50 | Why Anxiety Feels Unbearable Before It Gets Better

•  Why does anxiety feel worse right before things start improving?
•  What if this phase is not proof you are failing, but proof you are building strength?
•  What would change if you stopped waiting for someone else to make you feel okay? 

If anxiety feels crushing right now, this episode gives you a different way to understand what is happening. This is the phase where everything feels hard because you are building coping skills from scratch, without past wins to lean on.

You will learn why relying on reassurance keeps the anxiety cycle going, and how self-trust starts when you stop handing other people the scoreboard. You will also hear a simple story that explains why confidence is built through volume, not perfection.

Listen through the end for a clear mindset shift you can use the next time anxiety tells you it is too much.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode
• Why the beginning stage of anxiety growth feels like the hardest part
• How small brave moments build coping skills and resilience over time
• Why reassurance and validation create a loop that never feels finished
• How to start building self-trust when you feel like you are starting at zero
• Why repetition builds confidence more than “getting it right” once
• How to define wins for yourself without needing an audience
• What it looks like to move forward with anxiety instead of waiting for it to disappear

RESOURCES:
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🎙️ Presented by Davis-Smith Mental Health

This podcast was created by Davis-Smith Mental Health, offering counseling for teens & young adults in Illinois (only). We accept BCBS PPO, Aetna PPO, and self-pay clients.

Links: 
Anxiety Survival Toolkit:
https://www.blockoutthenoisepodcast.com/anxiety-survival-toolkit/

Newsletter:
https://blockoutthenoisepodcast.substack.com/welcome

Davis-Smith Mental Health:
https://www.davis-smithmentalhealth.com/

1:1 Confidence Coaching:
https://tidycal.com/blockoutthenoise/confidence-coaching

⚠️ Disclaimer:  Block Out the Noise provides personal insights and practical stra...

