Healthy vs. Unhealthy Anxiety: Anxious Times, Part 1 (#385)

Summary

Religion on the Mind – Episode #385

Anxious Times (Part 1): Healthy vs. Unhealthy Anxiety

Host: Dr. Dan Koch
Guest: Kristin Tiedman
Date: March 9, 2026

---

Episode Overview

In the first installment of the “Anxious Times” miniseries, Dr. Dan Koch—licensed therapist and psychology of religion researcher—teams up with friend and collaborator Kristin Tiedman to unpack anxiety through the lens of existential psychology. Together, they explore the difference between healthy and unhealthy anxiety, applying the insights of existential thinkers to both private experiences (like religious transition and illness) and broader sociopolitical upheaval. The conversation blends personal anecdotes, clinical wisdom, and philosophical context, all delivered with warmth and approachable humor.

---

Main Themes & Purpose

• Apply existential psychology concepts to periods of increased anxiety—personally, socially, and religiously.
• Normalize anxiety as a natural, sometimes helpful response, while discerning when it becomes harmful or pathological.
• Provide frameworks and practical tools for listeners to evaluate and manage their own anxious states.
• Connect psychological theory to lived experiences, especially in contexts of religious change.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

Setting the Stage: “Anxious Times” in Context

• The series is designed to offer practical applications of existential psychology and existentialist philosophy to periods of heightened anxiety (sociopolitical, personal, or spiritual) ([00:15]).

• Dan highlights that anxiety has been on the rise in the U.S., particularly since 2016, but points out America has faced such tides many times in its history.

• Personal and private anxious times, such as religious transitions, health crises, and new parenting, are equally relevant ([01:45]).

  “The main goal... is to take specific ideas from the worlds of existential psychology... that have practical application to human beings living through periods of high anxiety, which we’re calling anxious times.” — Dan Koch [01:00]

Personal Reflections on Anxiety

• Kristin shares her current “triple crown” of anxiety: new parenthood, return of MS symptoms, and ongoing religious transition ([02:49]).

• Both hosts joke candidly about their health-related anxieties, e.g., Kristin’s colonoscopy story and Dan’s history of panic disorder—highlighting the mind-body connection ([08:31]).

  “I am fairly convinced it was psychosomatic... I was having major digestive issues, and I didn’t know that psychosomatic... that was a thing.” — Kristin Tiedman [10:05]

Core Takeaways (Dan’s Three Main Points)

1. Some anxiety is not only normal, but healthy:

• It is an authentic response to difficult situations and can be a catalyst to fuller living ([06:20], [07:11]). 2. Anxiety can become pathological:
• When it closes us in, makes our world smaller, or cuts us off from life ([06:56], [07:11]). 3. Biology of anxiety:
• Unhelpful, anxious thoughts are often tied to high physical/emotional arousal.
• Helpful anxiety most often happens when distress is manageable ([07:11]).

“Healthy anxiety can and does spur us on toward living a more full life.” — Dan Koch [06:37]

The Body and Anxiety

• The mind and body are inseparable; all psychological experience emerges from our brains—part of our biology.

• A key therapeutic practice: checking in with one’s internal state using Subjective Units of Distress (SUDs), e.g., rating distress from 1–10 ([11:24], [14:07]).

• This self-check fosters self-knowledge and creates space for insight ([14:07]).

  “Just the act of checking in on oneself... can be a useful skill to build up, especially for people who have a hard time identifying that.” — Dan Koch [11:24]

Mood-Congruent Thinking

• Our current mood heavily shades our thoughts; when highly anxious, calm or grateful thoughts don’t “stick” ([14:41]).

• Emotional change lags behind cognitive change; techniques like gratitude can help, but are typically only marginally effective in the moment ([17:17]).

• Dan explains the limits of “quick fixes” and emphasizes deeper, longer-term existential work ([17:17], [19:20]).

  “Generally, emotional change tends to lag behind cognitive skill-building... It’s a long game.” — Dan Koch and Kristin Tiedman [19:20]

Practical Tips for Extreme Distress

• Dan introduces the “TIPP” skills from Dialectical Behavior Therapy:

  • Temperature (change body temp, e.g., cold shower)
  • Intense exercise
  • Paced breathing
  • Paired muscle relaxation
    ([27:55])

  “These are things you can do right now... to help get you down.” — Dan Koch [27:55]

• TIPP is considered “bottom-up;” start with the body to affect the mind ([30:05]).

Religion, Anxiety, and Spiritual Conviction

• Many raised in high-control religious environments learn to interpret anxiety as the Holy Spirit’s conviction or spiritual danger ([33:37]).

• This interpretation can reinforce anxiety spirals; communities may reinforce that interpretation, preventing alternative, potentially healthier understandings ([33:37], [37:25]).

  “Being at an 8 or a 9 can instantly produce a specific kind of catastrophic thought, like 'God is punishing me' or 'I’m backsliding.'” — Dan Koch [33:37]

• Kristin recalls childhood church anxiety and being physically affected by religious education ([37:41]).

Existential Psychology: Context over Symptom

• Post-WWII, psychologists and philosophers developed existential psychology in response to “reasonable” anxiety, despair, and meaning crises ([39:38]).
• Focus is on understanding suffering in context, treating anxiety as a potential signpost toward authentic living, not just a “symptom” to eliminate ([41:00]).
• Key thinkers: Karl Jaspers, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Rollo May.

“We respond to anxiety with responsibility... identifying what we value in the world and turning that into purposeful action.” — Dan Koch [41:00]

Healthy vs. Pathological Anxiety

Healthy Anxiety:

• Is natural, rooted in our consciousness of limitation and mortality.
• Drives creativity and engagement with life.
• Existential quote:

  "...the creative interchange of human personality rests upon the fact that we know we're going to die... our knowledge... gives us a normal anxiety that says to us, make the most of these years you are alive.” — Rollo May [49:32]

• Anxiety is a clue or invitation for our world to get bigger.

Pathological Anxiety:

• Makes our world smaller, closes us off, leads to excessive rumination and withdrawal.
• Clinical “cognitive distortions”: all-or-nothing thinking, catastrophizing, fortune telling ([60:37]).
• Examples: feeling that every anxiety spike must be a sign of guilt or doom; refusing to engage with life due to “what ifs” ([65:37]), e.g., not having children out of fear for the future.

Applied Examples

• Day-to-day: Sunday night anxiety before work—do you need CBT, or does this mean a new job? Anxiety is sometimes a clue for change ([55:03]).

• Religious context: Anxiety about beliefs or morality can be a clue that you need to explore new ways of thinking or a new community ([56:46]).

• Sociopolitical: Healthy anxiety may drive activism, creative response; unhealthy anxiety may induce powerlessness or nihilism ([58:50], [62:27]).

  “Healthy anxiety is an invitation... to open up, to ask more questions, to try things, to look more closely.” — Dan Koch [58:50]

Internet Culture & Catastrophizing

• Social media algorithms are not designed for clarity, but to maximize engagement—often amplifying catastrophizing and negative emotions ([74:35]).

• The rise of online spaces may fuel cultural habits of anxiety, overreaction, and hopelessness.

  “The algorithms are not built for clarity and aligning with reality... negative emotion, catastrophe, fear, anxiety... are kind of natural engines [of online engagement].” — Dan Koch [74:35]

Closing Framework & Takeaways

Revisited Takeaways ([77:10]):

1. Some anxiety is normal—and potentially healthy.
2. Pathological anxiety closes us in, making our worlds smaller.
3. Helpful anxious thoughts happen when distress is present, but manageable—not when you’re overwhelmed (8/10+).

“We’re not aiming for zero. We’re aiming for appropriate anxiety that spurs us on to wider and better lives.” — Dan Koch [78:38]

Practical Steps & Resources

• If your anxiety is haunting or paralyzing:
  • Therapy: Find support, work through unhealthy anxiety.
  • Self-help books: “The Feeling Good Handbook” (David Burns), “Retrain Your Brain” (Seth Gillihan), “It’s On Me” (Sarah Kubrick).
  • Online resources: Beck Institute (beckinstitute.org).
  • Coaching: Dan offers existential psychology-based coaching; email for more info.
  • When highly distressed (8–10), avoid making big life decisions; ground yourself before acting ([25:12]).

