An exploration of the connection between anxiety and the body by a clinical psychologist, drawing from the latest research alongside historical and cultural insights, arguing that only through understanding anxiety’s grasp on us can we transform it into resilience

Most of us are intimately familiar with anxiety, and with its increasing hold on our minds, our hopes and plans, and our bodies. But how well do we really understand it, and what can we do to transform it into something new—into resilience, or courage, or creativity?

In this extraordinary book, Dr. Alexandra Shaker, a clinical psychologist, takes us on a journey through the body—from brain to blood to heart to guts—to examine the connections between our emotional, psychological, and physical lives. She unravels what the body can teach us about anxiety, and what we can learn from our long cultural history of the anxious impulse.

Melding psychology, neuroscience, history, and literature, she considers why—despite all the checklists and scientific advancements—we are still struggling to outrun our oldest terrors, and how a new approach focused on accepting anxiety as part of the human condition can help revolutionise our relationship with it.