Reversible Anxiety

This summer vacation, I met some of my readers in Beijing. Since I am currently a university student, my usual schedule leaves me no spare time to meet people, so many of them reached out to me over the summer break.

What took me by surprise was that roughly half of the people I met struggled with anxiety of varying severity. Some even suffered hair loss or alopecia areata as a result. A good number of them are well‑educated, high‑earning professionals. Yet their income has not made life any easier, and their anxiety has begun to take a toll on their physical health.

I ended up doing a fair amount of informal psychological counselling this summer. I even earned enough money to cover my tuition and meals for the next academic year, something I never could have anticipated. I would rather not make money in this way, though, because counselling is not my main line of work. My sincere wish is that everyone could live with greater ease.

While the triggers for anxiety vary widely from person to person, one common issue stands out: many people are trapped inside an information cocoon. They are heavily influenced by anxiety‑mongering articles and videos circulating on social‑media platforms, which plant all kinds of biased mindsets.

Most of these individuals do not meet the clinical diagnostic criteria for an anxiety disorder or depression. Still, prolonged mental exhaustion has undermined their physical and mental wellbeing, triggering chronic insomnia and gastrointestinal problems. I would like to share my thoughts on this issue. I believe people in this situation can overcome anxiety through self‑regulation. That said, self‑adjustment alone will not suffice for people living with clinical anxiety or depression, who must follow medical advice and take prescribed medication when necessary.

I often head back to my hometown in the countryside and catch up with childhood friends who did not receive much formal schooling. Oddly enough, they tend to be far happier than many highly‑educated professionals I have met in the city. Whenever they have free time, they seek out simple joys: gathering in small groups to play mah‑jong, going shopping, fishing, or simply chatting and laughing together.

They also use social media, but mostly to watch silly jokes and low‑brow entertainment content that people with higher education often dismiss as mindless.

My firsthand observation is that chronic anxiety tends to afflict people who were labelled “high‑achieving students” back in school. Official statistics released by the Ministry of Education back this up: among enrolled college students, anxiety and depression rates rise with higher academic credentials and more prestigious university placements. Associate‑degree students turn out to be the happiest group on campus. These statistics are not fabricated; you can easily look them up online. Half‑jokingly, I say I was incredibly lucky to only get into a junior‑college program after last year’s college‑entrance exam.

Top‑performing students frequently hold impossibly high standards for themselves. Excessive self‑demands can easily lead to anxiety, depression, nervousness, irritability and insomnia. Many good grades were earned at the cost of playtime, and sometimes even sleep, from an early age. Having spent years living under the pressure of exam‑driven schooling, they developed extreme self‑discipline while disrupting their natural body clock, making it extremely hard for them to unwind later in life.

Human beings need adequate leisure time in order to cultivate a relaxed mindset. Why are students who spent more time playing and earned poorer grades often more laid‑back in adulthood? Many of them go on to build more successful careers and happier family lives than their formerly top‑ranking classmates. One possible explanation is that they are better at striking a balance between work and life, regulating their emotions, building mental stamina and executing practical plans.

I have managed to maintain a fairly balanced outlook myself. Back in school, I loved to have fun yet also delivered strong academic results in certain phases. As a child, I dabbled in countless hobbies and was so mischievous that my primary‑school and junior‑high teachers struggled to keep me in check. I got punished by teachers on numerous occasions. Starting from the second year of senior high, however, my grades improved dramatically, to the point where I barely had any academic rivals.

I took the Big‑Five Personality Test and scored 1.7 out of 10 on the Neuroticism scale, with the population average falling between 3.3 and 6.6. A score of 1.7 means my emotional stability surpasses 95% of the general population. I rarely experience anxiety or low moods, which greatly boosts my productivity in both study and work. Naturally, my emotions were not always this steady when I was younger. After reaching adulthood, I went through brief spells of depression and emotional pain triggered by life setbacks, yet I always recovered without medication before long.

When I was studying on campus last year, my school counsellor took a keen interest in me and often invited me for conversations. She watched me juggle family responsibilities, part‑time work, focused academic studies and a daily writing routine at my age. She described me as an unusually resilient person: emotionally stable, optimistic, energetic and highly productive.

My secret for avoiding mental burnout is reserving plenty of time for leisure. I constantly balance studying, working and playing. Moreover, I only take on work and study projects that genuinely interest me and never push myself past my limits. Most of my life experiences are therefore positive. I always consider myself fortunate, staying in a pleasant, contented state for most days. I rarely feel worn out, fall asleep as quickly as an infant, and retain strong curiosity and a thirst for new discoveries.

I have adopted a largely hands‑off, free‑range approach to my child’s upbringing. He has always loved playing, and still does to this day. His hobbies are so numerous I can barely keep count, and I rarely stop him from enjoying them. I only set time limits for mobile phones and computer games. For everything else — skateboarding, roller‑skating, yo‑yo tricks, musical instruments, model‑building and so on — I impose no time restrictions and let him play until he is fully satisfied.

