8 Signs You’re An Introvert With High-Functioning Anxiety
shivani k 
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Are you someone who ends up with sweaty palms for the slightest of worries that life throws at you? Do you refrain from sharing your thoughts with another person, fearing that you might be misunderstood? And, if to the outside world you appear to be a well-controlled human who has his/her life figured out well in advance, then you definitely are a victim of high-functioning anxiety.
Anxiety is nothing but our self-made chaos in the calm. It’s this voice at the back of our head that keeps us awake till 2.a.m in the night. Anxiety can sprout in our lives because of various reasons — a bad personal experience, a certain fear, getting conscious in a crowd of people, and much more (1). We all know the nature of an introvert — shy and reserved (2). And if you’re an introvert, it’s easy to fall prey to the hypnotizing world of anxiety. In a nutshell, high-functioning anxiety is a condition wherein the calmness in a person’s life may be a facade, and in reality, the person’s mind is a rising tsunami of worries and distress (3).
Anxiety can be difficult to identify (because we continue to shy away from giving importance to our mental health (4)). At times it is evident, and at other times, we aren’t aware that the troubles in our head are all signs of the anxiety that we face. Well, come on, how can a person with a chaotic mind realize his or her own bouts of anxiety, right? In that spirit, here are a few signs that could help you or your friends identify high-functioning anxiety:
1. You Are Stressed And Feel Irritated All The Time
Even a small pep talk could get you frazzled. Stress becomes your BFF and you begin to get irritated with everything around you. Anyone and everyone can irk you off into a volcanic outburst. If you feel you are facing this problem, or a person around you is, then learn to manage your stress to free your yourself from unnecessary apprehension (5).
2. You’re A Perfectionist
Geez, how could being a perfectionist be a negative trait, right? But it’s true; striving to make everything perfect isn’t healthy (6). It stresses your mind even more. You start expecting more from yourself and from the people around you. And it breaks you if you fall anything short from what you’d expected.
3. You’re A Pleaser
The word “no” loses its existence from your vocabulary. You never refuse to lend a helping hand when someone approaches you. Even if your sanity is at stake, you will go out of your way and help people. You’re doing it because of the fear that you might fall short in other’s eyes, or with a fear that you might lose your near and dear ones.
4. You Count Your Nervous Habits
Anxiety can manifest physically as well. No matter how composed you keep yourself, your anxiety levels give away in the form of nervous habits — scratching your scalp, nail-biting, face picking, key jiggling, etc. (7). These habits are a secret way of expressing your anxiety.
5. Stoic Mask Outside, Nervous Nellie On The Inside
If you’re suffering from high-functioning anxiety in addition to being an introvert, you must have mastered your way into masking emotions. And nope, it isn’t a compulsion that an anxious person needs to look all disturbed. A calm person can look way more nervous. However, this superpower (i.e. hiding your anxiety) makes it difficult for people to understand or help you.
6. You Engage In Negative Self-Talk
Self-talk should be encouraged as long as it is motivational to oneself. If you find yourself constantly cribbing about your ways of do’s and don’ts to yourself, it becomes negative and harmful to your mental health. Your internal voice will make your mind and heart so pitch-black that even a kid’s cartoon movie will appear like a horror movie. It’s like you have set off on a mission to distance yourself from peace and run towards chaos.
7. Nope, Just Cannot Sleep!
No treats for guessing this even before we mentioned it. If your mind is sailing through an unpleasant river of thoughts, it’s an obvious struggle to get peaceful sleep at the day’s end. You find yourself awake till the wee hours of the morning until the sheep you were counting on have also called it a night. Anxiety disturbs your sleep cycles (8).
8. You Live In A Small World
You find yourself running away from the feeling of being overwhelmed. Therefore, you keep your world small. You limit yourself to friends and family members whom you’ve known since the time you learned to talk. Social situations trigger an emotional discomfort in you. Public gatherings, travel getaways, music concerts, etc. are a part of your “to avoid” list. You opt for familiar routines and swear by them.
The level of anxiety and how much of it can be controlled or managed depends on the person’s brain. Studies say that anxious humans have a different brain (9). Their way of perceiving things in life and reacting to all of the world’s activities is very different.
We hope that this article will help you and the people around you to identify and deal with anxiety. Anxiety definitely cannot be wiped out in an instant, but it can be controlled and managed. Have you faced high-functioning anxiety? Answer in the comments below!
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