Anxiety is actually fear. Fear is produced by an alarm system in the brain, that triggers a syndrome called the fight, flight, and freeze syndrome. As humans, we evolved this syndrome to alert us of dangers that we faced daily when we lived by hunting and gathering. The symptoms of this syndrome, like rapid heartbeat, the shrinking of blood vessels, and being flooded with hormones, cause the body and mind to be in a state of hyper-alertness. A state of emergency that is supposed to end quickly—once the source of danger is gone. Gone because we either fought it, got away from it, or it killed us.
However, in modern times, in our modern jungle, the enemies to our survival can be ideas, concepts, and experiences like unemployment, failure, divorce, etc. These enemies can’t be fought or ran away from. But they are real threats to our survival, our ability to get food, shelter, safety, love, and status. Our brains still register them as dangers to our survival—because they are—and trigger the fear response of the fight, flight, freeze syndrome. When there is no resolution, and the emergency state keeps going and going, It becomes chronic anxiety.
As a result, many people then reach for drugs and alcohol to tone down the repeated triggering of the fight, flight, and freeze syndrome, and the anxiety it produces. In the process, many of them become addicted to drugs and alcohol.
So then what is the solution? If you don’t want to use drugs to tone down the anxiety, and it’s unsustainable to live anxious forever, what do we do? The question presents a huge challenge for modern humans.
I had to become an expert in anxiety, depression, and addiction to take on that challenge for my own sake and created Adaptive Center to help other people to meet it too. How?
First of all, you have to understand what anxiety, depression, and addiction are. Knowledge is power. So I learn and teach people the details of what it is that we are going through. Through a process of therapy, medicine, and self-discovery, we help people evolve, literally evolve, into becoming functional modern humans. A person fit to live, survive, and succeed in our modern jungle. A jungle full of enemies that are mental as well as physical. We help people to develop new tools, and new coping strategies, to be able to function and flourish in this modern world, by mastering their mental challenges, and even using them to their advantage. Our people grow stronger and fit to survive, overcome, and triumph through the power of adaptation. And that’s why our place is named the Adaptive Center.
It’s named Adaptive Center because adaptation has always been the way that humans have survived, and triumphed, over adversity. It is the way that we continue to survive. Everything that I have learned regarding therapy, regarding medicine, has helped me to survive in this modern jungle. As a person who has to manage Depression and Anxiety, the key to survival and success has been to tap into the amazing capacity for adaptation and resiliency that we humans were born with and is dormant inside of us.
Because—let’s be real—just because the jungle that we are called to live, hunt, mate, and succeed in is made of concrete, doesn’t mean that it stopped being a jungle. And, we are called to adapt and succeed in this new jungle, just like our ancestors were called to adapt and succeed in their ancient one. In both jungles, one basic law rules: those that adapt survive, those that cannot adapt will not.
Regardless of your challenges, the power of adaptation is in you. It’s our ancestor’s most precious gift.