“Everything Is Fine. So Why Am I So Anxious?”
“Nothing’s actually wrong. My job is okay. My relationships are stable. I’m healthy. Things are fine. But my body doesn’t seem to believe it. I’m on edge all the time—waiting for the next bad thing. I can’t relax. I feel like I’m bracing for something that never comes. What’s wrong with me?”
Dear Lydia,
There’s a certain kind of distress that’s harder to explain because it doesn’t have a clear reason. That’s the kind you’re describing—the kind that whispers, you should be okay, but your body tells you otherwise. And then you start questioning yourself. You start wondering whether you’re overreacting, ungrateful, or broken. But none of that is true.
What you’re experiencing isn’t irrational. It’s patterned. It's a deep imprint from your nervous system—a kind of emotional echo from past seasons when things weren’t fine. Even though your current life is technically “safe,” your body is still living in the shadow of what once wasn’t.
That’s what we call baseline dysregulation. It’s when your nervous system has been so trained by chaos, neglect, unpredictability, or high-stress survival that “fine” doesn’t register as safe—it registers as suspicious. Your system stays activated, even in the absence of immediate threat. Because threat used to show up without warning. So now, calm feels like the calm before a storm.
If you’ve ever lived through trauma, inconsistency, emotional volatility, or prolonged stress, your nervous system adapted to survive. It learned to scan, anticipate, brace. To be one step ahead. That pattern doesn’t just disappear once your external circumstances change. The inner machinery keeps running—because it believes it’s keeping you safe.
That’s why anxiety can show up when nothing seems wrong. Because anxiety isn’t always about the present. Sometimes it’s a residue. A relic from past danger. Or a rehearsal for imagined futures. Or both at once.
You might notice that your anxiety spikes when life gets quieter, not louder. That’s because silence, stillness, and peace weren’t always trustworthy for you. Maybe you grew up in a home where things could turn in an instant. Where the rug was always about to be pulled. Where emotional safety was unreliable, and calm was just the setup for the next blow.
So now, when things are “fine,” your body goes on high alert. You might find yourself scanning for something to worry about—because that’s how you’ve trained yourself to stay safe. You’re not broken. You’re just wired for survival. Still.
But survival mode isn’t meant to be permanent. And that’s why it starts to feel like suffering when it outlasts the danger.
This kind of anxiety often comes with a subtle form of anticipatory dread. Not panic. Not overt fear. Just a low hum of something is about to go wrong. Even when your mind can’t point to anything. Even when you try to reason with it. It’s not logical—it’s physiological.
And that’s important to understand, because it means you can’t talk your way out of it. You can’t think your way to peace. Not fully. The work of healing this kind of anxiety isn’t just mental—it’s somatic. It’s learning how to bring the nervous system back into present time. It’s learning how to show your body that this moment is not that moment. That now is not then.
And that’s where things get tender. Because the tools that helped you survive—hypervigilance, scanning, bracing—don’t give up easily. They’ve been your armor. Your compass. Your way of making sense of the world. And now, to feel peace, you have to disarm. But how do you disarm when you still don’t fully trust that peace is real?
You start by honoring the part of you that doesn’t trust it. You say, I see you. I know you’re trying to protect me. I know calm didn’t used to mean safety. And then you begin the slow work of building new associations.
You find small ways to remind your body that it’s okay to let go. Not through grand rituals or perfection, but through gentle repetition. Practices that re-train your nervous system to recognize stillness as safety—not threat.
Maybe that means five minutes in the morning with your hand on your chest, reminding yourself this moment is safe. Maybe it means letting yourself feel joy without waiting for the crash. Maybe it means noticing when you’re bracing—clenched jaw, tight shoulders, racing thoughts—and choosing to soften, even slightly.
This is what healing looks like: not the absence of anxiety, but the ability to meet it with curiosity instead of panic.
And here’s something else: sometimes anxiety is a cover emotion. It shows up when other feelings feel too vulnerable to name. Grief, loneliness, anger, shame. When those aren’t given space, anxiety steps in as the manager of everything unspoken.
So when you ask why am I so anxious, try asking instead: what in me hasn’t been acknowledged?
What am I still carrying that no one ever helped me hold?
What part of me doesn’t believe I’m safe yet, even if everything looks fine?
This is slow work. Quiet work. It doesn’t always give instant results. But with time, the edge softens. The bracing lessens. And you start to feel moments—not hours, not days at first, just moments—where your body remembers what calm feels like. And begins to trust it again.
You’re not alone in this pattern. So many people walk around with smiles on their faces and invisible fire alarms ringing in their chests. High-functioning anxiety isn’t rare—it’s just rarely spoken.
So speak it.
Let yourself name it without apology. Let yourself be exactly where you are without adding the shame of I shouldn’t feel this way.
You do. And that’s okay.
This is how healing begins—not by pretending you’re calm, but by offering compassion to the parts of you that still aren’t sure they’re safe to rest.
We’re learning to exhale again, slowly.
–RJ