Therapy Not Helping Your Anxiety?
Written by, Mak Estill
Anxiety, Panic & Life Coach + founder and owner of Actionable Anxiety®
First published 12/01/2025 ~ Last updated 12/05/2025
Is therapy getting you flaccid results for your anxiety?
Have you been feeling like you “should” feel better after all these months, years, or decades in therapy?
Were you expecting wildly different results than what you’ve experienced so far?
Not seeing any clear or satisfactory progress?
Below is a list of the most common reasons - from the perspective of an Anxiety, Panic & Life Coach 🙋♀️ - as to why.
⚠️ WARNING ⚠️ - This list is fabulously transparent, and unapologetically direct.
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REASON #1 👉 Most practitioners do not present to you a crystal clear definition and perspective of this thing we call “anxiety”.
❌ And definitely not an impressionable understanding that actually sticks with you throughout time …❌ Nor an understanding that you can take clear, consistent, empowered action from …
❌ And definitely not an effective understanding that was presented to you at the 👉 🏁 very start 🏁 👈 of y’all’s time together …
Most commonly, when practitioners start chatting with folks about anxiety, they often just jump into oversimplified and ineffective one-liners, such as:
It’s your fight-flight-or-freeze response
It’s your overactive mind
You’re just an over-thinker
It’s you worrying too much about the future
It’s JUST anxiety
It’s your body’s way of asking you to reduce stress in your life
It’s a trauma response
BLAH. BLAH. BLAH.
🙄 Any of these sound familiar?
🙄 And did any of those one-liners EVER do much for you?
Imagine this …If right now, you were grabbing coffee with a friend, and they were confiding in you about what it is they’ve been experiencing in their body, saying something like …
”Geez, I just wish I could understand what is really going on with me … I’m pretty sure it’s anxiety, but I don’t even know what the heck that REALLY means?”
If that scenario was happening TODAY, would you be able to look your friend in the eye …
Right there at that café table …
And be able to give your friend a definition (or perspective) of anxiety that leaves them feeling clear, empowered, and oriented toward effective action?
If not, then you likely haven’t yet gotten that from your therapeutic provider.
And that DEFINITELY would explain at least one reason why therapy isn’t assisting you in the reduction of your anxiety, let alone in any noticeable kind of way.
This is why obtaining an effective understanding of anxiety is my #1 anxiety reducing tip for anyone that is looking to live a life of lesser and lighter anxiety.
Too often, I find that a mere general explanation of the ‘fight-flight-or-freeze response’ does NOT really do much for a person …Because being told you have a built-in fight-flight-or-freeze response is similar to being told it’s going to rain on Monday evening ☔️ …
The actions you can take towards this unpleasant and inevitable reality feels pretty mild and minimal, don’t you think 🤷♀️?
I mean … what else is there to really do aside from grabbing an umbrella or staying inside come Monday?
Sounds super inspiring huh? 👎
As an Anxiety, Panic & Life Coach I don’t think I have EVER met someone where their introduction to anxiety (from another professional practitioner) has felt …
🎯 thorough enough
🎯 satisfactory enough
🎯 nor actionable enough
Can you relate?
So after the common therapy-goer receives the predictable, weak and practically useless intro to anxiety …
What generally follows, is the client asking the practitioner, “well what do I do about it?” …
The practitioner then proceeds to spend months and months, years and years, working through various coping mechanisms pertaining to generic mindfulness, breathing techniques, mindset shifts, and round-about conversations that (in actuality) present you with more hurdles to jump before ever getting to your desired result → less anxiety.
So my friends … I don’t know about you?
But for me, if I was seeing someone for anxiety, I would sure want (expect even?) that we would START and BUILD from a clear understanding of what I’ve been experiencing in my body and why.
Because geez, I think that sounds pretty sensical and effective, don’t you? 🤪
Especially when compared to the consequences of NOT starting there (you might as well go-ahead and submit a downpayment for years of therapy).
And I know this first hand!
