• If anxiety is a part of our day to day life, if we hold on to the framework that to be human is to be anxious, how did anxiety ever become a problem?
• How do you go from worrying about not being good enough to chronic states of worry?
• How do you go from feeling uncomfortable taking the elevator to developing an elevator phobia?

What maintains a psychological struggle?

And what are the skills – the core skills – that you can learn to navigate those anxious moments and get back into your life?

Short-term fixes that help us avoid or numb our emotions may temporarily alleviate our internal discomfort, but the same responses can also end up causing anxiety, depression, chronic anger, and even physical health problems.

In this episode, I chat with Matthew Mckay, Ph.D.

Key Takeaways

• The difference between rumination and worry
• Repetitive negative thinking as a process
• What is a transdiagnostic process
• How anxiety becomes a problem in our life
• What is a safety-seeking behavior
• Process-based changes

About Matthew

Matthew McKay, Ph.D., cofounder of New Harbinger Publications, joins us to talk about evidence-based resources and the ever-changing landscape of therapy. Matthew is a professor at the Wright Institute in Berkeley, CA. He has authored and co-authored numerous books, including The Relaxation and Stress Reduction Workbook, The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook, Self-Esteem, and Couple Skills, which have sold more than four million copies combined. He received his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the California School of Professional Psychology and specializes in the cognitive behavioral treatment of anxiety and depression.