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “The pressure to not be stressed makes me stressed.” — Kristin Tiedman [03:40]

• “You could say there's a natural, organic distress response that is valuable and a kind of bad, pathological, unhelpful one that is not.” — Dan Koch [05:23]

• “Mood-congruent thinking means, in general, our thoughts align with our current mood... If you’re up at an 8 or a 9 out of 10, calm thoughts are not going to feel like they're sticking.” — Dan Koch [14:41]

• “Don’t make impactful decisions when you’re feeling really dysregulated, highly anxious. Avoiding making those decisions will minimize later regrets.” — Dan Koch [25:12]

• “We want to understand the psychological suffering that our clients are experiencing in context, because sometimes the context is [that] it makes perfect sense... let’s use it.” — Dan Koch [41:00]

• “We are conscious of our own selves, our own tasks, and also we know we’re going to die... our knowledge of our death is what gives us a normal anxiety that says to us, make the most of these years you are alive.” — Rollo May [49:32]

• “Healthy anxiety invites us to bigger and more full life. Unhealthy anxiety closes us in on ourselves.” — Dan Koch [63:54]

• “Everything is always keep changing... [Saunders] encourages his students to remember to document this and continue being creative, even if it might be challenging, which is, I think, the call.” — Kristin Tiedman [64:31]

• “The algorithms are not built for clarity and aligning with reality... negative emotion, catastrophe, fear, anxiety, these things... are kind of natural engines of doing more [online].” — Dan Koch [74:35]

---

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Intro & series overview: [00:15]–[04:58]
• Kristin’s personal “triple crown” of anxiety: [02:49]–[04:58]
• Core takeaways (Dan’s 3 points): [05:08]–[07:10]
• Checking in with your distress: [11:12]–[14:07]
• Mood congruent thinking & gratitude “fixes”: [14:41]–[19:20]
• TIPP skills for distress: [27:55]–[30:20]
• Religion, anxiety, and conviction: [33:37]–[37:25]
• Existential psychology context: [39:38]–[46:17]
• Rollo May clip on anxiety & creativity: [49:32]
• Healthy vs. pathological anxiety: [55:03]–[63:54]
• Social media & catastrophizing: [74:35]
• Closing summary and practical resources: [77:10]–[83:46]

---

Tone and Style

Warm, conversational, candid, and gently irreverent (with “a little bit of cussing” as advertised). Dan and Kristin seamlessly blend clinical expertise, philosophical depth, humor, and vulnerable personal storytelling—inviting listeners into a nuanced, empowering inquiry about anxiety.

---

For Next Time...

• Episode 2 will explore “boundary situations”—those moments when inherited systems of meaning collapse and deeper forms of anxiety emerge.

---

Contact: [e-mail]
Links:

• [Feeling Good Handbook – David Burns]
• [Retrain Your Brain – Seth Gillihan]
• Beck Institute CBT Resources
• [It’s On Me – Dr. Sarah Kubrick (book)]

---

Summary prepared for listeners by AI podcast summarizer – Religion on the Mind, 2026

Transcript

[Dr. Dan Koch]

I saw this app.

[Kristin Tiedman]

I got a hit.

[Commercial Narrator]

In the new limited series, DTF St. Louis, Jason Bateman, David Harbour and Linda Cardellini star as three suburbanites who spice up their love lives.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Wow.

[Commercial Narrator]

Don't miss the new HBO Original Limited Series, DTF St. Louis, Sundays at 9 on HBO Max.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Welcome back, everybody, to Religion on the Mind and more specifically to this miniseries we are calling anxious times. I'm Dr. Dan Koch, licensed therapist and psychology of religion researcher, and I'll be joined in these episodes by a longtime friend of the POD and collaborator, Kristin Tiedman. For each Anxious Times episode, we're going to be highlighting one or more specific concepts from existential psychology and practically applying them to living through unsettling periods like the present moment. This first set will include five or six episodes and we plan to return for more later on, but possibly in the fall. Let's dive in. So this is the first installment of an ongoing series and the main goal of these episodes is to take specific ideas from the worlds of existential psychology, maybe sometimes existentialism as a philosophy that have practical application to human beings living through periods of high anxiety, which we're calling anxious times. And when we say anxious times, we are referring to multiple scenarios. The first and most obvious probably is sociopolitics, which in recent US History seems to be ratcheting up in terms of overall anxiety, I'd say especially since 2016, Trump's first term. But of course, the United States has gone through periods of high anxiety in the past. The Civil War, the World Wars, Vietnam War, civil rights movement, recession of the 70s, you know, you can name them. Most of my therapy and coaching clients deal with issues related to religious change. And when they come to work with me, they are also generally living through a more private anxious time. When old paradigms aren't working, relationships might be strained. Meaning and direction are generally less clear than before that, religious change. And of course, like individual anxious periods can occur for all manner of reasons. Transition, upheaval, relationship issues, parenting stresses. Kristen, you are living through your own. I was trying to think, should I call it a hat trick or a triple crown? You've got a little, you got a little three part anxious time going on right now, right?

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yes. Well, I was like, you're saying all that. I'm like, my bingo card is full, full, full. Yeah, as a new parent, I'm definitely anxious. There's a lot to be anxious about. They make you, I don't know if you had this or you have this in Washington. They make you sign even in the hospital that you understand the SIDS risks and that you're, that you have to sign that in a document that you're not supposed to shake your baby. I'm like, okay, I'm not going to shake my baby. But this is adding to weird pressure. And then there's, you know, just like you're hearing your baby at night wanting to make sure, I want to make sure she's okay. And then of course, yes, my Ms. Diagnosis, which we may have talked about previously, had kind of been downgraded. We're back to normal Ms. Full on now.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

So for a moment it was singular, but it's back to multiple.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, unfortunately it's back to multiple. There's some, you know, you know about diagnostic criteria that was kind of the, the whole, there was, that was the issue. But it's, it's fine. The treatment was the same anyway. So I'm on my new disease modifying therapy. But it's ironic, you're really not supposed to be stressed with Ms. And of course the pressure to not be stressed makes me stressed.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah.

[Kristin Tiedman]

And, and then, yeah, we're in this crazy world where life is a highway. As I, I've been, I've been known to say, no one else has ever said that.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

I've never heard any new jers, for instance, talking about life being a highway.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Exactly. So, yeah. And my religious transition in the midst of that, which is ongoing and I kind of tried to maybe even for myself, obscure where the ending point will be because why decide on an ending when you're comfortable in the journey on the highway, if you will. But yeah, it's a lot and I can resonate with, with just a lot of the things we're going to talk about today. I'm excited. I know you've kind of prepared so well and I'm excited to solve my personal issues and have no anxiety after this.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah, it's going to just be a one stop shop. We're going to, we got a few quick tips and tricks and we're just going to send you out the door. Ship shape.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Exactly, exactly.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

But bringing in these different ways that a period of time for a person can be sort of higher anxiety. I think it's helpful because the concepts here are going to apply in a lot of different scenarios. They are not. This is not like existential therapy for politics, you know, it's existential therapy for periods of high anxiety or concepts from that, that world. So I'm just glad to sort of set the field wide because I do think and hope that this Stuff will be pretty widely applicable. I want to say up top, the kind of main takeaways of this episode. And I'm always going to try and do this so that if people don't have the time to listen to the whole thing, they can get the bullet points and dig deeper on their own. And I would say there's three main points here. Number one, during anxious periods, some anxiety is not only normal, but also healthy, because it is a genuine, organic response to a bad situation or a tough situation. And we don't want to pathologize that kind of anxiety. We don't want to say it's bad. Actually, healthy anxiety can and does spur us on toward living a more full life. That's number one. Number two, anxiety also can become pathological, unhealthy, unhelpful. And typically, that is a type of anxiety that closes us in on ourselves and makes our world smaller. I'll say more about that later. Number three, biologically speaking, unhelpful anxiety. Unhelpful anxious thoughts are more associated with higher states of physiological arousal, of emotional distress. And helpful anxious thoughts are gonna occur more often when our distress is a bit more manageable in the moment. So those are kind of the main three takeaways, but we're gonna get into a lot more detail about each of those.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, Dan, I was excited to hear kind of about some of these takeaways, and especially how anxiety becomes pathological. I know there's a discernment component, really, in this, and it's hard when you are anxious to kind of self assess and be like, where am I at? But finding tools for that, I know even in my own life, will be extremely helpful.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

So I want to start with the body because it's sort of the most visceral type of anxiety. It's really kind of where we start as individuals. We are born kind of thrown into this world in a body, in a human body. The other thing to say is that, of course, our minds emerge from our brains, and our brains are a part of our body. So there is a biological aspect to the organ in our body from which all psychological phenomena spring. Right. At least that is the seat of what we sort of talk about as our mind. And these psychological phenomena come from that. And I've noticed some things going on in my own mind and body recently that kind of make me want to do a little setup here around the way that from a bodily perspective, we experience as human beings higher and lower levels of anxiety in our bodies.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, Dan. Not to derail anything but have I told you about my colonoscopy before?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

You know, I don't think your colonoscopies

[Kristin Tiedman]

come up, which that's actually crazy because this is one of my favorite things about myself. Everyone says that about their colonoscopy. No, I was 21.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

You are wearing a T shirt that says I went through a very difficult colonoscopy and all I got was this stupid T shirt. I guess that should have tipped me off.

