Transform Anxiety

 More than ever, anxiety is overtaking the students we work with. Renee Jain and Shefali Tsabary wrote Superpowered: Transform Anxiety into Courage, Confidence, and Resilience as a kind of student workbook for understanding anxiety and working with it to keep it from derailing progress. This is a book for kids, but it describes a series of activities and understandings that could be used with students to help them better understand and deal with anxiety. It is more wordy than a workbook, but includes many "write on" pages for young people to actively engage in the process.

The first thing they describe is how anxiety is a learned and developed behavior. For the most part, toddlers don't have anxiety. (The authors never address separation anxiety of small children, just the ability of little ones to fall down and try again.) They go on to say that anxiety/worry/stress are normal parts of life that are actually beneficial. The elevate levels of concern to help be do their best and be safe. The book does a nice job of walking through this concept as the beginning of transforming debilitation to function.

The book goes on to explain how to change mindsets back to being 

present- in the moment, not overly focused on the past or the future, the what ifs and shoulds

original- not a people pleaser but a person confident in who they are

whole- curb perfectionism (perfect is an illusion/ not real), and belonging to a group

energized- avoiding being fried by seeing the meaning of life and activities and using that to motivate progress

resilient- change from a fixed to growth mindset, able to use failure as an opportunity to grow.

They describe these skills as the superpowers everyone possesses, but may be hidden or underdeveloped.

The biggest challenge is that the idea that if you read the book you will be good by the end. Changing how you perceive anxiety is hard. The authors do recommend using professionals to help, but gloss over the commitment to change and the backsliding that inevitably occurs. Reconceptualizing anxiety is hard. This approach borders on cognitive behavior therapy, but would need help to make it truly there. That said, the best therapy for anxiety disorders is cognitive behavior therapy, an approach that takes time and professional guidance. Individuals can do some of this work alone to make progress. Medication may be required for people to take the first steps, but medication does not teach new thought patterns or break habits that have been perceived as helpful, even if they are not. (Flipping the light switch three times before you enter a room might make sure the light will come on, but is unnecessary.) In order to truly address anxiety disorders, new coping behaviors need to be taught and learned. If someone could do it on their own, they would have.

A great book written for young people.