When I was in my 20’s, there was not a single practitioner of any kind, that gifted nor accomplished this for me during my time working with them, let alone from the get go (🏁), which would have saved me oodles of 👉 time ✚ money ✚ suffering.
So if you or a loved one is searching for a more effective source of support for anxiety, now is a great time for action!
If you are seeking a definition and perspective of anxiety that leaves you feeling clear, empowered, and oriented toward effective action, you can always book us a time to chat.
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When you started therapy, were you wondering … “How long is this going to take?”.
That unknown timeline - for most - can feel a bit torturous, especially for chronic anxiety sufferers.
That sensation gets exacerbated by REASON #2 👉 which is that most therapists will not have - nor seemingly ever - co-develop with you (from the start) a clear intention for y’all’s time together.
And NO. Just generically hoping to “help you with your anxiety” is not an intention … and does nothing specific for crafting how the client will get the most out of their investment into therapeutic services … nor how they (the practitioner) is going to apply their craft and skill to your particular circumstances.Why this is a problem ⤵️ …
Because in the world of personal development and mental health, while sitting there in a session with your practitioner, there is infinite rabbit holes you can go down together 🐰 🕳️ 🌪️ 🔄 … eating up a lot of time, money, attention, energy, and leaving you feeling like you’re going round and round, repeating conversations, not getting anything done.
But when a therapist sets a clear intention for you, it’s similar to setting up appropriate (but flexible) guardrails along the rim of a canyon cliff.
With those guardrails, both party members avoid what would have been an inevitable plummet to the bottomless abyss (i.e 🐰 🕳️ 🌪️ 🔄 … the millions of conversational loopholes, rabbit holes, and deep dark holes you could dive into, get caught up in, and spend a lifetime talking in circles about).
It has therefore always been, and continues to be, SO common for folks to experience “falling off the cliffside” with their therapist, wandering around the labyrinth of the canyon floor system for months or years on end. And when someone says they’ve been in therapy for multiple decades for their anxiety, I have a strong hunch of how time is being spent in the therapy room.
And to no surprise, it doesn’t take long for both the client’s mind and wallet (🧠 +💰) to feel some unpleasant mixture of injured, dehydrated, perpetually confused, frantic, desperate, and hopeless … 🫠🥴🥵…
And how could it not? There is no clear and satisfactory sensation of progress being achieved?!
Does this sound like a familiar experience for you?
You: But I still don’t understand how this can be? Aren’t I hiring a therapist to help me move forward in life? So how in the world could they not, AT A MINIMUM, have an intention for my healing and my support received through their services?
Once again, you would be shocked … absolutely shocked … at how infrequently a therapist will create a guiding intention for:
❌ their time together with a client
❌ a client’s investment into their services
❌ nor how they are going to apply their craft and skill to the client’s particular circumstances
TRUST ME.
I’ve inquired towards a lot of practitioners and clients about this. And I continue to see this over … and over … and over … again … and again … and again.
FUN FACT ➡️ ‼️ I even just recently had a therapist who was at the very end of his career (so we are talking around 40 years of being a practitioner) and he only JUST RECENTLY considered the prospect of setting an intention for his work with his clients. He said I was the first person in his whole career that had ever even brought up the idea of HAVING INTENTION (?!) for how to best spend your time with your clients.
This reality continues to blow my mind and baffle me to no end 🌋🤯⚡️💥.
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REASON #3 👉 The majority of practitioners (therapists, doctors, coaches, etc) do not take responsibility for CAUSING the results of their client/patient/participant (i.e. YOU).
Here’s what I mean 👇.
When practitioners are not getting their client results, they often say things like:
“My client isn’t motivated to change” …
“My client is resistant to change” …
“My client isn’t ready to make the necessary changes” …
And all of this is a load of horse s*** 🐎💩.
You hired someone to help get you XYZ result (i.e. reduce your anxiety), and furthermore, THEY agreed to assist you in getting you those results …
However, here’s the crux …
The sneaky fine line that slips by most people 😬 …
They (the practitioner) often agrees to ‘assist’ you in getting to your desired result, they did not agree to cause it to happen.
