The 4 types of anxiety at work

Anxiety at work is part of the daily life of millions of workers. This is not surprising, given that the simple fact of aspiring to efficiency and productivity goals predisposes us to wanting to avoid “sleeping in laurels ”, which is why, in general, the professional context keeps us mentally active for many hours a week, for better and for worse.

It's true that sometimes those anxiety levels aren't high enough to be a problem. For some people, it can even be a source of motivation. However, in other situations, it does become an element of wear and tear on physical health and mental health, especially if it is maintained at high levels for several days in a row or even during weeks.

In this article we will see what are the main types of anxiety at work, so that it is easy to recognize their characteristics and detect them in our day to day.

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What is anxiety?

Although anxiety is usually linked to experiencing discomfort (at least for as long as it lasts), it is neither a psychopathology nor a problem that should be eliminated from our lives.

Our ability to feel stress or anxiety in certain situations is a survival mechanism, and in the vast majority of cases, it benefits us. In fact, it is so useful that practically all vertebrate animals have this characteristic, which allows them to react quickly when not doing so could seriously harm them (for example, earlier danger signs) or even end their life.

Thus, anxiety itself should not be confused with a different concept, that of anxiety disorders. The latter, including for example social phobia and panic disorder, yes constitute a harmful mental and physiological alteration that must be attended by professionals of the psychotherapy.

They are developed by some people who are caught in a loop of dysfunctional management of habits and emotions; And it is that although anxiety is not a bad thing in itself, like any other element of the functioning of the human body, it can lead to health problems if they occur certain circumstances and interacts with other elements: traumatic experiences, search for acceptance by a very elitist group of people, the death of a being Dear…

And it is that the adaptations arising from natural selection do not only provide advantages, as Charles Darwin demonstrated; that is something that depends on the context in which you live and what situations you have to deal with. And the mechanisms of anxiety are no exception to this rule.

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The main types of anxiety at work

This is a brief summary of the types of anxiety at work that occur more frequently in Western societies.

1. Anxiety due to accumulation of tasks

The quantitative difference between what one can do and what one should do at work (due to the amount of tasks that are assigned) brings out this type of job anxiety. It is a problem that has to do in part with the management of emotions, but that many times has its main causes in poor management of Human Resources or, simply, in precariousness labor.

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2. Anxiety due to excessive task difficulty

There may also be a qualitative difference between what one knows how to do and what one should do.. That is, it may happen that the assigned work is a challenge for the worker, depending on the so that there is a feeling not that there is no time to reach the objectives, but that there is a lack of abilities.

In situations like this, the discomfort is especially intense because there is an indecision or uncertainty about how and what to start learning earlier in order to reach productivity goals.

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3. Anxiety about lack of incentives to work

Many people are surprised to learn that anxiety can stem from apathy and even boredom, but it is like this. Although we technically enter a state of anxiety when our nervous system is highly activated and in "alert mode" and boredom seems to go in the opposite direction, they are compatible. Experiences such as suffering an existential crisis or feeling bad for not knowing what to spend the “extra” time in which we must stay in the office can predispose us to anxiety about not knowing what to do, and feeling that we are wasting hours of the week or even our talents and potential.

Therefore, the fact that our aptitudes and control capacity are above the quantity and difficulty of the tasks that are assigned to us makes many people suffer anxiety in the job; not because you feel like you are not reaching your productivity goals, but because the lack of meaningful reasons why they are dedicating themselves to it and not to other more challenging tasks.

• Related article: "Demotivation: what is it and what are its types?"

4. Anxiety about social interactions

Finally, we cannot separate job performance from the fact that, for the majority of workers, it implies relating to other people. Facing these kinds of social interactions makes many people feel bad, and if that discomfort becomes very intense, in some cases it can even turn into a social phobia.

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Do you want to learn effective ways to manage anxiety?

If anxiety or stress are a common source of discomfort in your work, there are a digital resource that may interest you: Meyo.

This app for android and iOS is designed to function as a physical and emotional healthy habits coach, and includes many programs thought of as exercise routines and chains that serve to train skills such as anxiety management, developing an assertive communication style, adopting good sleep routines, managing time at work, etc.

You simply have to download it to your smartphone, select the content that suits what you need, and use the application daily following its guidelines and exercises.