Re-Framing Anxiety

Natural Anxiety

In the entire universe, God is the sole being who has complete self-possession of his own life. God is never surprised by what happens next, he never has to worry about the future like you and me, and he also has no regrets in the sense that we do. God is only and always in complete self-possession of his entire life of eternal blessedness.

By contrast, creatures like you and me only ‘get’ our lives instant by instant, through the passage of time. The last instant is gone and cannot be retrieved, and the next instant is hidden from our view and always becoming present. As much as we would want to sometimes, we cannot stop time to ‘lock in’ a moment in order to savour or revisit it truly. As creatures, we never fully possess “being;” (we can take time to rest and recuperate from busyness, but we can never “just be”) we are only always in a constant state of “becoming.”

But in virtue of being in this creaturely state, our future is necessarily hidden from us. There is an invisible veil always before us; we do not know what the next moment will bring. Will the future be like the past? Will it not? What will it be, and will I be able to handle it? Will I be able to find happiness and love in the future? If I already have it, will I be able to keep it? These are the natural questions that arise sheerly because of this veil before us. This is ‘natural anxiety.’ It doesn’t necessarily have to do with our degree of trust in God. It is just the cost of finitude – the price of not being God.

Squeezing the Present to Secure the Future

Having these questions and concerns raised within us is natural to human creatures, and I don’t think they are sinful in themselves. What might become sinful is how we navigate those questions. For many of us, it is right here where we will be tempted by the primal temptation that Adam and Eve faced in the Garden: “that you too can be like God.” How so? We rehearse the first sin by attempting to be the sole controller and master of all our lives. We want to transcend our creatureliness and be in possession of more of our life than we are called to. We do this by giving our all to secure our future. We cannot stand the uncertainty of the future. We want to be able to see, touch, to some degree even enjoy, our future now. And so we “squeeze” our present for the sake of trying to make our future more concrete, so as to ease our anxiety in the present.

Those who have done well in life might be worried about maintaining their success, or they might want even more. They strive by work, effort, and sheer fortitude to implement strategies in order to concretize their future. Those who have not had a good start in life, or had made mistakes in the past, desperately want their future to be different from their past. So they, similarly, pour all their willpower and strength into the present in order to make sure their future is better than their past. Parents who know how hard life can be will be tempted to squeeze their children to breaking point in order to secure their future for them (and lessen their own anxiety).

Now there is nothing inherently wrong with ‘making the best out of the present,’ but like everything else, it comes down to the motives and movements of the heart. God is much less interested in our actions than he is with our heart.

But it is good to be mindful why we do the things we do, what drives our actions and desires in our deep? How much of our desire to “be a faithful steward” is actually from a deep need for control, for certainty about our future? How much do we reject our creatureliness and want to be God?

Anxiety as an Old Friend

I grew up being taught that anxiety was a sin, that just harbouring those questions and worries in my mind about the future was reflective of a lack of trust in God’s loving provision. After all, if I REALLY trusted that God is my loving heavenly father, why would I have these worries?

There are several problems with that line of reasoning. The biggest one to my mind is how the Bible talks about faith and trust. In this life, we live in the age of faith, not of sight. It is only when we see face to face that we will have full certainty and trust. In this life we only always see through a glass darkly. That is faith – the knowledge and trust that comes from only seeing through a glass darkly. It is fundamentally different from knowledge and trust that comes from seeing face to face. And so we would do well not to expect that kind of trust and certainty in this life that the Bible tells us can only come in heaven when we stand in the presence of God.

And so what would it be to learn and accept that natural anxiety is actually a part of what it means to be a creature? It isn’t a mortal enemy to be defeated in the sense that our goal is to not ever have those questions or wonderings in our mind. The questions of anxiety and worry can be used as means of grace – as windows to be with God in the truth of ourselves. They are pointers that nudge us God-ward rather than inward onto our own strength and savvy. When something happens that triggers deep panic and anxiety in us, it is first and foremost a reminder to us that: “I am not God. I am a creature. I do not have complete self-possession of my life. I am fundamentally not in control of most things in my life.” That is what it means to start using anxiety as a means of grace.

Next, notice how your heart reacts to those statements. For me, a large part of my heart would simply reject them outright in the moment. “No, I CAN be in control of my life if I just did ______. I WILL be in control. I too can be like God. Watch me.” And God watches us try. Or your heart might be softer and less wilful: “Arghh, God. Look at my heart. Look at how desperate I am to manage my anxiety, to do whatever it takes to make this feeling of uncertainty go away. I don’t want to live with these questions, concerns, worries, and uncertainties. I do want to be You. I reject my own creatureliness. God, I need you!”

The presenting of anxiety in itself is no cause for alarm. It is how we have been subconsciously trained to navigate our anxious heart that most of us need to turn our attention to. Few of us are even consciously aware of what we do to deal with our own anxiety because it is so instinctual, having been built up over decades of situations and relationships. Some people, at the presenting of anxiety, immediately go into strategizing, they come up with an action plan. For some, just coming up with the plan is enough to dampen the anxiety; they don’t even have to execute it. For others, the anxiety and fear of failure is so great that they just cannot hold it and have to distract themselves from it immediately. They have to divest their attention to other things; entertainment, distractions. Yet others immediately get overcome with despair. The heart feels like it drops fifty storeys deep into the ocean and it is just drowning all the way down, there is no hope at all.

This anxiety presents itself even in the context of the spiritual life. When we face situations or people that trigger within us a sense of “I’m not where I should be as a Christian. Can I ever get there? What can I do?” There is also anxiety in the Christian life. And again the same temptations seep quietly in. This is why the most pointless pastoral advice to anxiety is to be simply given a regimen of ‘things-to-do’ to make our anxiety go away. If you just do these disciplines, be active in these ministries, go on these mission trips, do evangelism X times a week, then you will be ‘on the right track.’ Again, there is nothing wrong with disciplines and service. It is what we’re using them for. It is entirely possible to use Christian service and ministry as a means of trying to escape our anxiety and guilt in the Christian life.

How does your heart react to anxiety? There might not just be one way, but different ways depending on different situations and relationships. What are your ‘presenting symptoms?’ Whatever they are, take them to the true Doctor of our Souls for a consultation. God, in his omniscience, already knows and hears all these worries and anxieties in our heart even before we become aware of them. He is not shocked, surprised, or horrified at them. But what God sees, he wants to hear from us. Talk to God about your worries and anxieties, ‘present them to God.’ Do not be afraid of them or see it as your job to convince God that you don’t have them. That is an utter waste of a Christian life. Come out of hiding. Learn to be with God in your anxiety, and you will find yourself constantly on sacred ground, in the very presence of God.