Let me use a visual to help walk you through this …
Let’s say you want to scale to the top of some majestic mountain 🏔️ …
So you hire a local sherpa to help carry some of your gear and lead you to the top (helping to ensure you don’t get too lost, exhausted or distracted along the way).
And hey! That sounds great and all.
But remember, the real goal is to get to the top of the mountain, not to spend years getting there.
And if a sherpa took years to get you to the top of the mountain, wouldn’t you question if they were just secretly lost the whole time too?
Or maybe …
They were never actually familiar with the terrain to begin with?
Or maybe …
You would start to wonder if they were a complete lunatic, who derives pleasure from leading you round and round on some never ending death hike.
At that point ….
So many months along the journey …
It’s a VERY appropriate time to turn to the sherpa and say - “Hey buddy?! What’s the hold up? Are we lost?”
This sherpa-mountain experience parallels the experience of many people (and likely you too), who have been navigating various mental health and people changing services for a prolonged time, with little to no results.
And in my opinion, life is way too short to spend time hiring a sherpa that takes excessive months or years getting you to where you want to go … and surely not for the price you are paying.
Now let’s compare the wondering sherpa to a gondola 🚠 …
Which picks you up at the base of the mountain and directly, painlessly, and enjoyably takes you to the top of the mountain.
And yes, when it’s all said and done, we can argue the gondola ‘assisted’ you to the top of the mountain.
But in comparison to the entirely unhelpful sherpa …
The gondola did a hell of a lot more ‘causing’ than ‘assisting’. Wouldn’t you say? AND you got to enjoy the beautiful views the whole ride up ✨🏔️✨.
Most practitioners do not take responsibility in causing the results to occur for you, and instead (whether they say it or not) are agreeing to walk with you on a long-winding journey that they merely hope is leading to the results you seek (the mountaintop).
Why does this happen? Why are they not taking more result-oriented responsibility?
Why are they not guaranteeing a timely ascent to the mountaintop?
The long and short of it …
Is if they never take full responsibility for getting you your desired results, then they get to be free from the burden of guilt that will (inevitably) fall into their lap. So, their subconscious brain steers them away from possibly ever obtaining that unwanted guilt, by avoiding responsibility altogether in the first place - YIKES 😬❌👎🏽.
I instead advocate for practitioners to:
→ 1) take full responsibility to CAUSE a shift
→ 2) identify early on, if not immediately, if they do not have the correct skills to cause such a shift in their client
→ 3) and if so, to re-direct their client to someone else more skilled (avoiding the involvement of guilt all together).
At Actionable Anxiety, I take full responsibility for the quality of our sessions (i.e. the value you receive, the immediate results acquired, and the long term results you sustain).
This is a very different perspective and approach than other service providers out there. I consider it my job to cause you to get to where you want to go.
I focus on lifting, shifting and clearing - think gondola ✨🏔️✨🚠✨🏔️✨.
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REASON #4 👉 A good service provider will likely present new, shiny and interesting perspectives (i.e. ways of thinking) for you to entertain, chew on, and cuddle with outside of your session time.
But - OFTEN - not enough attention is given during the session time to causing facets of your subconscious brain to increase receptivity and attraction to whatever is being introduced.
If this happened more often, I can guarantee it would lead (with more ease and impact) to the adoption, embodiment and prioritization that new and desired way of thinking.If that sounds a bit too wordy, and I’m starting to lose you …
Then let’s back up and use an easy example👇.
I bet you there have been many times in your life where you’ve thought of a FABULOUS idea (a good ol’ fashion ‘lightbulb moment’ 💡) - OR - you were hit with some new inspiration 💥🤩.
Then …
Before you know it …
An hour later, a month later, 6 months later …
You’ve completely moved on.
That great idea? Forgotten about. That mind blowing inspiration? Left in the dust.
