The Game of Why (Gateway to Anxiety)
[ excerpted from "How to be anxious" by David Egan* ]
~ by TPO ~
As a starting point for getting a grip on the concept of anxiety, imagine being a five-year-old again. You might remember that game where a child discovers that there’s no explanation that can’t be met with the question ‘Why?’:
– What are you doing?
– I’m sending an email to my boss.
– Why?
– Because I want to update her on the project that I’m working on.
– Why?
– Because I want to stay on my boss’s good side.
– Why?
– Because I don’t want to lose my job.
– Why?
– Because I don’t want to have to worry about money.
– Why?
Usually in these games, the grown-up runs out of patience before the child does. Persistent questioning can be annoying – consider what happened to Socrates. But it can also be instructive. If you’re willing to play along, the child can help you realize that financial security is a significant motivator in your life – and confront you with the question of whether it should be.
Try playing both sides of this game with yourself. Start with any ordinary activity – what you were doing at this time yesterday, what you plan to do this evening – and ask yourself why you’re doing (or did) that. Keep probing and see where you get. Try to answer each ‘Why?’ question as concretely as you can, and frame it in the first-person: I’m asking why I am invested in these activities.
The child’s discovery of the potentially bottomless series of ‘Why?’ questions reveals something about the structure of our reasons: there’s no definitive ‘Because…’ Whatever reasons you think you have for living in the way that you are, in odd moments those reasons might cease to have a grip on you. Your sense of purpose can swirl away into a vortex of ‘Why?’ like water swirling down a drain.
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* Source : "https://psyche.co/guides/how-to-be-anxious-like-kierkegaard-sartre-and-heidegger?utm_source=pocket-newtab"
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