Collier’s Anxiety: Challenge by Another Name student example

Essay #2 Anxiety: Challenge by Another Name

In his essay “Anxiety: Challenge by Another Name” James Lincoln Collier discusses different situations he has encountered in his life and the anxiety that each brought with it. He discusses three different experiences and how they each helped shape a rule for him to live by in his life. Collier uses examples from his college years, deciding what path he will take with his career and an example from his own child’s experience.

Collier didn’t just learn from his experiences, he also developed ways to help not only himself but other people to deal with anxiety. The rules that he came up with have proven helpful in his life and in mine. Given my many encounters with anxiety I am able to relate my own success in overcoming my anxiety with the three rules Collier developed that helped him conquer his.

Lesson number one as Collier states “do what makes you anxious, don’t do what makes you depressed” (35). Last year in August my roommate and I began discussing moving to Spokane. Just the thought of leaving my comfortable hometown of Walla Walla made me sick. I would get this empty feeling in my stomach and want to cry. In order for that feeling to go away I would have to completely dismiss the idea of moving and think about something else. December came around and my roommate had applied and been accepted into the Spokane Community College Massage Therapy program. This suddenly made everything real and I knew I couldn’t bail out on her and not move. I was afraid that if I didn’t go I would not only hate myself but spend the rest of my life wondering what if and being depressed about not leaving. March came and it was time to move, despite the anxiety, “…stage fright, butterflies in the stomach” (Collier 35). I knew I had to leave; I had to do what gave me that anxious feeling because I knew that I would be depressed and regret it if I didn’t.

Lesson number two as Collier states “you’ll never eliminate anxiety by avoiding the things that caused it” (36). The move to Spokane opened up many new and different experiences. One of the biggest differences was the traffic and the familiarity of the area. I had no idea where I was ever going or how to get there. When I was driving with my husband he was able to direct me and get me from place to place. If I had places to go and errands to run I would wait for him, I would never leave the house without a navigator. The thought of leaving the house alone left that anxious feeling in the pit of my stomach once again. “If you put an individual in an anxiety-provoking situation often enough, he will eventually learn that there isn’t anything to be worried about” (Collier 36). This statement has much truth to it. After driving around over and over again with someone I began to feel a bit more comfortable. Finally the day came when I had to leave the house by myself and once again that anxious feeling came creeping back. Then I had to start driving to work every day, and since I couldn’t make my husband come with me I had to do it alone. After being forced to drive to work alone everyday I gradually became more and more comfortable and before I knew it I was confident and ready to drive anywhere in town. Without being forced to drive by myself I would have never realized that there is nothing to worry about when it comes to driving in Spokane.

Lesson number three Collier states as, “you can’t learn if you don’t try” (37). After I moved to Spokane I had to start a new job. Unfortunately I was unable to find a job as a phlebotomist which was what I had spent the last two years of my life doing. I had to look for a job doing something that I didn’t know how to do. I happened to come across a job working in the lab at the Inland Northwest Blood Center as a lab assistant. This job was something that I was unfamiliar with. Going to work the first few weeks was scary and stressful, everyday on my way to work I would have to calm myself down. I would try to eliminate the anxiety that came along with going to an unfamiliar place and working on tasks that I was still unsure of. As I would complete different tasks I always found myself double checking my work and wondering if I had done it right, worrying that I would mess up and do something wrong, I never thought I would learn. Suddenly I found myself doing the same tasks as before only I didn’t have to double check everything. I was no longer worried about messing up on the given tasks and it was like second nature to me. If I hadn’t given the job a chance then I would have never learned how to be a lab assistant. I would have let the fear and anxiety stop me from doing something. I tried my hardest, overcame my anxiety and learned not only how to be a great lab assistant but that I can do anything I want if I just take a chance and go for it.

Anxiety comes with life. There are times in our lives when we will be faced with decisions that we have to make. These decisions won’t be easy for us to make, we will feel unsure, scared, and doubtful. The feeling that comes hand in hand with those feelings is one of anxiety. One way to work through those feelings is to use the rules that James Lincoln Collier set for himself as he encountered issues that caused anxiety for him in his life experiences. If we use his rules and relate them to our own lives then I think that we can work through our anxiety issues and overcome anything.

Works Cited

Collier, James Lincoln. “Anxiety: Challenge by Another Name.” Readers Digest Sept.1997: 35-37