[Kristin Tiedman]

I don't know how I could have missed that actually. It's so funny. Colonoscopies getting put under is such a crazy experience because I've never been under general anesthesia.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah, I've never done it. No.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Okay. You think it's like sleep, but it's not because it's truly like it feels like the very next second like there's no time lapse, which is bizarre. I've had it only twice, but the second time was the colonoscopy. So I was, I'm 21 years old, I've just returned from studying abroad in Costa Rica and I'm like, I've got a parasite. I know it. I've got a parasite. Something happened to me. Now I had had a stressful times in the study, only three month program, but stressful for a number of reasons. Won't get into them now, but I was like, I've got to figure this out. So I'm going for blood tests, I'm going to, going to the doctor and they're like, we don't know what's wrong. We're going to have a colonoscopy. The end result of that was there was nothing they could find, there was no issue and I am fairly convinced it was psychosomatic. Is that that's the correct term?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

That's the word? Yep, that's the word.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah. Where I'd been so anxious about stuff, there was actually some religious change mixed in there. Early precursors to my later deconstruction days. But yeah, I think I just carried it so heavy that I was having major digestive issues and I didn't know that psychosomatic, I didn't know that was a thing. I didn't know your mind could affect your body. And I learned it the hard way, although in a way also the stool softening way.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

In both a hard and soft way you might say.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Exactly, exactly.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

So I had panic disorder for a decade or two. I'm not sure on the exact dates, but much of my life and just sort of anxiety issues much more viscerally until my 30s, when I got a better handle on it. And I tell clients, you know, when it's relevant, I say, like, during those years, I gave myself basically every major disease at some point, you know, and I.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Why didn't you get ms? Why didn't. Why didn't you get ms, though? We could have been Ms. Buddies.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Well, yeah, every other. I don't know, every other disease. No, I. I mean, I certainly thought I had Ms. At one point. I was feeling tingling sensation in my leg, of course.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Oh, I didn't know.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

The mind is incredibly powerful and. And the power of our mind to shape our experience is a theme that will run through these episodes. It is sort of. It's almost like a prerequisite for the rest of it. Like, our minds are extremely powerful, and so we work with them, you know, and cognitive therapy works with thoughts because thoughts are really powerful, basically, but back to the body. So with clients, it is often helpful for them to tell me their internal level of distress at any given moment. Right. So this is especially true if you're doing any kind of exposure therapy or trauma work or anything where the work itself tends to raise distress, anxiety, sadness, activation, whatever, if it's triggering someone's nervous system or whatever. So there is a real difference between an 8 out of 10 and a 4 out of 10. We call these sometimes subjective units of distress. And they are subjective, right? Like, yeah, someone's eight is not another person's eight, but the difference between an eight and a four is going to be significant for anybody with any level of clarity of what's going on inside. And just the act of checking in on oneself can. It can itself be a useful skill to build up, especially for people who have a hard time identifying that. And it can be sort of an early step to. I would. I don't think it's too strong to say an early step towards greater self knowledge. Just recognizing when I'm activated, when I'm more calm, stuff like that.

[Kristin Tiedman]

It's funny, like, in a culture where I do think we think about ourselves a lot and are kind of inclined to think inwardly and compare ourselves, but a lot of times it's comparing ourselves with others or looking around, kind of trying to find out if we're normal. But I remember I'm not the best. I still could check up on myself more, but I remember kind of starting to learn the feeling of, oh, I'm not at the best place right now, and recognizing how powerful that was to be. Like, how did I get here? What does this mean? And then it Kind of recontextualizes your whole state of being, as opposed to manically being like, I need to do this next thing. Where is that urge coming from? Why am I trying to do that right now? And, oh, yeah, it's because I'm a little upset about this conversation I had two days ago that I was just thinking about again.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah. Basically, if you are checking in on yourself, then by definition, you're slowing down, you're taking a beat. Cause it takes a little time, attention, focus, energy to direct your mind to look at your body or even just sort of look at your overall state, evaluate it, give it a number or put a word or two to it. Like that alone slows you down for 30 seconds. And like what you're describing there is in that space, some real insight can pop in. And a lot of therapy, especially early stages therapy, is about creating just a little bit of distance, a little bit of head space so that a client can go, oh, all right, I've got a little toehold here. I can use a little bit of agency. I can even just use a little interpretation and understand what's going on. And that's kind of what I'm hearing you describe. There's a concept connected here that's called mood congruent thinking. And this is not just an existential psychology. This is much more widely used in therapy. Generally speaking, mood congruent thinking means, in general, our thoughts align with our current mood. I should say our current thoughts align with our current mood. So if you're feeling really depressed, then a joke that would ordinarily make you laugh might not work. If you're feeling really anxious up at an 8 or a 9 out of 10, calm thoughts are not gonna feel like they're sticking. If I think I'm in the middle of a cardiac episode because I'm having a panic attack, and, you know, my wife brings in carpet swatches for me to choose. That's not the time, honey. I am not going to be able to sort of get to that level to consider, you know, which color of gray we want to use or whatever. Right.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah. I'm laughing because I'm thinking about what? I'm going into labor, and we had to do all these breathing exercises, which I had been doing. But once you get to a certain level, you know, Beau's trying to help me with the breathing exercises. I'm like, you need to stop right now. I'm like, I can't do that.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

All bets are off.

[Commercial Narrator]

Yeah.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

We've reached the point of no return. Beau.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, I'm like, I'm in pain and that's just how it's gonna be.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah.

[Kristin Tiedman]

So. Yeah. But the other thing I was curious, I've heard, I don't know, somewhere in the zeitgeisty pop social psychology world that we all live in is that surrounds us like a warm blanket, sometimes suffocatingly so. But I wanted to say I'd heard that if you. Because, because of this. Because like your mood kind of is that the glasses, rose colored or otherwise with which you see through. I've been told that if you're, if you're kind of angry or something like that, you're supposed to think like of what you're grateful for because that you can't have those two moods at once. Is that something similar? Is that like a practice or is that just feel goody sort of social media stuff?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

So the idea that certain emotions can't sort of coexist at the same time, that kind of bare fact is reminiscent of what I'm saying with mood congruent thinking. It's like there is a kind of a unity of human experience. Moment to moment, you might say. Right. It's also true. So that part I think is really solid. I think the little, the tip or trick part of that. So like just think of five things you're grateful for and you won't be able to be angry. You know that I'm a little less into that and I'll tell you why. So it is true, broadly speaking, that changing our thoughts can affect and change our emotions. I would actually say that is the number one core tenet of cognitive theory, certainly of cognitive behavioral theory. And cognitive theory also has led to acceptance and commitment theory therapy, dialectical behavioral therapy, like huge, really effective schools of therapeutic work. But it's not like that change, changing thoughts, changing feelings downstream, that doesn't happen immediately and quickly. Generally, emotional change tends to lag behind cognitive skill building and process in terms of more lasting change. So I could imagine the think of five things you're grateful for that can help on the margins. I'm gonna share some stuff later around like bodily distress, that helps on the margins, but it's actually kind of a good contrast with the deeper, more existential concepts that we're working with in this series that are helping beyond the margins when they're working. So yeah, I think that it's helpful to say, yeah, these things can't coexist. But there's a good complicated, deeper question of how in the long run we get from anger to gratitude. Not just in the. In the moment to moment. Does that make sense?

[Kristin Tiedman]

It's a long game. Yes. The we're here for the long haul marathon, not a sprint. I.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

But those marginal gains, like, in the moment, if you can get yourself from a 9 to a 6 or a 7, like that really matters. Like, there are things that you could now do that you couldn't have done five minutes ago, you know, if that works. So I don't mean to. I don't want to say it's not real and not helpful. It's just what's the scope and how effective can it be? Is worth thinking about.

[Kristin Tiedman]

I like that. And I do think, yeah, in the. In the mood congruent sort of stuff. I've been also in a place where I would say I feel depressed or just super down. And. Yeah, I mean, it's tough how much that's a blanket over everything. And, like, looking back, even on happy memories, I. I've felt like, oh, why isn't as happy as it should be? Like, it's not as happy as I thought it felt at another time. And then vice versa, where you're happy and you're like, oh, that depression wasn't so bad. You know, that depression was. It was tough, but it's okay.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

How about childbirth, Labor? Right. That's like a big thing that people talk about. That's not my world. But apparently, you know, there are mechanisms. No, I don't. I'm not a doula. I'm a doula of sorts. Kristen.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Okay, doula. Dan.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

I'm helping people birth their better versions of themselves.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Let's go.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

That's. I am gonna. I'm gonna put myself in timeout for that.

