136: Why Thinking Can’t Heal Your Anxiety

2025-10-06

Download

What if worrying is just your mind’s way of trying to stop you from worrying?In this episode, I pull apart the myth that positive thinking can cure anxiety. The alarm in the body and the worries in the mind feed each other in a loop that never ends. Childhood separation leaves a mark when you aren’t seen, heard, or protected, and that’s where the alarm takes root. Growing up with a father who had schizophrenia, I learned to escape into worry as my coping strategy. The real healing began when I turned toward the younger v...

What if worrying is just your mind’s way of trying to stop you from worrying?

In this episode, I pull apart the myth that positive thinking can cure anxiety. The alarm in the body and the worries in the mind feed each other in a loop that never ends. Childhood separation leaves a mark when you aren’t seen, heard, or protected, and that’s where the alarm takes root. Growing up with a father who had schizophrenia, I learned to escape into worry as my coping strategy. The real healing began when I turned toward the younger version of myself and felt what I’d spent years running from.

You’ll Learn:

The reason changing your thoughts alone can’t heal chronic anxiety
What happens when childhood separation creates an alarm that gets buried in the body
The surprising link between being highly sensitive and carrying lifelong anxiety
The damage of relying on worry as a coping strategy that turns into addiction
Why the alarm–anxiety cycle keeps looping between body and mind
What it feels like to abandon your younger self and the pain it creates
How the brain’s insular cortex and amygdala drive the fight-or-flight loop
Why worry is the mind’s attempt to stop you from worrying
The path back to connection by feeling the alarm instead of escaping into thought
How seeing, hearing, and defending your inner child becomes the foundation for healing

Timestamps:

[00:00] Introduction

[03:31] How unmet needs in childhood turn sensitivity into lifelong alarm

[04:04] How the alarm anxiety cycle traps us in worry

[09:32] The deeper separation between mind, body and inner child that fuels anxiety

[10:28] The neuroscience of how alarm in the body fuels anxiety in the mind

[13:50] Reconnecting with the inner child through feeling the body’s alarm

[19:13] Healing anxiety by feeling the body’s alarm and reconnecting with the inner child

Resources Mentioned:

Anxiety Rx by Russell Kennedy | Book or Audiobook

Find more from Russell:

Russell Kennedy | LinkedIn