The Anatomy of Your Anxiety: Your Amygdala is Running the Show

Anxiety is not all in your head, despite what others may say. It's very real, it's very physical, and it's very uncomfortable - even scary. It feels like our body is betraying us and we can't figure out why. The racing heart, the sweaty palms, the queasy stomach, the jittery sensations... then on top of it, your brain is going crazy trying to figure out what is wrong and why it's happening so you can fix it and make it JUST GO AWAY.

The problem is, we usually take the wrong approach to make it go away. Trying to solve it from our thinking brain only creates more distress because it's our body holds the secret. There is no obvious logic involved, no matter how hard we try. We need to understand that anxiety is actually a physical malfunction due to incorrect information. Your body, through the primal part of your brain, has created a problem that does not exist. Our society has evolved past the frequent hunter-prey lifestyle, however, our brain has not evolved with us. And that's not your fault. (Tip: Keep this in mind for removing judgement when anxiety arises.)

So here's the science lesson on anxiety...

There’s this little almond-sized piece of your brain, called the Amygdala, that is responsible for initiating the fight/flight/freeze response before the rest of our brain has any clue what’s happening. In the hunter-prey era, many moons ago, this came in VERY handy - getting you to react without hesitation to get to safety, in the same way that, when a deer jumps in front of your car, you slam on the brakes before you even register what just happened.  

Here’s how it works:

Sensory information enters through the eyes/ears/touch/etc. and that information goes to the Thalamus, a walnut shaped part in the center of our brain. The Thalamus then sends that information to both our Frontal Cortex and our Amygdala.

Here’s the problem…. 

Our Amygdala registers the information WAY faster than our Frontal Cortex, AND it doesn’t have detailed information, so it often makes mistakes. Its job is to processes the information as fast as possible, then, if it detects a threat, tells the body to release the stress hormones, thus initiating the fight/flight/freeze response. However, the Amygdala is not able to identify or communicate what we need to protect ourselves from. That’s the job of the Frontal Cortex. But panic has already kicked in, which shuts down the thinking part of our brain, so that's not very helpful, is it?

Here’s the other BIG problem….

Our Amygdala does not differentiate between physical threat and emotional threat - it responds the same way, releasing the same stress hormones and creating the same physical response. And this is where our evolutionary progress fails us, because we logically know that physical danger and emotional danger are very different in terms of how we need to handle it. The Amygdala also creates an emotional memory associated with any experience. This thing = danger, or this thing = love/safety.  Yes that’s right, our Amygdala is ALSO involved in love and bonding. 

But we aren’t done with the big problem yet! The Amygdala can actually remember what happened, even when the Cortex does NOT! (Remember, Cortex = thoughts/memories). So if our Amygdala makes an association, we don’t have to remember what happened for it to remember that *this thing* means danger. And *this thing* only needs to have the tiniest, slightest bit of similarity to the original experience for the Amygdala to jump to conclusions. So for example, if you lived in an emotionally abusive household as a child, made to feel like you were unwanted and undeserving of taking up space or even breathe the air, you might now have panic and stress about not having enough money. What?! Why?? Those things seem so different! Well, there may be a tiniest, slightest bit of similarity, because adult you knows we need money to survive and feel safe, just like kid you knew we need air to survive, so anything related to not having an essential resource to your life makes your body go into the stress response. You could be swimming in money and KNOW this fear is irrational, but the fear is still there because it has a hint of resemblance to that lack of love, belonging, and safety. Quite a jump, right? And I'll be really honest - this is why I LOVE what I do using Neuro Emotional Technique with my clients - the process can help us identify what this confusing, conflicting, doesn't make sense Amygdala/Cortex response is about, and clearing it from the body whether we have an active memory of the experience or not! (You can read about Neuro Emotional Technique on my website).