[Kristin Tiedman]

He must be born again.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

So here's what I noticed the other day in terms of mood congruent thinking just to kind of make this practical. So we're recording this for context. Late January 2026, we're sort of in the middle of the stuff that's been going on in Minneapolis and the state of Minnesota, and I read an article about refugee treatment. And that's kind of my big political issue. It's sort of where my heart gets the most involved in politics. I attempted to reduce my anxiety. Tell me if you think this was a good idea by engaging one of the few true conservatives that is still in my life and trying to get the two of us on the same page. Do you think that that worked?

[Kristin Tiedman]

I wonder if it might not help.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

It did not work. And what I noticed was at one point, I Was up to like an 8 or a 9 in anger. Really. Powerlessness was a big part of that. Actually probably more so than anger. I was feeling super powerless when I was in that eight or nine out of ten, you know, subjective distress. What I wanted to do was at one point throw a chair through our living room window. That was a thought I had. I rejected that thought. That would not have helped. I wanted to scream into a pillow or cry. I really was just like I almost didn't recognize myself for a few minutes there. Within 20 minutes including like a really helpful conversation with my wife. And actually I think it's relevant at one point she just like I was laying on our bed and she just laid her body on top of me. Not in like a sexual way. It was like a. Almost like you might do with your kid, like containing their body. And like she has been talking about like co regulating with our boys. And so I think she was just trying to co regulate with her husband. But I noticed in 20 minutes I was at like a 4 out of 10. I was still feeling. I was bummed. It was like not a good day. But I was like, oh my gosh, I have so much more clarity of mind. It wasn't like far from my mind. Like I was still kind of. I spent the day sort of processing those questions. But I had that space and going from an 8 or a 9 down to a 4 or 5 made a huge, huge moment to moment difference.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, I mean I definitely think I'm trying to work on my own recognition of kind of when I'm elevated. But at times it's odd. Like the way I would almost phrase it is. I think I'm logical and sometimes I try to work my emotional state almost end like it's logical to be this emotional. Which in a way you can say I know we're getting more into that of where anxiety makes sense and doesn't and some of that. But it's like, oh yeah, well the world is weird so I should get fired up. But it's like then I'm almost detaching from my emotions at times I'm just treating them like okay, I'm a robot, here comes my emotion and I can get over. I can overanalyze it I would say in my own life. So I think finding. Trying to strike a balance there, being realistic is not know. Trying to find that out is a skill I could work on, I guess.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah. Hopefully what we're talking about today will. Will be beneficial in that regard by sort of identifying healthy versus Unhealthy anxiety. And then we'll have other concepts later as we go. But also just normalizing the fact that organic, natural, healthy anxiety can exist and we should expect it to be higher in moments of time where there are more anxious stimuli. You know, when things are just gonna produce more anxiety. You should feel more anxious after you open a letter from your bank that you are a month away from mortgage foreclosure than you felt before you opened that letter. If you didn't feel more anxious, what would that say about you? Right?

[Kristin Tiedman]

You didn't feel that anxious. You need to figure out how to become a climber and then free solo. Because the only way that that guy was Alex whatever was able to climb the entire mountain was because he's so detached from his fear.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Anyway, I can't speak to his mental state, he's not my client. But sure, yeah. So a really simple rule of thumb here that we can go through quickly is just if you notice you're up at an 8 or a 9 or more out of 10 in overall distress, overall anxiety, whatever sort of physiological arousal, these kinds of things. Don't make impactful decisions. Just do not make big decisions when you're feeling really dysregulated, highly anxious. And avoiding making those decisions will minimize later regrets. Most of the ideas that we're going to cover in this series are going to make more sense in those down times. So when our rationality is able to sort of have a full seat at the table, maybe we're able to sort of zoom out a little bit, get a little bit of context, see the wider picture. That is mostly when the concepts that we are going through in this series are gonna be able to stick. So if you're ever listening to us and you notice that you're in the like 7 plus range, it might be good to take a break, go for a walk, listen to some music, hug a person or a pet that you love, get yourself grounded and yeah, I just would recommend that.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, it's funny, Dan, Something that's coming to mind right now is I read a book, not a psychology book. It was like a actually probably pseudo Christian, self helpy sort of thing. It was given to me at one point, but it was essentially saying the opposite of what you're saying. Again, because it was not a psychology book. It was like, well, when you make an emotional decision, like someone hurts you and you say, I'm never letting this happen to me again. And like, it's like a promise to yourself. And then you, then you're Guarded. And then you're on the track to living in alignment with what you think. But it's like the supercharged. I know, whoa. It was. But I remember that really stuck with me. And I'm like, oh yeah. And I, I am seeing like, I think that I'm talking about the times I've made progress previously, but this is some of that where I think I've internalized a bit of that. Like that must be how I really feel because I'm making it at the most emotional time. But I'm like, oh yeah, I'm making it at the most emotional time. It's like, yeah, it's heightened, it feels important, it feels imperative. But it also could even be at the time something that's like extremely overprotective or even vindictive or something like that. And I'm sure I'm assuming you see this kind of decision making with clients at times too.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, you're right on it. So really quick, I want to give some practical tips. We'll put a PDF for these tips in the show notes. These are kind of like what you were saying earlier that the gratitude anger thing, although this is what I'm sharing here, is like highly evidence backed. This comes from dialectical behavioral therapy. And this is the best sort of set of tips I know for like moments of extremely high distress. You know, these are things you can do right now over a few minutes to sort of help get you down. And there's an acronym for them, TIPP T I P P, sometimes called TIPP Skills. Basically it's temperature, intense exercise, paced breathing and paired muscle relaxation. And the PDF has specific directions on how to do especially the muscle relaxation and the breathing, the temperature stuff really quickly. Cold shower, ice water on the face if it's winter or cold outside, like going outside for a few minutes without warm, you know, without a really warm jacket. Obviously don't put yourself at risk in sub zero temperatures, but like changing the temperature and physically cooling down the body is one sort of quick biological way to also slow down a little bit of the automatic nervous system stuff. And then intense exercise does it sort of in a different way. Like you, you sort of like shocking the system is maybe the overlap between the two. But like really intense exercise for a few minutes at a time can just kind of, yeah, really just give some of that energy a place to go. And so people will sort of try various ones of these. You know, paired muscle relaxation is where you're. Anyway, you could look up the directions on how to do it. But these are just ways of giving the body something to get that foothold in a short time frame. But mostly what we're talking about in this entire series is much longer time frame. These are things to be considering. Yeah. In those more calm moments.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah. Is this. Dan, Could I almost categorize this as, like, the thoughts? If we're saying the thoughts are like, top down, you know, it goes out to the body, then this is a little bit almost like bottom up. Like, start with the body and then it goes and impacts back the thoughts.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Great way to say it. Yep. Because they're always connected. They're, you know, you are one person, you have one body. And your mind emerges out of the context of your brain. And your brain is impacted by what hormones are in your blood, it's impacted by levels of serotonin, dopamine, things like this. So we really do. If we wanna understand everything that's going on with somebody, we have to take into account both the sort of hard biology, if you wanna call it that, and the softer, emergent sort of mental properties of mind. Like, they both matter and they're both connected.

[Commercial Narrator]

Monster Energy. Everybody knows White Monster, Zero Ultra, that's the OG it kicked off this whole zero sugar energy drink thing. But Ultra is a whole lineup now. You've got Strawberry Dreams, Blue Hawaiian Sunrise and Vice Guava. And they all bring the Monster Energy punch.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

So if you've been living in the

[Commercial Narrator]

White can branch out. Ultra's got a flavor for every vibe, and every single one is Zero Sugar. Tap the banner to learn more. New Year, New Me.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Cute.

[Commercial Narrator]

But how about New Year, new money? With Experian, you can actually take control of your finances. Check your FICO score, find ways to save and get matched with credit card offers, giving you time to power through those New Year's goals. You know you're going to crush start the year off right. Download the Experian app based on FICO scoring model offers an approval not guaranteed. Eligibility requirements and terms apply subject to credit check, which may impact your credit scores. Offers not available in all states. See experian.com for details.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Experian.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

It's tax season, and at Lifelock, we know you're tired of numbers, but here's a big one you need to hear. Billions. That's the amount of money and refunds the IRS has flagged for possible identity fraud. Now here's another big number. 100 million. That's how many data points LifeLock monitors every second. If your identity is stolen, we'll fix it. Guaranteed. One last big number save up to 40% your first year. Visit lifelock.com podcast for the threats you can't control.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Terms apply Eczema is unpredictable, but you can flare less with epglis, a once monthly treatment for moderate to severe eczema after an initial four month or longer dosing phase. About four in 10 people taking EB GLISS achieved itch relief and clear or almost clear skin at 16 weeks, and most of those people maintain skin that's still more clear at one year with monthly dosing.