And we both know that an egg … when left in an incubator without any light on … never has a chance to actually hatch! 🐣 😭
Similarly, what often ends up happening is that a client (you) will have a session with a service provider (like your therapist), and be gifted a new perspective or activity to try on …
And you end up saying “Ok, I’ll give it a try" … only to forget about it as fast as it was introduced to you.
When a new way of thinking is introduced to you … if the conditions aren’t right (i.e. the subconscious lightbulb hasn’t been turned on ❌💡), it can never really hatch … let alone take flight!
A real missed opportunity. On repeat.
Can you relate to this experience?
This is where working with a life coach is so powerful. Life coaches not only introduce new, attractive and highly impactful perspectives for your life ... but they also coach your mind to create conditions that better guarantee success for hatching and flight (i.e. we turn the damn light on 🐣 💡).
It’s not a mystery why so many people are in therapy for months and months, years and years, and with a lame return on their investment!
If a majority of attention is given to the conscious mind during session time, when a majority of psychological turmoil comes from data processing activity in the subconscious mind … then we’re in trouble (especially if we were hoping for timely and effective results) 😬.
If both the conscious - AND - the subconscious mind play a role in the birth and the eradication of emotional turmoil …
It is therefore required to address both psychological spheres in order to achieve results towards revolutionizing and transforming whatever’s been going on for you (anxiety, anger, grief, resentment, stress, etc).
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REASON #5 👉 Professionals over-rely on the silence tactic, eating up your time, draining your enthusiasm and stamina, straining your wallet, and prolonging your journey to crossing your desired finish line.
Here’s a quick breakdown of the issue 👇 …
The silence tactic is a certain tool that is used in a variety of circumstances and environments, employed by various professionals and non-professionals alike: therapist, lawyers, doctors, coaches, judges, interrogation / conflict / negotiation / resolution / law enforcement experts, pissed off partners or parents, etc.
It's a tactic that is ultra simple and has the potential to yield worthy fruits, because employing silence in a conversation more feasibly gets someone to talk …
And the more someone talks … the higher the chance they will reveal useful information and/or come to their own self-realizations.
Let’s use an example you’re likely familiar with …
Have you ever been in a situation where social silence made you uncomfortable?
→ Such as on a date?
→ Or in an elevator?
→ Or at the dinner table?
→ Or after a fight with your loved one?
And within the uncomfortable silence …
Someone eventually speaks up, often forcibly saying anything at all that will help create more social ease (this is why so many people bring up the weather upon greeting each other 🌦️☔🌤️).
So the silence tactic is strategically utilized when one person desires another person to say something.
This silence tactic CAN be useful …
Sometimes VERY useful …
And especially in environments such as a coaching or therapy session.
Why? 🤔👇
As it pertains to one’s personal development journey …
A client will end up more powerfully fueling and sustaining their desired transformation if much of the new insights, perspective, ideas and realizations are derived from themselves. Which is one of many reasons practitioners will do a lot of active listening (i.e. silence), in the hopes that the client curates the next informative or inspirational “ah-ha💡”.
Ideas, thoughts, reflections, realizations, and epiphanies that come from ourselves often hold much more weight for our transformational process, EVEN IF a therapist were to look you in the eye and offer you up the same thing 🫴.
Insights that are merely prescribed or presented by a professional CAN BE very inspiring, but unfortunately, often operate like cheap fuel that burns quickly for the client.
So hence … why the silent treatment is so commonly utilized!
Funny enough, this is where the stereotype comes from …
You know the one …
Where the therapist looks at the client and asks, "And how did that make you feel?” … and the patient replies, “Angry.”, and the therapist continues to hold a long painful pause until the client begins awkwardly fumbling on more material to elaborate on.
I am not anti-silence-tactic.
There is indeed a serious purpose and place for the silent treatment, and I have both witnessed and experienced the positive results of this tactic, when employed appropriately.
BUT HERE IS THE PROBLEM ⤵️
From my experience, I have found that this tactic is often way too over employed, so much so, that has become very obvious to me that professionals employ this tactic when they don't know how to help their client directly in the moment, or they want to make their job easier for the day (i.e. less talking on their end = less work = an easier day at work). Both of which are inappropriate and entirely insulting to the client’s investment.