Transcript

The Hardest Phase Of Anxiety

Jessica N. Davis 0:06

If you're feeling crushed by anxiety right now, I need you to hear this. It won't get harder than this. This phase where every social interaction triggers panic or every decision feels overwhelming. This is the hardest part. And if you can just make it through this, everything else starts to feel more manageable. It's not that life's challenges will disappear. Future pressures might feel even more intense and complex. But with time, you'll find the coping skills, resilience, and support that make those future challenges far more manageable. Hi, and welcome to Block Out the Noise, a space to quiet the noise of anxiety, self-doubt, and overthinking. I'm Jessica Davis, licensed therapist, mindset coach, and the creator of the Courage Method. I specialize in helping teens and young adults build confidence, courage, and purpose. If anxiety ever hits fast and you wish you had something simple to guide you through it, there is a free anxiety survival toolkit linked in the show notes. It's made for moments when your thoughts start spiraling and you need something steady to hold on to. Also, quick reminder: this podcast is here to support and guide you, but is not a replacement for talking to someone in real life. If you're struggling with your mental health, please reach out to a therapist. And if you're in crisis, contact emergency services or a local helpline. You don't have to go through it alone. Right now, it feels like it's you against the lion. That lion is your anxiety, the panic attack that hits before a test, the fear that freezes you in a conversation, the dread that makes leaving your room feel impossible. And honestly, facing this lion right now feels harder than any future challenge because you're building your resilience, your coping skills from scratch without the reassurance or knowledge of past wins. It's not just the intensity of the fear, it's how alone you feel in it. You look around for someone to take the anxiety away, and the truth is, it's you who has to face it. And here's the thing: this is where courage is built. Those moments when you feel completely unprepared are actually adding essential tools to your toolkit. Every time you use a breathing technique to calm a panic spike, every awkward interaction you push through despite the fear, it's another skill you're building. The abilities you develop in these hard moments, like self-soothing or tolerating discomfort, are what will help you face bigger challenges later. So instead of resenting this phase, see it as your essential training. The difficulty is proof that you're growing stronger right now. I know you might be listening and thinking, if only there was a way to make this anxiety disappear forever. If only a friend could offer the perfect words, or even as a therapist, I wish I could just lift the weight from your shoulders. I would love to be the one to face that anxiety for you. But here's the paradox. The thing that might feel tough but is truly empowering. No amount of external support can replace the action you have to take yourself. I can provide you with the strategies and a safe space to talk. Your friends can encourage you, but we can't breathe for you during a panic attack. We can't force the words out when social anxiety silences you. We can't make the choice to attend the event for you. You've likely felt this cycle before. You search for that magic solution or that perfect validation, hoping it will be the cure. But when you receive it, the anxiety is still there. And sometimes it grows because now you're anxious about not meeting expectations. That reliance on outside factors to rescue you is what's keeping you from discovering your own strength. Here's what I need you to hear. The moment you accept that you are the one who must face a lion, that you are the hero of the story is when everything shifts. It's not about being alone, it's about claiming your power. You realize that the person you've been waiting for has been you all along. You have to be the one to take the first step toward the lion. And when you do, you learn that the lion of anxiety doesn't have to control you. And you are capable beyond what you imagined. So, how do you actually build that confidence when you're starting from zero? How do you go from feeling paralyzed to actually taking action? There's a famous story about a pottery teacher who split his class into two groups. One group's entire grade was based on the total weight of all the pots they made. The more pots, the better the grade. The other group, they only had to make one pot, but it had to be perfect. One shot. Can you guess what happened? The group that only got one shot spent the whole semester theorizing, planning, and overthinking. They were so afraid of wasting their one chance that they could barely touch the clay. The group that got unlimited chances, they just got to work. They made pot after pot after pot, lumpy pots, lopsided pots, pots that completely collapsed. And by the end of the semester, not only did they have a huge pile of pots, but the quality of their later pots was far better than anything the one-shot group produced. Here's what this means for you. When you believe you only get one chance at something, the stakes feel so high that you don't even try. But when you give yourself permission to have many attempts, each one becomes low stakes enough to actually do it. And that's where the learning happens. Think about it. If you believed you only got one chance to talk to someone new, you'd probably never do it. The pressure would be too intense. But what if you told yourself, I'm going to try to talk to 10 people this month? Some will be awkward. That's fine. Each one is just practice. Suddenly it's not so scary because no single attempt has to be the attempt. Here's the truth about confidence. It doesn't come from getting it right the first time. It comes from repetition. Think about it this way: someone who makes one attempt at something, they have no evidence that they can do it again. They could say it's sheer luck. Someone who makes 10 attempts, they start to build a track record. Someone who makes a hundred attempts, they've seen themselves survive awkward moments, mess up, recover, and keep going. And someone who makes a thousand attempts, they don't even question whether they can handle it anymore because they have a library of proof. That's how confidence is built. Not by doing something perfectly once, but by doing it imperfectly over and over until you trust yourself. Every awkward conversation, every time you put yourself out of your comfort zone, every attempt that doesn't go the way you hoped, it's not failure. It's evidence. Evidence that you tried, evidence that you survived, evidence that you can do it again. It's how you move from, I can't talk to new people to I've talked to dozens of people this year. And yeah, some were awkward, but some went really well, and I'm still here. That's what volume does. It builds proof, and proof builds confidence. Here's something that might sound familiar. You're anxious about something. You're like, of course I am. Maybe it's a decision you have to make. Maybe it's something you said and you can't stop replaying it. Maybe it's something coming up that you're dreading. And at first, you keep it inside. You're battling it alone in your head, running through every scenario, every possible outcome, every way it could go wrong, which is exhausting. And eventually it gets so loud that you go to someone, a friend, a parent, anyone. You tell them what you're worried about, hoping they'll say something that'll finally make the anxiety stop. And maybe they do say something helpful. And for a minute, you feel better. Okay, it's fine. They said it's fine. But then you start wondering if they really meant it, or if there was a better way to handle it that they didn't think of, or what if they're wrong? And just like that, you're back where you started, still anxious, still unsure, still needing someone else to tell you it's okay. Does this sound familiar? That cycle, the one where you're constantly looking outside of yourself for relief, it never actually ends. Because there's always another worry, another decision, another thing to second guess. And as long as you need someone else to give you permission to feel okay, you're stuck on that hamster wheel. So here's what I want you to consider. What if you could be the one who decides you're okay? Not in a fake, toxic positivity way, but in a real way. When you stop needing an audience to tell you how you're doing, you get to decide what counts as a win. Think about the difference. When you're constantly looking to other people to tell you if you're doing okay, you're handing them the scoreboard. They decide if you succeed, they decide if it was good enough, they decide if you should feel proud or ashamed. That's exhausting. And it puts your peace in someone else's hands. But when you become your own judge, you get to say, that conversation was awkward, but I did it. That counts. You get to say, I showed up even though I was terrified. That's a win. You get to say, I don't know if I made the best decision, but I made a decision and I can handle whatever comes next. No one else has to agree. No one else has to notice because you noticed. And your opinion of you is the only one you have to live with 24 hours a day. Here's the shift. Instead of waiting for someone to say it's fine so you can feel okay, you learn to say it to yourself and actually believe it. Because you're not asking, did I do it perfectly? You're asking, did I try? Yes. Did I show up? Yes. Am I still here? Yes. That's enough. When you build that foundation of self-trust, other people's opinions stop hitting so hard. Not because you don't care at all, but because their voice isn't the loudest one anymore. Yours is. And that's when the anxiety starts to lose its grip. Because so much of anxiety is meaning certainty you'll never get from someone who can't give it to you. But when you've already decided you're okay, you're not waiting for permission anymore. You're free. So this is what I want you to take with you. The lion you've been facing is an external monster. It's the fear and self-doubt within you. And each brave step you take isn't about defeating an enemy, it's about making peace with that part of yourself. Winning doesn't mean eliminating anxiety. It means learning to coexist with it and moving forward anyway. You already have everything you need to start. Give yourself permission to try, give yourself many chances and close the gap between deciding and doing. That's how you build proof. That's how you build confidence. That's how you build a foundation of self-trust that lasts. You got this. Thank you so much for listening. Until the next time, keep moving forward, trust yourself, and never forget you have what it takes to block out the noise.