[Commercial Narrator]

MGLIS Lebricizumab LBKZ a 250mg per 2ml injection, is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema, also called atopic dermatitis that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals, or who cannot use topical therapies. EBGLIS can be used with or without topical corticosteroids. Don't use if you're allergic to ebglis. Allergic reactions can occur that can be severe. Eye problems can occur. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with ebglis. Before starting ebglis, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Ask your doctor about eglis and visit ebglis.lilly.com or call 1-800-lilyrx or 1-800-545-5979.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

So I want to, I want to make the first kind of specific connection here to religious change, which is something that I mentioned is going to be a part of this and in this instance around sort of bodily activation. A lot of listeners, a lot of clients of mine were raised in sort of high control or fear based religious environments. And sometimes in those environments you get taught either quite explicitly or at least heavily implicitly, that anxiety is actually the conviction of the Holy Spirit. And I'll say I was not raised in a particularly high control or fear based version of evangelical Christianity. I was raised in a more moderate version, but because of my anxiety disorder, undiagnosed at the time, as like a teenager, I totally bought this every time I would wake up in the morning after any kind of romantic dalliance, which might mean, like I told a girl, I thought she was cute and she thought I was cute, next morning, racked with anxiety, interpreted as the convicting guilt of the Holy Spirit. Okay, so this can Be really common that you would say, well, that's the conviction of the Holy Spirit. Or maybe you're taught that to feel in distress means you're in spiritual danger, that there's some kind of spiritual warfare going on, and that's your clue. So if that's your past, if that's your story, then being at an 8 or a 9 can instantly produce a specific kind of catastrophic thought, like God is punishing me or I'm backsliding or I'm in spiritual danger. If you get down to a 3 or a 4 out of 10, those same beliefs are gonna feel less true. They're not gonna feel as grippy. I wonder if this is kind of what you were getting at with that Christian book you read, that that was sort of a way of saying these moments of high internal clarity, that's actually the voice of the Lord. And I guess I'm saying, I'm arguing for the opposite, that you don't wanna treat them that way. But if your community is consistent enough on these teachings, on this approach, then even when you yourself, your body has calmed down, if you go to anybody in your community looking for another interpretation other than that's the conviction of the Holy Spirit, that means there's spiritual warfare going on. You're not going to get it. Because the people in your community are all in agreement that that's really what it is. And then your. That anxious cycle and the interpretation of that feeling of anxiety has been reinforced by your group. My own anxiety especially was around End Times teachings. You know, Antichrist, the Rapture, Jesus is coming back. And it took eight years from my initial traumatic experience at age 11. It wasn't until I was 19 that I actually read a book by a serious Christian thinker that proposed an alternative to those specific views about the End times and the Antichrist, the Rapture, which are in like the Left behind books and movies. I didn't even know. So I went to people probably during those years. I don't have a ton of specific memories about this, but if I had, I calm down and then I go to a teacher and I say, is this really true? They would go, yeah, Dan, that's true. So then it took a long time till I even had anything else to kind of crawl out of that.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, gosh, as we're talking about this, I'm like going back in time and I'm recognizing, like, I also had some of these, like, post whatever anxiety spikes, like maybe I smooched someone. And then I'm like, I'm a Sinner.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

How dare you?

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, I mean, and then it's something like.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

I'm like, sins of the desires of the flesh, Kristen.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, well, I'm like, we probably shouldn't even be doing this. Like, this is so bad. And I'm like, I. And. But it's weird also because. And I almost forgot about this, but it comes up now and again and it's. I forgot about it and prior to talking about this episode. But I'm remembering now that even when I was a kid, like first grade, we had. We had moved not that long before, I guess, and we were maybe kindergarten and we were looking for a church. And I would get so anxious, specifically at church, not at school, going into Sunday school and like, the new context, that I would. I would get a terrible stomach ache and go in, have to go and sit with my parents. Because I was like. And I think I was like, what is. Like, I was anxious about stuff I was going to learn in the Bible because some stuff you learned as a kid. I don't need to tell you, you're like, what is going on? Everyone on earth died except Noah on the flood. That's kind of sad. Sad, you know, et cetera, et cetera. But there's also, I mean, we talked in the great Divorce series. There's a component of this, like, self gaslighting where it's very difficult because even now I could imagine someone listening to us saying, well, maybe some of this is the physiological component of a conviction, spiritual conviction. And it's tough because that's extremely hard to argue with. So you almost get in this place where it's very hard to discern what are my feelings mean and why do I feel them. But then you look and you're like, I have my twin sister who has never been as anxious about things as I have been, at least not externally. And as a kid, I'm like, she seems fine. What's going on? And it's very. That's its own add to the anxiety when you're like, what's wrong with me? Or I must be specifically bad.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Well, that's kind of a perfect bridge into what I want to do next, which is just to briefly define existential psychology. It's not a widely understood concept, but that is kind of getting at what you're asking there. So to contrast it, we could say there's a kind of very. This is a bit of a strawman, but a very present focused. It's all about reduction of symptoms. It's just about having no anxiety, no depression. Just like, moment to moment, experiencing a calm life or whatever. Like, that's. There are very few therapists that. That's truly what they want to do for their clients. But, like, so it's a little straw man, but that is like an overall approach against which existential therapy and psychology would really stand in contrast. Right. So it's not about just symptom reduction. This form of psychology emerged after World War II, right. And really becomes a thing kind of after the Holocaust. News comes out, and philosophers and psychologists and clinicians are really grappling with anxiety, despair. A lot of this despair seems like quite reasonable given what just happened. You know, meaning crises, people losing their sense of. Of the meaning of life. That, like, these are real. These are like sensible responses to the limits of human life. Like death, our freedom to make choices. So people are free to make choices. And Germany chose this, you know, for instance, guilt, uncertainty. We're gonna. Maybe we should treat these as like signposts towards truth, not like something to just be gotten rid of. So, you know, big thinkers, early thinkers, are like Karl Jaspers and Soren Kierkegaard and sometimes Nietzsche. And then they bring in people like Rolo May, who we're gonna hear from a little bit later. It emphasizes that we should understand the psychological suffering that our clients are experiencing in context. Because sometimes the context is gonna say, that makes perfect sense. We don't need to get rid of that. Let's use it. And so we respond to anxiety with responsibility. We're taking responsibility for our own lives. We are identifying what we value in the world, and we are turning that in to purposeful action. And we're doing that's sort of like a. It's like a offense versus defense. So we're like, going on offense and just playing defense would be like, let's just eliminate distress. So do you see how that's like. Do I need to connect that more to what you were saying, or do you see the connection there?

[Kristin Tiedman]

No, I do. And again, I think we're gonna get more, I'm sure, into the discernment part. But it is. I think I've talked to you about this before, that this is something I'm interested in terms of taking responsibility and a component of values and figuring out what we value. And again, that existential attitude is very helpful. But, yeah, I would say something I see in a lot of attitudes on social media are externalizing, which is like, this is why this isn't my fault, you know, or the system is messed up because of X. You know, it's a systemic issue, or I can't take responsibility for X in my life as opposed to like, no, actually, I can. I can take this small part of it, maybe not all of it, and I can do something with that, or I can value Y, and I can do it for a reason that seems really solid, even if it's not popular. Now, something that this is big in my mind currently is how much this takes discipline. And I think that's something. Also, that's not necessarily a popular word. It's so funny. As a kid learning about discipline in church, I'm like, ugh, annoying. But now I'm like, all right, all right. But, yeah, I would say it's exciting to hear about. And this Rolomee, I had not known about him before, was doing a little bit of digging. I'm like, oh, this guy's awesome. And especially has this emphasis on kind of creatively taking the offense. I was like, love this. I actually went and haven't read it yet, but bought a book. So whether I read it or not, it'll be on my beautiful bookshelf of beautiful books.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

There you go. Yeah. Anyway, yeah, a bunch of the books behind me I have certainly not read, but there they are on the shelf, gaining me some love.

[Kristin Tiedman]

It looks like you read them.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yes, it looks like I have all that knowledge. Yeah. I would just say briefly. So an existential therapist is not going to ignore the role of systems. I mean, you think about post World War II is that's all the. There's tons of systemic stuff that happened there. But what it's going to do is it's going to still place that responsibility with the individual client, the individual person to make what they're going to make of their own life. So it's not a. It would. It would share in its analysis that systemic causes are totally real. And in fact, we are often blown about as if by the wind because of these big things that we have no control over. But nonetheless, we do have our own agency. And the answer is not to simply name all that stuff to make ourselves feel better about not doing anything. And by the way, there will always be a market for people telling you that. There will always be a billion people who want someone to tell them that they're just fine the way they are and they don't have to do anything. And that's like, the easiest. And it's not your fault. That's the easiest way to make some money. Just tell people that and they'll pay you for it. But this is calling us to something bigger. And there's another little tie in here with religious change. And I think a reason that the existential psych approach resonates so strongly with people who have gone through or are going through religious change, including most of my current clients, honestly, is that it was developed precisely in response to moments when inherited meaning systems collapsed. I'm gonna say that one more time. This form of psychology developed precisely in response to moments when inherited meaning systems collapsed.

