Anxiety is an emotional and physiological response to a poorly defined threat, some anticipated, threatening event that may happen in the future.  It is a more unfocused, "objectless," and future-oriented fear.   Anxiety can alert us to potential threats and evoke a call to make necessary adjustments and decisions.  It can be productive at a certain level when it encourages us to problem-solve proactively.

Anxiety and fear are both responses to perceived threatening situations.  Fear involves actual, real threats in the here and now.  Anxiety concerns a diffuse fear of perceived threat, real or not, that is anticipated to occur in the future.  It can be a vague apprehension.  The emotional reaction to an anticipatory or imagined threat can persist over time regardless of whether the trigger continues.  Anxiety can be a reaction to a cognitively exaggerated threat.  When the emotional response is disproportionate to the triggering event is anxiety, we can become chronically vigilant for potential hazards.  And it can lead to nonproductive behavior such as worry, social isolation, avoidance, overthinking, and mishandled emotions (i.e., substance use or other overused soothing behavior such as compulsive eating, overworking, gambling, etc.).  The threat may be so ambiguous that anxiety may not seem to have a triggering stimulus.

Anxiety can be helpful if it prompts you to take appropriate action for your future benefit. Chronic, excessive, unfounded anxiety that and interferes with your performance and happiness is no longer in the best interest of your survival. Fear and anxiety are related, but they are not the same.  Fear and anxiety can have some of the same physical reactions, but the situation or the stimuli that lead to them differ.  Fear involves a genuine threat in the here and now—anxiety concerns fear of anticipated threats that could occur in the future.  Fear and anxiety can occur together in a circular, self-reinforcing circle.  Fear goes away after the fear-inducing event.  Anxiety may linger.

What is stress?

Stress is similar to fear and anxiety and is closely related.  All involve physical, emotional, and cognitive responses to a perceived threat.  Stress can be productive if it helps us identify and respond to some level of peril by taking action.   Fear, anxiety, and stress involve a fight, flight, freeze, or fawn reaction to a threat.  Stress symptoms can serve as a warning alarm system involving physiological and psychological responses.  Even after the original threat has been eliminated, your alarm is still going off and remains in a state of alertness.  In the modern world, it's one threat after another.  Stress is a normal psychological and physical reaction to the endless parade of threats (acute or diffuse).  Stress reflects insecurity about whether you can adequately deal with life's demands.  Stress can help us get motivated to take action for our well-being in the present and the future.  We may become motivated to change, solve problems differently, make other choices, learn new skills, or adapt functionally.  When chronic or related to trauma, stress can negatively affect physical and mental health, interfering with functional adaptation and problem-solving.  A related action, worry, tends to be a dysfunctional adaptation to stress.

What is worry?

Worry is an anxiety-related way of anticipating potentially unpleasant things that could happen in the future.  It is not just a thought or a feeling but a process of thoughts, feelings, and actions involved in a repetitive and persistent preoccupation with anticipated potential threats and their consequences.  Worry and its unrelenting and seemingly uncontrollable nature can have catastrophic effects on your day-to-day life.  While occasional worry is a normal response to the demands of life in the fast lane and the anxiety and stress that comes from that, it can get to the point where it's so pernicious that it negatively affects productivity, relationships, and health.    Some worry can be productive if it serves as a nagging reminder to spur you into taking action on something to prevent the exact outcome you are worrying about.  Obsessive thoughts about the possible negative or catastrophic things that could befall you or someone you love can become disabling to the point where it prevents you from taking action on that over which you do have power or control.  Many chronic worriers have a kind of "magical thinking" in their worry.  On some level, they believe that their worrying prevents the thing or event they fear or prepares them for what could happen.  They often have difficulty seeing the benefit of letting go of "needless" worry.  Other chronic worriers identify the negative impact on their lives and fear that they will lose all control over worrying.

Anxiety over uncertainty can fuel worry.  Many people have a low tolerance for unpredictability and use "control" to gain a sense of safety amid uncertainty.  Worry can serve as a way to feel in control but is merely chasing an illusion of control.  A pessimistic worldview of hostility and danger also fuels worry.  While worry serves as hyper-vigilant protection against what could happen in a dangerous world, it involves cognitive distortions that perpetuate chasing an illusion of control.  Even in the face of the negative consequences of worry, it isn't easy to give up something you see as having a positive benefit in your life.  Yet, to let go of needless worry, you must acknowledge the absence of any consistent help from worry to eliminate it.  Stress, worry, and anxiety are all perpetuated by your rehearsal of concern.