Anxiety tells you stories. It says: everyone noticed, they all think badly of you, the worst possible thing is almost certainly going to happen, you are not good enough and it is only a matter of time before people find out. These stories feel true because anxiety speaks in the first person, in your own voice, with a certainty that feels like knowledge. But anxious thoughts are not reliable reports on reality. They are your brain's threat-detection system firing when the threat is not actually there — or is far smaller than the story makes it seem. Recognising the pattern does not make anxiety disappear. But it does give you the ability to notice it without believing everything it says.