The Frontal Cortex

If it all worked smoothly, emotional threats would first be processed by the Frontal Cortex, where we have our ability to think through, rationally, what is happening - BEFORE our body gets hijacked by the Amygdala. But the communication pathways make that tricky. While the Cortex is able send information to the Amygdala, the Amygdala cannot send information to the Cortex. So if the Cortex cannot control the Amygdala, that means WE cannot control the Amygdala. Instead, it takes us some work to re-write these stories our Amygdala has created by processing them with our Cortex after the stress event, and sending that information to our Amygdala in a way that it can understand and make the change. This is why people say you have to "train your amygdala" - telling it to do different won't work. It learns through experience, so we have to create positive or neutral associations to replace the negative ones, and it will only learn through repeated actions. This is where the beauty neuroplasticity comes in - creating new neuropathways through repetition.

When we think about how as kids, and even often as adults, we just don't have enough information to process what has happened - we need time, perspective, self-awareness - wow does this leaves a big clean up job for your Frontal Cortex. And shows us why therapeutic interventions are so important to help you through the mess. You do not have to do it alone, AND getting and outside perspective can be invaluable. But in those panic moments, using tools like deep breathing and other mindfulness techniques are how the Frontal Cortex can take charge and calm down the stress response that the Amygdala created. Calming your body back down from panic is the first step. From there we can explore what triggered it and determine what interventions will help stop the Amygdala from misinterpreting the situation moving forward.

To summarize, our Amygdala is very black and white in how it sees things: It’s either dangerous, or it’s not. We need to let our Frontal Cortex do what it does best: explore the grey area and input the important, lacking information. Unfortunately, we need to expect that our brains will shut down during panic. Our thinking processes do not have dominance in the brain because that’s not what keeps us alive. So, remove the judgement - acknowledge that it's actually normal to first panic, and then once calm we can engage our rational brain. It was not a failing that you went into panic. It just tells us that we need to explore something because our amygdala has inaccurately decided there's danger.

But what about worry?

Worry may not seem the same, and certainly doesn't feel as bad as anxiety, but it is still a low level fight-flight response. It is still predicting danger and trying to prevent it. So if I'm saying even worry is a physical body reaction, not ACTUALLY a thing to think yourself out of, how does this make sense?

Well, first of all, we humans are meaning-making beings. This is how we evolved differently from other species: the ability to rationalize and make meaning from experiences. So, when our body has these unexpected anxiety sensations suddenly appear when there is no danger around, our brain immediately tries to figure out the “why” and tries to make it make sense. Then we panic even more, or the worry thoughts become more pervasive, because it just doesn’t make sense, and we don’t know why! And now we feel out of control, which we do not like.

And here's another tricky secret - those worry thoughts are actually a defense mechanism, distracting you away from feeling the scary and uncomfortable physical sensations. It makes us believe we just need to get some kind of control which somehow worry will give us, and then we won't feel this way. But that's not the language of our body. We have to stop being afraid of those physical feelings and directly acknowledge what sensations our body is feeling. It's a straight shooter, doesn't like the thinky fluff. You'll be amazed how quickly the sensations settle when you let yourself state them and let them be present, rather than panic in hopes they go away. Our body is literally trying to get you to run from nothing. So we need to say "Hey body, I see you are thinking I need to run. I can tell because my heart is beating really fast, my breath feels short, my stomach feels queazy, I maybe even want to cry... you feel scared and are trying to get me to safety. That's cool, but we are actually safe, and I'll just sit with you until you feel better. We can just let these sensations be and pass through because they certainly won't kill me." Remember, going in to panic is exactly how nature designed it - our body is actually doing its job correctly. The problem is it didn't have all the information it needed BEFORE going into panic.

Tools to help anxiety and panic are designed to get you out of the fight-flight-freeze response. They are so helpful, but they are essentially the front line defense where we stop the bleeding and bandage the wound. Once that phase is complete, exploring and healing can begin. Just keep in mind, sometimes scabs come off and we bleed again. Some wounds heal faster than others. Different wounds need different medicine. But hopefully all of this can help you see and experience panic differently, with less self judgement, and more understanding, because just that can sometimes make a huge difference.