[Kristin Tiedman]

That's good.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

That's good. Let's fucking go. So for many people who've gone through religious change, like deconstruction, faith deconstruction, or deconversion, this type of experience functions like a miniature version of that old answers stop working, certainty disappears, and then anxiety naturally increases, not because there's something wrong with you, but because you are now awake to limits that you weren't able or allowed to see before. And just briefly, this is also gonna apply to sociopolitics. There's gonna be things about the world. This is going to come in a future episode around boundary situations. But we'll talk about how boundary situations are these periods of time where the old order is like, not making sense of the data anymore. And it sort of forces us into this sort of like a tectonic plate shifting type of a thing. And that can also happen in the individual sense around religious change.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, it's funny, I took a class on World War I in undergrad that was wonderful. And it was. Had a lot of emphasis on the social components going on at the time. It wasn't like heroes, this battle and that battle, you know, not just the military side of things. And the Dada movement kind of arose, you know.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah, Dada is.

[Kristin Tiedman]

And one of the. One of the quotes that sticks with me is like, they were like. This will be seen as the polite response basically to what was going on. And it's funny. Yeah, we have to do something with these big feelings. I mean, many people do, maybe not everyone, but I would say that's another kind of flavor of this existential approach. Taking that control of what you can in. And I think the responsible way is exciting as opposed to just depressing and. And yeah, I mean. And they didn't probably have the psychological tools that we have now. You know, that was so 100 years ago. But getting those tools, it's like, it's empowering. It's a new way to live. And it's like, again, I rather. I get invigorated. I'm invigorated now. So tell me, give Me, the pill, Dan.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Okay, hold on. All right, hold on to that thread of it can be exciting and it can spur us on. First, we just need to identify. So now we're into our meat. We're into our entree here of healthy versus pathological anxiety. But the first thing to recognize from an existential perspective is that anxiety occurs naturally. So anxiety. Okay, but they have a particular, you know, under. They have a particular reason for saying this, that. That it occurs naturally in humans because of our brains, basically. And it is a natural source of creativity and action. Okay, so we're thinking about the good type of anxiety. So here I've got a clip of Rolo May from an interview late in his life explaining, like, where this comes from and how it can be healthy and natural. Human dilemma of being mortal, of ultimately having to confront our own demise.

[Rolo May]

We are conscious of our own selves, our own tasks, and also we know we're going to die. Man is the only creature. Men, women and children sometimes even are the only creatures who can be aware of their death. And out of that comes normal anxiety. When I let myself feel that, then I apply myself to new ideas. I write books, I communicate with my fellows. And in other words, the creative interchange of human personality rests upon the fact that we know we're going to die. Of that the animals and the grass and so on knows nothing. But our knowledge of our death is what gives us a normal anxiety that says to us, make the most of these years you are alive. And that's what I've tried to do.

[Kristin Tiedman]

I mean, makes me happy for my dog, you know, that he doesn't have to know he's going to die.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Elsewhere in that same interview, he highlights that this basic natural anxiety is, quote, is something that, quote, every human being has to face if he lives with any creativity at all, obviously, he is. He or she. This is, you know, the 80s or whatever.

[Kristin Tiedman]

And no, only.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

So he's really tying. He's tying this. This natural anxiety to the creative spirit in human life.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, I mean, I read a while ago, like, there's a nonfiction Madeleine l' Engle book it was like, all about. The themes were, like, chaos and cosmos, and cosmos being this idea of bringing order to the chaos. And that, I mean, feels adjacent here to this, like, the anxiety kind of needing to be wrangled and needing to be put in its proper place instead of just like the horse going anywhere it wants to go. But I would say, like, this is also, you know, it can be still dangerous. It constantly needs to be monitored because it feels or it seems that way, which is kind of hilarious because there's this urge at the same time for the creative act itself to be a type of immortality, you know, to then live on instead of us, if that makes sense. So to say I need to do this in like, almost the proper context, not as the reason for me to. How do I say it? Like, not instead of me, but as part of this. Even my finitude. The creative act needs to be for itself. Even if people don't notice, even if I don't achieve fame or like this, you know, other type of immortality. Does that make sense?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

It does. That'll probably come up in. In future episodes. But the idea is we are always doing this work within the context of recognizing the actual real limitations of the world we live in and of our particular life and self. So that kind of keeps it in check. So, yeah, you might have creativity to write a book. And in fact, just briefly, if you think I could write the best book ever on this subject, I will be world famous. Well, probably not. Also, the book's probably gonna suck, if that's what you try and do. Better to go, what could I write a book about, actually? What do I have real expertise and knowledge about or experience about limiting it to that and being realistic, that's going to be a better book. It's going to be less grandiose, but it's actually going to. It's going to actually reach people more effectively. And who knows, maybe eventually you build on that and you can write that. That bigger book. But there's a realism that is always going to be tied in. In realism is a good word to kind of. To get us back to this question of natural anxiety. So there's a logical consequence to this basic idea that anxiety comes about naturally when we are in situations that produce it. A lot of natural anxiety, because it is uncomfortable, will get unnecessarily pathologized. It will be turned into something bad, a mental disorder, some suffering we want to get rid of, and so let's just try and eliminate it. And existential psychologists would say that all of the anxiety being currently treated in therapy offices or over telehealth all over the world, some of that anxiety should not be resolved, but it should be listened to. It should be used as fuel to get shit done. And by the way, we are also. We're already doing this all the time, if I like, we had to prep for this episode and we had a time on the calendar when we were going to record that gave us A little bit of anxiety, especially if we were behind. If we were like, oh, I wanted to be more ready a day before. Right. So then it sort of spurred us on in a very ordinary way to get our prep work done. Right?

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah. I mean, I wouldn't want you to be mad at me. Extremely anxiety inducing.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

That's why I rule with an iron fist, is to keep everybody's healthy. Natural anxiety there. Yeah, yeah. So you rather. So if you can identify healthy anxiety, you don't want to get rid of it. You actually want to treat it as a clue. Right. So I've got an example here. Like a non politics, like just a very simple example, not about particularly anxious sociopolitical times. Let's say you got a dude, he's feeling anxiety on Sunday nights before work. On Monday, he has difficulty sleeping those nights, he finds himself dreading. Monday mornings, he comes into a doctor's office or a therapy office and he's given a general anxiety screener and he scores highly on it. Right. Okay. So if you don't look any more closely, you could go, all right, let's give this guy some cbt. Let's do some relaxation techniques. Let's engage in some cognitive reframing, help him think about these things differently. The more extreme thoughts that are contributing to his anxiety, and let's see if that improves things. But conversely, you could go, is this a clue that this guy needs to change his job or his career? Should we at least consider that? Right. And so the existential psychologist would say, you don't want to treat the anxiety until you're pretty confident that it's not a clue that you need to change something. You have to, like, do something different.

[Kristin Tiedman]

I mean, is this also, like, we're talking about faith change? Is there some component of this that is like, all right, if you're this anxious, like, even, I don't know, like something related to church, like your church is making you feel so bad. Is that something people should tune into?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah, I would say you could think of an analogy to that. Right. So let's say you have people who are. Something about what's going on in their faith community is not sitting well, or maybe in their private, you know, Bible study or conversations with people or whatever. And they go, man, this, this thing keeps coming up. Like, I. I feel like not like this is not the place for me or like this is causing all these things. You could go to a leader in that community and they might go, oh, yeah, that's just normal doubt. Let's just resolve that Doubt. Here's some answers. Again, this is a little bit of a straw man, but, like, here are the answers to those questions, and that should resolve it. That should take away that anxiety for you or whatever. And there are, you know, there are some instances where that is probably what's necessary. You know, maybe somebody has no idea that people doubt. You know, like faithful Christians can doubt. And maybe it is just enough to know that doubt can exist alongside faith and there will be some individuals. That's all they needed to hear. And that would be good. But to use the analogy here, there's also going to be people for whom. No, actually, like, this is a clue. Like, you should follow this clue because what. Who knows what's going on right now in your life? Are you in a community that is making your life or other people's lives worse? Is it making your children's lives worse? Like, I don't know. So you'd want to be open to the idea that that's a clue and that you should follow it.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah. I mean, it's so funny. It's still tough because you can. Like, it's almost the gaslighting is there. I feel it for myself under the surface. It's like, maybe your anxiety is well placed or maybe you want to be anxious because you want a reason to get out and you want to make it justified. You know, it's tough. It's tough. So I think just the existential, the whole existential sort of project here, there seems to be building a little bit of trust in your own judgment, which is, I think, something a lot of people are not naturally good at either, myself included.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

The way of thinking of healthy anxiety in this existential frame is that healthy anxiety is an invitation, provides an invitation to, like, open up, to ask more questions, to try things, to look more closely. It's basically an invitation for our world to get bigger. Okay, but what then is pathological anxiety? Okay, so first I'll start from a cognitive psych perspective where anxiety about what's going on in a tough time might indicate treatment. So consider. Let's do sociopolitics for a second. We'll use Minneapolis as an example. Assume that these two thoughts, one or the other, are coming from a white adult US Citizen. There would be different settings for, you know, individuals with a green card and an accent or things like that. Let's just say these are white US, you know, born and raised in Minnesota. Okay, thought number one. Wow. I cannot remember a time in my life when immigration control officers acted with so much impunity with tons of legal cover being broadcast from the most powerful people in the country and really causing a lot of harm. This situation is really fucked up. Okay, that's version number one. Here's version number two. Ice is going to knock on my door any day now. Or alternately, well, I guess American democracy is over. The fascists have won. So anything I could do now is meaningless. Right. So what do you hear in the difference between those two thoughts, Kristin?

