Dr. Aziz argues that exposure alone won't free you from anxiety. Practicing feared actions like saying no can show you it's possible, but without addressing the underlying emotional response, you're left with guilt and stress. Real freedom requires inner work, not just repetition.
exposure and doing the thing that scares us doesn't just automatically give us the outcome or the freedom that we want. There's, there's a shift that has to occur inside. For example, it's really hard for me to say no. You could say, I'm going to do exposure, I'm going to say no, I'm going to look for 3 opportunities this week to say no. And you could do it, and that's going to be beneficial, and you could grow, and you could say, hey, saying no is not so bad, I'm okay. It's also possible that every time before you do it, you're like, and then after you do it, you're like, oh, I feel guilty. Oh, is that okay? I'm stressing out. And it's not like there was no growth there, but it's not, it's not like you're more free cuz you could do that 10 times and be stressed out every single time.