I do not worry if play cuts into his study hours, nor do I fixate on his exam grades or college‑entrance results. Whatever scores he gets, I am happy with them. Whenever he underperforms, I often come up with reasonable excuses to comfort his mother. As a result, my son has excellent stress resilience. He bounces back quickly after failures and regains his drive in no time, which I find deeply satisfying.

In this respect, he takes after me. I believe that after turning thirty, he will, like me, grow into a long‑term thinker, dedicate himself to work he genuinely enjoys, steer clear of mental burnout, and very likely achieve solid accomplishments.

Even Yuan Longping, the great scientist, had no clear idea what career suited him best before he turned thirty. Young people therefore ought to experiment and explore widely to discover their true calling.

While reading books on depression, I noticed that many scholarly works highlight a pattern: people with too little unstructured play in childhood are far more vulnerable to anxiety and depression in adulthood. If your child is fond of playing, you should count yourself blessed to have a naturally anxiety‑resilient kid, rather than lamenting their lack of focus on schoolwork. Life is long, and practical job‑related skills can be learned at any age. The capacity to find inner joy, by contrast, is much harder to nurture once critical developmental windows have passed.

I still pursue dozens of hobbies myself. I enjoy tinkering with musical instruments (though my skill level is admittedly terrible), growing flowers and vegetables, cycling, playing ball games, and frequently heading into suburban mountains in search of new adventures. My high daily activity levels keep me from putting on excessive weight. I have developed a slight paunch in middle age, but I am still in far better shape than many peers.

When the psychologist Carl Jung went through his mid‑life crisis and sank into anxiety and depression, he turned to the games he had loved as a boy for healing. Playing with mud beside the water helped him pull through. Many burnt‑out middle‑aged adults could follow his example and reconnect with their innate playful side. Once they resolve this inner imbalance, they can return to their jobs with renewed vitality and drastically improved efficiency.

A major root cause of adult anxiety and depression is the failure to maintain a healthy work‑leisure balance. Anyone who fails to carve out enough downtime, lacks relaxing hobbies and cannot alternate between intense effort and rest will struggle to sustain high‑quality work over the long run.

Without healthy outlets for recreation, people may seek out destructive, numbing forms of escapism, chasing cheap thrills to stir up excitement. This pattern can easily spiral into serious trouble over time. The reason I can sustain consistent study, work and daily writing year after year, for a whole decade, is that I also make plenty of time for fun almost every single day.

I have no plans to retire. I intend to keep learning, working and enjoying recreational pursuits for the rest of my life. My classmates, who are younger even than my own son, have nicknamed me “the old urchin” on campus, and I have a great time hanging out with them.

Play helps us stay authentic and grounded. A life entirely stripped of leisure goes against human nature. I would never accept a job that denies me sufficient free time, nor build long‑term relationships with people I cannot joke around and relax with. I would gladly take a lower‑paying role that leaves me room for recreation. I always choose work I am passionate about, instead of chasing higher salaries or social prestige. When judging life gains and losses, we must look beyond immediate circumstances and take the long view.

When someone is having fun, they tend to carry that relaxed, positive mindset into their work and social interactions. Their work efficiency and interpersonal relationships improve, and hobbies also open doors to new friendships. Happy people are better at noticing strengths in others and interacting with them effortlessly.

I am well‑known wherever I go for my high productivity and easy‑going personality. A fulfilling leisure life keeps resentment and dissatisfaction from building up inside me. I avoid dumping negative feelings on my friends — in fact, I rarely carry heavy emotional baggage to unload — and prefer light‑hearted banter instead.

Most of my friends therefore enjoy spending time with me. They describe me as humorous, calm, tolerant and easy to get along with, and find my company deeply stress‑relieving. This is probably why many reasonably well‑off readers in Beijing are willing to pay to meet me, treating me as an informal counsellor and wellness advisor.

Narrow horizons and a lack of hobbies drain people of vitality. Over time, this breeds low spirits and apathy. Large numbers of China’s exam‑focused high achievers fall into this trap. After growing up, they are generally less joyful and energetic than their less academically successful childhood peers.

I also maintain a safe distance from social‑media platforms. Although I share links to my articles on WeChat Moments, for older followers who read my work there, I keep my Moments feed deactivated most of the time (WeChat offers this built‑in setting in the Discover tab). I only turn it on occasionally. That means I usually cannot see, and therefore cannot reply to, Moments comments. The “out of sight, out of mind” rule works wonders for my peace of mind.

I have also disabled the comment section under my official WeChat account and ignore most meaningless private messages. The volume of incoming messages would exhaust me completely without such boundaries. I avoid excessive outside distractions and limit my time spent online. I devote most of my spare time to seeking genuine joy in the real world, which offsets study‑ and work‑related fatigue — though, because I genuinely love what I do, burnout is rarely an issue.

Get outside, have more fun, meet new people and try new experiences. Do not keep yourself perpetually overstretched; we are not burdened with an endless list of missions to fulfil. Break free from your information cocoon. This shields you from absorbing other people’s anxiety, sparks fresh ideas and broadens your perspective.

This change can only bring benefits to your work, daily life and career. If you make these adjustments, you will no longer need to consume self‑help motivational content. After all, not all inspirational anecdotes are beneficial, and some are downright toxic — including the piece you have just finished reading, written by me.