Leaving the client feeling like they are way too often talking in circles with their therapist, week after week, month after month, year after year.
And it's because they are 🫠!
Can you relate?
The thing is … that most of us are pretty damn good at talking to ourselves. And if we're suffering with persistent anxiety, we're likely very active with personal introspection and internal dialogue.
So by the time we come to a professional for help, we often aren't needing to get prompted into further introspection.
Instead, we are needing some other tool, perspective, or medium to be applied or gifted to us. (i.e. we are asking for something that we have yet to figure out how to provide for ourselves, and we want it fast).
But because the professional is not in your brain hearing every introspective realization or thought you've accumulated for the day, the week, or the last decade of your life … they default to this tool of excessive silence because they're assuming that you will eventually reveal a series of grandiose realizations or perspectives that will help you move yourself forward with your life … and that you simply need a “safe space” to support your process of walking yourself to where you wanna go.
But those of us with persistent anxiety often do not need to merely continue walking …
Let alone continue walking ourselves along some romanticized, long-winded personal development journey.
A lot of us are just needing a f****** exit sign.
Someone to - ACTUALLY - lift, shift and clear our chronic anxiety symptoms, with more ease, efficiency and effectiveness.
And you know what's not going to get us that faster? 👉 Over utilized silence tactics designed to prompt further introspection from a person that is very exhausted of introspection 🙄.
FUN FACT ➡️ 👻 I one time had a therapist that employed the silence tactic for 99% of our session … LITERALLY … it turned creepy. She was like a ghost. I fired her after 4 sessions. That was 4 sessions too long.
OTHER FUN FACT ➡️ 👎 Did you know there are coaching schools that really try to urge professional coaches to try to be silent for 80% of their sessions with their clients (i.e. let the client do most of the talking). In my opinion, there are a million circumstances where this is NOT the most effective way to get your client to where they want to go, nor helping to get them there faster … and definitely not the most strategic use of a client’s investment (⏰ + 💰).
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REASON #6 👉 Most practitioners excessively promote “processing”.
… processing your feelings 🔄
… processing your thoughts 🔄
… processing what happened during an event 🔄
The result? 🤔
The client is pushed into a prolonged performance that includes some inevitable rollercoaster of:
➰🎢➰ venting
➰🎢➰ never-ending introspection
➰🎢➰ excessive detail sharing
➰🎢➰ and feeling all the feelings
Most of which …
Is neither relevant - nor - the most advantageous in getting you to where you want to go, or how you want to be experiencing your days ahead.
And especially not within any reasonable timeframe ⏳.
Now …
There are some very-real positives that CAN and DO come from all this “processing”.
But here’s the deal …
A FASCINATING component of the human mind, is that it actually has a "negative energy budget"🔋🔁🪫.
Let me explain👇...
Do you know of someone who vents or complains all the time?
Or have you ever vented to someone for a long time, and felt better afterwards?
Well, when we are experiencing something negative (i.e. stress, frustration, anger, etc.), and we vent or talk about it for a prolonged time (such as during a therapy session) we CAN and OFTEN DO feel (sorta-kinda) better.
And this is because negative energy that builds up in our life, is similar to a reservoir of water.
The higher amount of water behind the dam, the greater amount of ‘potential energy’ that is building (middle school science class anyone? 🤓).
When we open up the dam doors (i.e. start venting or talking about our problems), it begins to release (i.e. putting in motion) some of that potential energy.
Which can seem like a good thing, right? 🤔
“Ahhhhh … releasing …. letting go …. blowing off steam …. shedding! 😮💨”
But what can happen is that we release so much energy through venting and processing, that we don't have any “potential energy” remaining …
WHICH …
We actually need in order to fuel and direct actions towards desired results and solutions → 🎯→ 🎯→ 🎯→🏆.
Or more accurately put …
It would be MUCH EASIER if we DID have some reservoir of potential energy remaining, so that we don’t have to be scrambling to get our anxiety “better” while feeling like a glitchy drained battery throughout the whole dang process 🫠.
