I think 2025 was the year all our collective emotions ignited and converged. We rolled down hills of emotions that were out of control, dangerous, fast-moving, and hard to stop.
Everything felt louder. Sharper. More immediate.
If you asked me what emotion slapped me around the most, I’d answer quickly and without doubt: anxiety.
Not sadness.
Not anger.
Anxiety.
The constant hum underneath everything else.
Anxiety Is an Emotion, Not a Personality.
Anxiety is an emotion. It’s fast. It’s physical. It shows up in the body before the mind has a chance to explain it. Like fear or joy, it’s meant to rise, do its work, and pass.
Did you catch that? Rise. Work. Pass.
If you always feel anxious, perhaps it’s time to ask why.
Anxiety is not a personality trait. Feeling anxious does not mean you are an anxious person. It doesn’t define your character, your strength, or your intelligence. It simply means your nervous system has entered a heightened state. A heightened and temporary state.
That distinction alone can ease a great deal of shame.
What Anxiety Was Built For…
Anxiety did not evolve to make life miserable. It evolved to keep humans alive.
At its core, anxiety is a forward-scanning survival system. It watches for danger, notices changes in the environment and prepares the body to respond. For most of human history, that danger was immediate and concrete: predators, hostile groups, unstable terrain.
Back in the way when of yesteryear, the system would activate, action would happen, and then it would shut off. Work done. Shut down.
The issue isn’t that anxiety exists.
The issue is that modern life rarely gives it a clear “all clear.”
It’s kind of like this: YouTube Shorts beckon you to follow and not fall behind. You don’t fall behind. But you do become locked on target, going and going. There’s no clear stopping point, no natural resolution. So, the system never gets the signal to stand down.
When Anxiety Becomes Constant
When anxiety doesn’t resolve or disappear and instead lingers, what begins as a brief emotional response can slowly turn into a mood. Not because something is wrong with you, but because the system never receives the signal that it’s safe.
At that point, anxiety stops feeling sharp and starts feeling heavy.
Exhausting. Backgrounded. Less like panic and more like constant vigilance.
This isn’t weakness.
It’s fatigue
Anxiety Around People
Anxiety doesn’t only show up around events. It often shows up around people.
Certain interactions, certain dynamics, and certain forms of closeness can activate anxiety even when nothing overtly threatening is happening. Physical proximity matters. Unpredictability matters. History matters.
Anxiety responds to patterns and access. The body often reacts before the mind has the words. That doesn’t mean anxiety is always a command to act.
But it does mean it’s information worth paying attention to.
Survival Responses Aren’t Just Fight or Flight
Most of us were taught that when danger appears, we either fight it or run from it. That’s only part of the picture.
There are other survival responses that exist precisely for situations where fighting or fleeing isn’t clean or safe. Sometimes the body freezes, becoming hyper-alert and still. Sometimes it appeases, explains, or smooths things over to reduce escalation.
These responses are not failures. They are strategies.
If you’ve ever wondered why you didn’t “just leave” or “just stand up for yourself,” the answer is often that your nervous system chose the option it believed would keep you safest at the time.
Anxiety as Protective Surveillance
In many situations, anxiety isn’t panic. It’s watchfulness.
Protective surveillance looks like this:
- Watching for pattern repetition
- Bracing for sudden reversal or blame
- Staying ready to defend reality
This is not an irrational fear. It is mental labor. It is the nervous system maintaining guard when it does not trust that conditions are stable.
That’s why anxiety can feel tiring rather than dramatic.
The system isn’t screaming. It’s standing watch.
Grounding as Regulation, Not Self-Improvement
Grounding techniques are often misunderstood as tools to “fix” anxiety or make someone calmer.
That’s not their purpose.
Grounding is about regulation, not self-improvement. It gives the nervous system clear, physical signals that, in this moment, you are here, supported, and not under immediate threat.
Simple actions like placing your feet on the floor, noticing what you can see, feel, or hear, or slowing your exhale do not solve your life. They widen the present moment just enough for the system to pause.
You’re not erasing anxiety.
You’re allowing a guard to rest.
A Gentle Close
If anxiety has been loud for you, it does not mean you are broken. It may mean your nervous system has been carrying too much responsibility for too long.
You do not need to overhaul yourself. You do not need perfect calm. You do not need to defeat your own body.
Sometimes it’s enough to offer small, real signals of safety and let the system settle inch by inch.
Protection does not always look like running.
Sometimes it looks like noticing.
Sometimes it looks like resting.
And sometimes, that is exactly what allows anxiety to stand down.
Would you like to learn to be steady and stand strong with me?
I would welcome your company.
My best regards and dearest felicitations,
Bird
Bipolar Redux 