Another Aha! Moment

I've enjoyed reading for about 60 of my 67 years. Thousands of my articles of choice have been connected to the whys of human behavior and studies on the workings of the brain. I'm pretty introspective and have wondered about my various personality quirks such as why I've always thought of myself as shy, my "loner" instinct and my delight with God, angels and all things spiritual. Now I've just finished reading an article in the January 2009 O magazine, that packed a powerful punch and shed a bright, bright light on the reason behind so much of human behavior. I feel so enlightened by this bright light and I want to share it........Here's the gist of the theory presented by Robert Kegan, PhD, and Lisa Lahey, EdD, experts in adult learning at the Harvard Graduate School of Education: " What lies underneath the surface is anxiety...the most important - and least understood- private emotion in public life. Most of us think of anxiety as panic attacks or stage fright, acute episodes brought on by a big presentation to the boss or some other high stakes presentation. Or a condition specific to people who were traumatized as children or survived some horrifying event. But Kegan and Lahey see anxiety as our brain's background noise, revving up when we're confronted with something new, unfamiliar or threatening, and operating at such low volume that we don't even hear it...We all have anxiety just by virtue of being human. We don't think of ourselves as continually fearful...because we have figured out how to manage the undercurrent of anxiety.".....These thoughts made me think of all the different ways people handle this murmuring state - pills, alcohol, meditation, yoga, sports, movies and all the other diversions created by our technologically advanced civilization. My method of coping with the anxiety has been to call on and establish a relationship with God, Blessed Mary, my guardian angel and various other saints . I always thought I was abnormal because of my "shyness" but now it feels good to know I'm just a normal human being and I'm glad I've chosen God and His cohorts to calm my murmur rather than some of the other methods. How do you calm your murmur of anxiety?