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, I mean tonally, obviously a lot more of a 2A and 2B. I mean the first part being super like personalizing and it's inappropriately so. But then to be, you know, American democracy over. I mean, I'm saying this, I've probably had this thought myself, but it's like yeah, kind of going to the nth degree. Whereas the first thing, the first one seems measured, you know, kind of holding things like yeah, they're stressful but not needing to go to that nth degree.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

So from a cognitive perspective, we would say those latter thoughts include what we call cognitive distortions or thinking errors. In this case, I'm picking up on all or nothing black and white thinking. You know, either we have democracy or we don't. When in reality democracy like comes in little units, you know, it's sort of like we have more of it or we have less of it is actually probably the way to think about democracy. Catastrophizing, which is when only really bad outcomes seem plausible to us. And remember, mood congruent thinking, catastrophic thoughts feel true when we are in a highly activated moment. More mood fortune telling, AKA predicting the future. We don't know the future. Nobody does. If they did, they would be like Biff from Back to the Future too. And they'd be self made billionaire from sports betting. Think about how much easier it would have been now with DraftKings for Biff to have gotten really wealthy. He could have gotten wealthy in like a week instead of over many years if he had come Back to the 2020-in a day.

[Kristin Tiedman]

There's that thing about you can vote for anything. It's like voting. I forget what it's called.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

You could bet on. Yeah, anything anyway.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Literally anything anyway.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

So the idea here from cognitive therapy and psychology is that one of these is distorted and one of these is more accurate and tied to reality. I like that. I'm a cognitive existential therapist. That part's really important to me. From an existential perspective, what we're looking at is what is that anxiety? What are the, what's the anxiety latent that is present within those thoughts. What is it asking of me? And the first thought, wow, I can't remember a time when things were this bad. Well, that implies there could be a time again in the future where they're also not this bad. Like, it implies change, and maybe I could be a part of changing it back. Right. Or improving it with a new system or whatever. Whereas the second two thoughts, that's not opening you up. That's like, well, I better protect myself. Or if this is all over, I guess I need to just sort of escape. And if you're escaping, if you are running from evil, that is not a situation where you are opening yourself up to the world and various possibilities. This is really protective mode. And so that's a kind of a way to think of it from the existential frame. Healthy anxiety invites us to bigger and more full life. Unhealthy anxiety closes us in on ourselves. As I said at the very beginning we of the episode.

[Kristin Tiedman]

You know what's crazy, Dan, is that we're talking about this and I'm like, oh, yeah, this is the reason I have my tattoo, which I've never. Like, I wouldn't have articulated it along.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

What does the tattoo say? Or what. What is the tattoo of?

[Kristin Tiedman]

Well, it's based off of. Because not all tattoos have to have meaning, but mine does. No, there's. There is a George Saunders letter that he wrote to his students at the beginning of COVID which. George Saunders, a writer.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Fantastic. Mostly fiction, short story, Author. Yep.

[Kristin Tiedman]

And teacher, professor. So he kind of wrote this letter at the beginning of. I mean, another very anxious, acutely anxious time. It was like March or April 2020, and they were about to kind of end classes in person classes. And it's this. You can look it up. It was featured on this other podcast, but the whole thing was everything is always keep changing, which is, yes, grammatically incorrect. But he talks about how the world is on the back of a tiger and the tiger wakes up and things change. But he kind of encourages his students to remember to document this and to record it and witness it and really to continue being creative, even if it might be challenging, which is, again, I think, the call. I'm like, yes, okay. There's something in me that just said yes to that. Like, I'm like, that's what I need to remember. But I think it's very fitting along these lines. Like, you could say the tiger moving potentially. I mean, everything changing could be neutrally balanced. Like, yes, it can change for good, it can change for bad, but the

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Fact that change doesn't mean good or bad necessarily.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, but it's a. Like the change is the constant. And again, it's when you, when you kind of get into this, maybe, maybe it's some of these catastrophizing, like, change to this level shouldn't happen or shouldn't be possible. Like, other cognitive distortions deny that change, which is the reality. So, yeah, I'm like, it's funny. I'm like, oh, yeah, it all makes sense.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

And yeah, it's like you could take that kind of tiger image and maybe twist it slightly to like, you're either riding the wave, like, if time and life are in flux always, if that is just a bare fact of the matter, then you could choose to ride the wave and get yourself a surfboard and figure out how you want to ride it. Or you could say, nope, I don't have to do that. I'm going to build a concrete platform where I can strap myself down and the movement of the waves won't affect me or whatever. Now, it still will. Right? Like, you can't stop the waves from crashing. You're just going to have salt water hitting your face all the time and getting in your nose. It's not going to be better. Right? But you could tell yourself, well, this is how I feel secure, or I'm never going to go to the beach anymore, or whatever. That analogy is breaking down. But I wanted to give a couple concrete examples, more wide examples of when anxiety might close us off from the world. So, because it's not always about sociopolitics, but these are some signs you're not able to spend as much time with your friends anymore, or you're withdrawing from your family or your kids, you're missing class or missing work. And instead you're like spending hours anxiously ruminating on various cyclical ideas. Maybe the anxiety is sort of looping inward where most of your thoughts actually are just ends up being about your own self. Why can't I do this? What's wrong with me? Over and over again. Maybe, like having increasing trouble handling uncertainty or ambiguity and constantly seeking reassurance from a person or a teacher or a book or whatever. Those are some sort of broad ways that, like, we might think about that with clients to apply it to the sort of sociopolitical times. You know, it's not fun to live in a moment like ours with, you know, let's just assume here that we would agree that temporarily there's an increase in sort of government tyranny, that certain rights are Being either ignored or at least somewhat ignored. Rules are being bent that increase sort of government power and not citizen power. So it's not a good situation, but it does not close off all our options for principled action. Some of us could protest. Some will get involved in voter registration for the midterms. Some will volunteer with local organizations that work on related issues. And who knows, like, maybe within a few years the current chaos results in new legislation that makes the country better for decades to come. However, if we give in to the smallness, to the nihilism, to the powerlessness, it's all over. Well, then that's gonna close off options. There's nothing to be done, right?

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, I mean, I've definitely never done any of those things you listed out of anxiety. No. Yeah, it's tough not to go to those places sometimes. Especially. It's funny, one thing I've noticed is like since having a daughter, I mean, driving can be just in general has a level of danger, a level of risk. Getting in the car, I'm like, oh, but it's dangerous. Should I just stay home? I find that risk because you want to protect this beautiful new life. So, so that like, seems so vulnerable, but I'm like, okay. Also what, what does that, that could lead to a really bad place. I mean, and I try, you know, it's not like I, I leave the house, don't worry, but you know, it's like even getting stuck in thinking about that all the time. I, I, I mentioned to you there was like a CS Lewis. Lewis is big in our lives recently, but a Lewis?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah, we just, we just wrapped up a, a series of reading and responding to his book the Great Divorce. We've referenced that a little bit and people can find that if they want to listen.

[Kristin Tiedman]

But I found a super apt quote like prepping for this, which just ended up popping up somewhere else. And it was like kind of about the atomic age. And he said, if we are all going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb, when it comes, find us doing sensible and human things. Praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts, not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. So that hit me hard.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

I mean, and you were saying the other day too about that reminds me of this idea of not having kids because the world is bad. And by the way, there's been a thousand variations on that thought you have climate change versions of it now. Or maybe the rise of fascism is Something in people's minds. So why would I bring a kid into this world? World War II had its own version, Vietnam had its own version. You can be catastrophic about AI, whatever you want to do. But I do think that the existential psychologist would say, okay, maybe you shouldn't bring kids into this world. We can pursue that, but I think as a rule of thumb, we'd want to start with that. Sounds like it is closing you off to the world. Now, it may still be, you know, there may be circumstances where that's right. But it does appear to me to be having that effect. Whereas someone who chooses to have kids might go, well, I'm taking a big risk here. But it does open up a wider world. And maybe that's my bias as somebody who really loves being a father. But, you know, there would be different scenarios for different people, different pieces of information that would go in because people's limitations are different. So there's a lot of individual difference. But yeah, a sort of a dumbed down version of that is similar to just the catastrophizing. It's like, well, there's no way that our kids could have a good life. And the fact is, you don't know. If you were pregnant in 1943, you might have thought that too. My parents grew up with atomic bomb drills in their elementary schools, hiding under the desk. And an atomic bomb has not dropped in 80 years. Now it could again, but it hasn't. Entire human lives have been lived in the time since the last atomic bomb was dropped on a nation. And what a waste to have not lived or not been able to. You know what I mean? Like, you. Yeah. Anyway.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Yeah, yeah, I mean, I, you know, I obviously. Look, I had a child too. Like, you know, I'm in the same boat. And I've actually seen really good, even secular cases for like, pronatalism arguments.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah.

