Anxiety arises in us from one of its two sources - "loss," and "lack of confidence." The first is an exterior one (outside of the personal boundary) which is a type of stress, called, "loss," in which fearsome, negative energy is hurled at us, trying to take something from us. The second source is an interior one (inside the personal boundary) which arises from being low on the type of self-esteem, called, "confidence" - a feeling of "being able to handle" what challenges come our way.

If hurt breaks into the personal boundary, it makes us anxious and fearful to an equal measure as the energy within the anxiety-provoking threat. It also causes us an equal depletion of a certain amount of the positive energy of self-esteem, called, "confidence." It is explained in detail in the Anxiety Map.

Now we are anxious, and we have three options for how to employ it or transform it (since the laws of thermodynamics say that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed.) These parallel the "three brains" of the Triune Brain Model.

1. The "reptilian" option for anxiety is to impulsively react to the threat, or to reflexively try to avoid it in the destructive, "win/lose" form, called, "addiction." This hurts ourselves by "not thinking" about strategic ways to solve the stress, and to just hunker down in distractions, addictions, or lashing out in aggression (which takes us over to the Anger Map.)
2. The "mammalian" option for anxiety is to simply let it fester in our emotions, growing into masochism ("playing the victim") and also transforming into sadness or depression by crossing onto the Anger Map. In masochism, we actually dispense with our anxiety by dumping it onto others, perhaps "guilting" them. This causes them harm in the form of making them anxious instead of us. It is a form of the defense mechanism called, "projection."
3. The "higher-brained" option for anxiety is to employ patient, mature character that is constructive and "win/win" in nature, through courage, which uses the anxiety we feel to go face our fears directly, doing our best to use our intellect strategically, rescuing ourselves, a form of "fathering ourselves." In this way, we don't guilt or harm others with our anxieties.

Learning to work with anxiety constructively is one of the two major tasks of phase two - emotional attraction - in step five of human courtship - "Finding Stress in Each Other," and sets us up for step six, and the best-friendship of "Finding Completion in Each Other" - before we move on to an actual, committed partnership in intellectual attraction.