

Panic is the most intense form of anxiety and probably the most common phobia is social anxiety disorder. (A consuming fear of any social situation). Afflicting fifteen million Americans. Social anxiety disorder takes a serious toll on quality of life.

All of these forms of anxiety can bleed into and feed off one another, and they often seed other disorders such as depression

The Defense (Through Exercise):

Firstly exercise is a better alternative to taking medicine and individually one gains a sense of control. Exerting the body physically also takes one’s mind off any anxiety. The ripple effects of exercise are then profound.

Overall the situation may not change a huge amount, however one's response and thus their attitude certainly will.

The Evidence

When we increase our heart rate and breathing in the context of exercise, we learn that these physical signs don't necessarily lead to an anxiety attack. We become more comfortable with the feeling of our body being aroused, and we don't automatically assume that the arousal is noxious.

By using exercise to combat the symptoms, you can treat the state, and as your level of fitness improves, you chip away at that trait. Over time, you teach the brain that the symptoms don't always spell doom and that you can survive.

In the body, physical activity lowers the resting tension of the muscles and thus interrupts the anxiety feedback loop to the brain. If the body is calm, the brain is less prone to worry. Exercise also produces calming chemical changes.

The majority of studies show that aerobic exercise significantly alleviates symptoms of any anxiety disorder. Clearly, therefore there is a connection between how much you exercise and how anxious you feel.