My Top 10 Takeaways from "Beyond Anxiety" by Martha Beck

Summary

Martha Beck is one of my favorite nonfiction authors. She writes books that are readable, relatable, and immediately applicable to daily life. With her newest book, Beyond Anxiety, she does not disappoint. In it, she argues that the opposite of anxiety is not calm.  Instead, calm is simply a waypoint on the path to the true antidote to anxiety: creativity.

Another way to put this is: even though it is hard to feel creative when you are anxious, if you are able to calm yourself down just enough to tap into your creativity and curiosity, those activities are a more lasting way to dispel anxiety than simply using calming techniques.

Book Structure

First, she describes her view of anxiety – as the left brain's futile attempt to control the uncontrollable.  Then she spends some time on practical ideas to bring on a sufficient level of calm. Finally, she explores all the ways to nurture your creativity and build a life that centers on fulfillment and pursuit of passions, rather than feeling anxious.

Takeaways

I take notes as I read and I ended up with pages of them. Here are the 10 top takeaways that I selected to share with you. You'll notice that I particularly enjoy her visual imagery and have included some of my own illustrations of her ideas.

1. Anxiety must be replaced. This is where the book goes beyond what I've read about anxiety (ah, I just now got the title reference!). Instead of just turning down the volume on anxiety, she insists that we have to turn up the volume on something else. And that's something else is creativity.  I think this is true of most habits we are trying to break – it's not good enough just to try to stop the habit, you have to replace it with something else.

2. Fear vs. Anxiety.  I've heard this before, but it bears repeating: there's a crucial difference between real fear and anxiety. Real fear is present-oriented, specific, and induces action. Once the threat is gone, fear subsides. Anxiety is different. It is future-oriented, sometimes vague, and full of frazzled energy with no clear action to channel it into. It also tends to stick around after the threat is gone as a sense of doom and foreboding. It's important to know the difference between these: fear keeps you safe, anxiety keeps you stuck.

3. Be an "Anxiety Whisperer." She touches on something here that I have found to be true over and over again – to calm down from anxiety, be soothing and kind to yourself. The way I say it is, your emotional brain is a dog. And when it's anxious, it's a terrified dog. Treat yourself just as you would a terrified dog who you wanted to coax out of the corner. She has a sequence for anxiety whispering: Sigh. Soften your eye focus. Move a little. Accept the feeling. Make soothing sounds. Offer yourself kindness.  Tell me that's not how you would attempt to calm a frightened dog!

4. "Wait Until Nothing Happens."  This is another tip from dog training. With reactive dogs, trainers know to simply wait until nothing happens in order to rewire the dog's brain and change their conditioning. Our emotional brains are no different! Instead of pushing through panic, gradually expose yourself to a trigger. When you feel the edge of anxiety, stop. Stay at that edge of your comfort zone and just wait until you start to get bored and relax. Doing this repeatedly begins to rewire your nervous system.

5. Free Your Inner "Art Toad". 

Unleash your inner Art Toad

This is one of the things that I love about Martha Beck. She has a billion personal experiences that illustrate her theories.  She restarted an art interest and almost immediately became a complete painting, drawing, sketching zealot, which she refers to as her "Art Toad." Once she got started, Art Toad never wanted to stop!  The name came from the Wind in the Willows series, where Mr. Toad is wildly obsessed with motorcars.  The point about Art Toad is that she's probably been suppressed throughout adulthood.  Healing comes from allowing Art Toad -- or however creativity shows up for you -- to let loose without judgement and without an ultimate goal.

6. Curiosity and fear are related. I've always been fascinated by the fact that most of the people I know who love true crime shows are also really anxious (blog post on this coming soon). And this idea explains that!  We are particularly fascinated by (meaning intensely curious about) things that fall into that sweet spot between almost scared to death and I'll probably survive. This is why we love (some of us, at least) skydiving and roller coasters and horror movies.

Pursue your squirrel interests!

7. Find Your "Squirrel Interests".  Some adults don't believe they are creative, but all children are! Perhaps we've simply lost that zest for what makes us curious and inventive. You don't have to be artistic, musical, or a good writer to be creative. Some of my most creative years were spent coming up with systems on how to squeeze more productivity out of my ADHD brain!  For those who need some guidance, Martha Beck encourages us to find our "squirrel interests" — the things that light us up, make us say "hmmm", or motivate us to learn more. Following those ideas in the way that a dog might chase a squirrel is the path towards creativity and away from anxiety.

8. Embrace the "Both/And" Mindset.  The goal of life is not to be relentlessly happy every single moment. The goal of life is to respond flexibly to whatever happens to come at you. Being able to hold contradictions and paradoxes is the key to creating a flexible mindset. A while ago I experimented with never, ever saying the word "but."  Instead, I would substitute the words "and also". That simple practice has dramatically expanded my ability to tolerate complexity.

9. Ask the "Magical Chicken."

Ask the Magical Chicken.

I think this is my favorite visual metaphor in the whole book.  She likens the process of coming up with a creative solution to laying an egg. She describes a hilarious process whereby she 'asks the magical chicken' to consider a problem while she goes for a walk or does something else and always finds that the magical chicken will lay an egg for her when she's at least expecting it. And finally,

10. Build a "Sanity Quilt."  This is her idea that life is not a linear, goal driven pursuit. Instead, it's a process of stitching together a patchwork quilt of passions, interest, loves, and labors. Our job is to keep our eyes and hearts open to find the pieces of patchwork to stitch together to construct our own adaptable, meaningful, and satisfying life -- whatever that looks like.

A Final Thought from a Therapist's Perspective

While I find her framework useful, I offer a slight critique of her depiction of the brain's hemispheres. Framing the left brain as the source of all anxiety and the right brain as the source of all creativity is a helpful metaphor, but it's an oversimplification. In reality, the left hemisphere's capacity for logic and language is vital for grounding our creative insights, and the right hemisphere is also involved in processing negative emotions. Our wellness depends on allowing them to work together seamlessly. That said, Martha Beck's model serves as a powerful and practical map for navigating away from anxiety and toward a more creative and fulfilling life.

I'd love to know what you think! If you've read the book, share your favorite takeaways in the comment section below. And subscribe to my newsletter to make sure you don't miss future posts!