Why is avoidance not an effective technique to reduce anxiety?

Avoidance of anxiety triggers seems like a logical and easy-to-implement solution to anxiety.  For example, if we are anxious when socializing in groups, why not just set ourselves up for success by only socializing one-on-one?

The problem with avoidance is that, over time, it actually feeds our fear.  If you avoid the situation that you fear and thus don’t feel a surge of anxiety, your brain gets confirmation that the avoidance pattern was effective.  Then, the pattern gets reinforced and tends to expand over time.  Avoidance of one narrow thing can eventually become an avoidance of everything in that category. 

Avoidance behaviors cause temporary relief of fear, but long-term reinforcement of anxiety. 

Many people with untreated anxiety start to live more and more self-restricted lives. 

By avoiding, you also miss out on an opportunity to show your brain that the feared stimulus is not actually dangerous.  Yes, socializing in a group will cause a spike in anxiety, but if you stick it out, the anxiety will most likely level out over the course of the evening.  Best case scenario, the experience will end up being more enjoyable than anxiety-provoking.  Your brain’s anxiety triggers will be rewired, just a little, every time this happens. 

We need to teach our brains that anxiety is our brain overreacting to stimuli in our environment.  Just because we fear something, does not mean it is dangerous. While Cognitive Behavioral Therapy can be effective at challenging our anxious distortions and thinking patterns, real-life experiences of confronting our fear can be an even more effective healing tool. 

In therapy, we can develop a fear-hierarchy, which basically rates your anxiety-provoking situations and stimuli.  We determine how much distress these situations may cause, as well as how much you avoid them.  Then, we can systematically support you in slowly facing these fears and defeating them.  Sometimes, the first step is just imagining or describing the dreaded situation and sitting with discomfort.  When working through fears, it helps to have a supportive therapist and a plan.