Hi everyone,
I wish to understand the big picture of how 2 of the main treatments for Generalized Anxiety Disorder work and if they contradict each other. I would like the forum members' feedback on these issues. First, there is Freudian psychotherapy. The approach to curing anxiety is to try to open up a hidden subconscious and expose various traumas, blocks, leftover childhood issues that are unresolved, etc. By clearing away the hidden gunk of my past in my subconscious, I will be able to engage in free and clear thinking and be rid of my anxiety. A psychotherapist gets at that hidden gunk by getting me to talk and grabbing onto my thoughts expressed in my speech as a window on that hidden gunk. The second approach is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy/Mindfulness therapy. The idea here is that you simply sit with your thoughts, not judge them, or try to fix any problems your thoughts identify. You use that stillness as a means to allow thoughts that might lead to anxiety to simply float away without triggering further anxious thoughts or rumination.

The two approaches seem contradictory. Freudians want to get at all of your thoughts (they expose the subconscious) and so everything you think and say is important. They go for the sources of the anxiety. CBT proponents don’t care about the unconscious. Your anxious thoughts are ultimately to be allowed to dissolve harmlessly. There isn’t an effort to get at the source. Am I understanding these approaches correctly? Are they essentially opposite approaches to the problem of anxiety? As a long-term solution, wouldn’t it be more effective to clear away the source of the anxiety?