You don’t need to look far to find books promising the ‘crushing’, ‘conquering’, ‘taming’ or ‘mastering’ of worry and anxiety. If you are amongst the many millions of people dealing with such issues, I see the appeal, but why aren’t these same books bestsellers? Maybe it's because people are more savvy.

Hinting at or claiming cures for anxiety is misleading. Why? Well, anxiety can’t be cured. It’s part of the human condition. It’s hard-wired, baked-in, call it what you will. Without it, we’d be in a real mess — but it can, and does, get out of control.

This book is largely based on answers to questions. It’s informed by those many busy people who are trying to get on with their lives but remain pestered by worries and anxieties. Some have tried different therapies with varying degrees of success. Many have settled on some uneasy alliance with anxiety, knowing it will never go but realising they have some say in the matter as to how badly it may affect them.

The book does offer self-help suggestions but its primary purpose is to answer some of the broader questions I’ve been asked about why we experience worry, anxiety, fear and stress and the different contexts in which these occur. I look at what’s happening inside the brain in terms of the chemicals involved and the thought processes we employ.