[Kristin Tiedman]

And I, you know, I think it's easy to, you know, respond. I can totally see why people wouldn't want to have kids. Absolutely. Like, I can see that. And also I think that they're like. One question that came from this is I think there can be almost. Yeah. The catastrophizing instinct then spilling onto the Internet and almost demonizing people who do have kids. Or there's just a lot of, you see a lot of posts that are, again, hyperbolic, I think, to the point where they want to encourage action. But it's almost created like a new norm of how we communicate about these issues as opposed to taking that measured perspective. It's like everything is ratcheted up like as the most intense version, like this is the most terrible time to live or the mo. You know, it has to like we focus so much on this catastrophizing language. Like have you. Do you feel like that comes out with clients? Obviously it's not like you were practicing 20, 30 years ago where we didn't have this ubiquitous influence of Internet culture. But is that something that you think has become a bad habit culturally?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

The most straightforward way that I would say it is the algorithms of these tech companies that run these platforms. The algorithms are not built for clarity and aligning with reality. That's not their incentive structure. Their incentive structure is time spent on the app. That is what they are maximizing for and they will utilize to the extent that they can get away with it legally. I think whatever in humans glues them to the app. And negative emotion, catastrophe, fear, you know, anxiety, these things can, they are kind of natural engines of like doing more. You know, I like the phrase panic research, which is not a clinical term, but really like it's in a motion city soundtrack song. My panic research was no help. Great line, you know, great six words right there. A lot of wisdom in those six words. Like, but like, we all reckon many of us recognize the sort of, there's a natural energy and momentum to continue that kind of engagement with those negative emotions and that fear. So I would just say, you know, the, those algorithms are always changing, the platforms are changing, various companies ascend and descend. But certainly there are going to be things that are popular that drive engagement, that, that therefore people are finding useful in the moment or, or whatever, but that might not be helpful for them just because they are like drawn to it. And so I could think of any number of patterns like the one that you described that come from a tech company's desire for maximizing profits for their shareholders, not from, let's get a clear eyed sense of ourselves and where we are in the world.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Imagine a world where someone logs into Facebook or Instagram and just scrolls happily getting more creative inspiration and wants to make the world a better place afterwards and has less anxiety after spending two hours. Maybe there's someone out there and I sure hope someone is having that experience.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Yeah, I mean, I think these days the answer is just like, what do you want to do with your time? You know, like, what do you want to do in your life?

[Kristin Tiedman]

What do you want to do with your one wild and precious life?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Exactly. What do you want to do? What's worthy of your finitude via Aaron Simmons. Yeah. Okay, so let's kind of. Let's wrap up here, back to those kind of three main takeaways from earlier, and then I'll talk about some possible ways forward. Number one, during anxious periods in history or in our individual lives, some anxiety is not only normal, but healthy and can creatively spur us on towards more full lives.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Right.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

We talked about that a lot.

[Kristin Tiedman]

So you're not a weirdo if you have anxiety?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

No, you're not. You're normal. Number two, anxiety can also become pathological and unhelpful, closing us in on ourselves, making our world smaller, doing the opposite of spurring us to creativity. And then third, there was that biological element, that unhelpful anxious thoughts are more associated with higher states of momentary physiological arousal and distress. And helpful anxious thoughts, the kind that spur us on, are gonna occur much more often when our distress is more manageable and not zero. Right. Because it is anxiety. You might be at a 3, 4, 5, but you're. You're in control, roughly, of your. Of your body and your mind at that point. And that is sometimes the sweet spot. So we're not aiming for zero. We're aiming for appropriate anxiety that spurs us on to wider and better lives. Yeah. Any. Any final thoughts on those before I give a couple concrete ideas?

[Kristin Tiedman]

I. I think this is a con. It's just a. The way of addressing it is not. It makes sense. It's like, oh, yeah, that. That is how we should live. But I think there's so much talk, especially with, you know, therapy being so normalized, of like, eliminate. Eliminate anxiety. I have depression. I have anxiety, like being kind of labels people wear. And it's like, I'm not saying that you have to just get rid of that, but it's like, well, what if we. I. You don't hear, I have anxiety. And it. It makes me want to be more creative or. And I recognize it was too high, but there's a normal level. And when I'm at that place, I make my decisions. You know, it is an empowering way to view it. That's how I feel. And I hope I remember in my moments of anxiety.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

I hope so too, for your own sake, because I don't want to have

[Kristin Tiedman]

another colonoscopy at this age.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

All that wasted ex lax and discomfort of the camera. Okay, so we will be talking more throughout future episodes about what to do. Do with the healthy anxiety and how, like, what are different ways of following that and allowing our worlds to open up. But I wanted to close with a couple practical ideas for the unhealthy anxiety, which, you know, I have. I experienced that regularly. Most people who end up in therapy have some version of that unhealthy anxiety and that's where they are. And the first idea is therapy. Of course you can work on the unhealthy anxiety in therapy. Therapy is designed for this. You don't want to, as I've, you know, if you find this stuff convincing, you don't want to use therapy to get rid of the healthy anxiety, you want to follow the healthy anxiety. But if you notice the stuff that's turning you in on yourself, becoming cyclical, cutting you off from the world, therapy is great. There are also for less money, there are some books that can be helpful. There are good sort of cognitive and similar books that can help you kind of get some of those wild thoughts more manageable. The Feeling Good Handbook by David Burns is something that helped me in my 20s. It's in multiple editions now. Retrain youn Brain by Seth Gillahan is another one that I sometimes use with clients today. There's also free resources at the Beck Institute. I think that's beckinstitute.org that is named after Aaron Beck, the founder of cognitive theory and cognitive behavioral therapy. His daughter runs it now, I think nephew third I still need nephthysm. I still need to read it. But I do know that Dr. Sarah Kubrick's book It's on Me is a popular level mix of memoir and existential psychology. She's an existential therapist that many therapists recommend to their clients. So I'm just putting an asterisk that I haven't read it yet. It's on my short list. But I've heard good things and I've listened to an interview with her and I so I would sort of co sign the general approach. And then finally, you know, I offer therapy and also psychology based and existential psychology based coaching. There's a limit there to working with that unhealthy pathological anxiety. As a coach in Washington state, I can't directly treat it, but there's a lot of stuff in coaching that can indirectly treat it. Especially kind of more of this opening up like taking that offensive approach with some of these existential ideas. I do a lot of that with coaching clients. So if you want some more clarification about that, you can email me and see if that would be a good fit. But those are some of my practical ideas for the unhealthy anxiety. Any last thoughts here, Kristen, before we

[Kristin Tiedman]

wrap up any wild, wild, wild thoughts. You know that song?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

No, I don't know it.

[Kristin Tiedman]

What?

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Not a huge Rihanna guy, you know? I know. Loved Umbrella.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Wow. Like the first.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

I'm a 42 year old basic bitch. That's what's going on.

[Kristin Tiedman]

I was in Reading Terminal Market and that song was on and I said, wow, wow, wild. And then someone, a total stranger, turned around to me and said, the next lines are wild, wild, wild, and then walked away. And that was one of the best moments of my life. No, I am highly encouraged. I want to take. I mean, it's just what we should be hearing in our crazy world, this kind of empowering message. I sound so cheesy. I guess it's just.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

Thank you, Pastor Kristen.

[Kristin Tiedman]

Right. I don't want to just be. I should find something more compelling to say, but I'm about to go live in the world myself and encourage and I. I hope to carry these things with me. It's like. It is like leaving a sermon, a good sermon, which, listen, I'm not hearing every day these days, but you walk out and you're like feeling the blessing of the pastor on you. Anyway, that's how I feel. So there you go.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

To the extent that I can take you seriously, I. That. That's kind.

[Kristin Tiedman]

It's. It is kind. It is. Anyway.

[Dr. Dan Koch]

All right, well, thank you for joining me. I'm excited for the next episode, which I think is going to be about this idea of boundary situations. So we've already started working on that. Excited to record it with you later. Thank you guys for listening.