I'm anxiety. Where can I put my stuff?

...and other thoughts on my favorite character in Inside Out 2

You know the makers of Inside Out 2 have made an excellent film the moment Anxiety entered the scene.

If you’ve ever had serious bouts of anxiety, or if you still do, then you know how incredibly ACCURATE this is.

Anxiety carries a lot of psychological baggage. It takes up so much space in the mind. It shows up everywhere in the body.

That headache you’ve been nursing since you started that new job? Yeah, that’s anxiety.

But as Inside Out 2 has captured so well, anxiety is not the villain in this film (no emotion is). It doesn’t have an evil agenda.

Anxiety exists because it’s only trying to protect and prepare you for what’s to come.

The other day, I saw an Instagram post about what to do when you experience anxiety.

It suggests that you should confront your anxiety and ask it, “What are you here to warn me about?”

Currently, my most common form of anxiety involves worrying about my parents — Mama, especially. She’s a senior and she’s home alone most of the time.

Once or more a day, I have negative thoughts about accidents and fires and whatnot that could happen at home. I can’t even detail it here because I’m — you guessed it! — too anxious to do so.

It’s funny how humans are gifted with the power of imagination, only to use it mostly for conjuring gloom and doom.

I think what my anxiety is trying to tell me is I should spend more time with my parents.

My imagination aside, the truth is, Mama is getting older.

And unfortunately, I’m not exaggerating when I say that for every day that I don’t see her or talk to her, my chances of doing so get fewer and fewer.

Towards the end of Inside Out 2, when Anxiety finally relinquishes absolute control over Riley’s emotions, we see Joy and the gang work together to help Riley navigate adolescence.

When Anxiety starts to go off the rails again, she is taken to her “Special Chair”, a corner in the room with scented candles and tea so she can relax.

Joy: “We can't control if Riley makes the team. But what can we control?”

Anxiety: “Well, um, oh! Riley has a Spanish test tomorrow! We need to study!”

I can’t control the passage of time, or Mama’s diabetes, or the thousands of other factors that could make my worst worries come true.

What I can do is talk to her often, make time to see her, remind her to take her medication, and tell her I love her every day, while I can.

So if you’ll excuse me, I’ll hop on a phone call with her now.