Can you relate?
This is one of many reasons why folks so often feel like they’re never actually getting any satisfactory or highly worthwhile results from their investment into therapy, regardless of:
⇢ loving their therapist
⇢ find their therapist to be nice and well intended
⇢ feel seen, supported and heard by their therapist, etc.
To prove my point exactly …
Just yesterday I had a mother reach out to me inquiring about setting up some coaching support for her teenage daughter.
And she said those oh-so-classic words I hear all the time …
💬 “My daughter feels very supported by her therapist, but we’re not seeing much change in her anxiety.“ 💬
If you can relate …
Then chances are high that the structure of how your support sessions are currently being run (i.e. how much your practitioner is allowing or promoting prolonged venting, detail sharing, or introspection during session time) are likely leading to suboptimal results for your goals (i.e. the needle hasn’t moved much for your anxiety).
This is because …
☝️ - You have an internal negative energy budget 🔋🔁🪫.
✌️ - That, when not optimally balanced, leads to feelings of low fuel in your fuel tank ⛽️🪫 … the fuel tank you rely on to ACTUALLY & CONSISTENTLY pursue new and different actions outside of your session time.
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REASON #7 👉 The most common therapeutic prescriptions to reducing anxiety, often have nothing to do with anxiety in and of itself.
And instead, has much more to do with navigating you through various side doors and back alley ways that CAN & DO harvest you certain rewards (including temporary symptom reduction for your anxiety) …
BUT …
Oh-too-often …
These prescribed tools and activities sign you up for an unnecessarily long-winded journey to get to where you would (ideally) love to be tomorrow.
This phenomenon - which is present in 100% of people that come my way - creates what I call the “🧠 brain pain, 🪫 brain drain and 💰wallet strain” effect for folks that have been looking to get help with reducing their anxiety (and this was a massive part of my story too 🙋♀️).
We’re talking things like …
😮💨 breathwork
🧘♀️ yoga and mindfulness
📝 journaling
🏃♀️ exercise
🧊 sensory tools like cold water
💊 medication
The best way to understand this better is to get yourself a crystal clear, empowering, and actionable understanding of what the heck anxiety really is.
As an Anxiety, Panic & Life Coach, I consider this my #1 tippy-top tip ⬆️🏔️☝️for folks looking to live a life of lesser and lighter anxiety. -
The grand finale … ✨🥁✨ … REASON #8.
I’ll keep this one short and simple, because it includes all of the factors discussed above (intention, responsibility, etc.).
There is a difference …
Between → EXPERIENCE vs SKILL
And here’s the no bull**** truth 😬.
A practitioner can have all the titles and credentialing acronyms attached to their name.
AND …
They can have decades of “experience”.
But none of that guarantees the caliber nor consistency of their ACTUAL SKILL to get you the results that you seek 🙅♀️.
Nor that they have similar lived experience to the circumstances you’ve been navigating and seeking support around 🙅♀️ (which can make a massive difference in the results you receive + your overall experience teaming up with a practitioner).
Because having “experience” in an industry is NOT the same as having “experience” getting your clients consistent, timely, and high caliber results.
If you are not genuinely feeling better and doing better, after all your months and years in therapy, then you have likely not yet landed on a skilled practitioner.
Want to explore how I could be a new and interesting support resource for you? 🙋♀️ You can book us a free 45-min Consultation & Connection Chat 📲.
If you would like to explore how anxiety, panic & life coaching support through Actionable Anxiety® can accomplish getting you a life of lesser and lighter anxiety - OR - if you just would love the chance to pick a coach’s brain about how to continue forward as clear and empowered consumer of therapeutic services, book us a chat below👇.
If this hit home, these next reads might too:
👉 👀 📝 - What is Anxiety?
👉 👀 📝 - How to Heal Your Anxiety?
👉 👀 📝 - #1 Tip for Reducing Anxiety
👉 👀 📝 - Anxiety vs Fear Explained
