Having a good understanding of the way the brain works.

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I was just wondering, whether having a good understanding of the way the brain and emotions work, such as at a post graduate university degree level, helps with anxiety.

I wonder if I had a scientific pragmatic view of the reasons why I might be experiencing stress and anxiety, that might help the body to relax and stop going so overboard with things all the time. Perhaps I could learn to say to myself, "the reason I am feeling so anxious is because I am perceiving a threat" etc etc. But at a deeper more scientific level.

I have the opportunity to go back to university if I wish and one of my elective subjects could be psychology or brain studies rather than more business or education subjects which is what the degree would be (bachelor of business/education). I'm wondering if that might be personally beneficial to me or whether it would just be a waste of time and I should do an extra education unit to get my degree in teaching faster.

why not combine both - knowledge of neuro science and education?
there is a shortage of teachers with in depth knowledge about autism and asperger's, this is evident from the posts on the parents board on WP, .

to your first point - i am wondering about the exact same question at the moment. i do feel relieved about finding out what caused me so much misery in the last 4 decades, seeing pieces fall into place daily, in hindsight and the present, but will this knowledge "affect" the way my brain is dealing with the world in the future? it often seems to me that knowledge is of more explanatory than preventative ( as in wrong life decisions ) use to ourselves.

i am in two minds about this - i wonder, whether bio feedback with functional MRI ( way in the future ... ) could be used as a help to people on the spectrum - it seems to be working to a certain degree with epilepsy, but this is learning to regulate electrical pulses rather than genes, .

Things that helped with my anxiety was looking at people as though I was studying their behaviour and comparing it to mine, as though they were wild animals. I like to read about the brain and compare normal brain vs. autistic brain.
It doesn't always work to decrease anxiety though. But I do find the differences interesting.

This site could entertain me for hours, days, weeks, etc:
http://www.autismresearchcentre.com/pubs/results.asp

Yeah it can help. Knowing how the mind works too. I don't think you necessarily need to invest in an advanced education course just to deal with your anxiety, though. If the subject really fascinates you, then maybe.

Well, You know you have anxiety, that's the first step. Many of us struggle even with that. So then there's what you do with it. What I would do, is to tell my rational mind that there's no sense in being tense, since it's unlikely I'll use that physical tension for any good purpose; unless I'm going to run away or beat someone up; both being unlikely.

So then you can tell your body to relax, and stop holding the tension. This can be difficult, and I recommend learning progressive relaxation, breathing exercises and similar techniques so you can quickly and effectively let tension go.

Keep doing it until you get a habit. Get good at quickly noticing tension, and letting it go quickly. Eventually you may not even get anxious at all, or only when it really is necessary, because you'll notice that there's never any value in it, and anxiety becomes a thing of the past.

You could just acknowledge that you can't trust your nervous system - i.e. just ignore the feelings it throws up and do things anyways.

That kind of knowledge does help me reduce some of the "all the time" elemement of this, but no, "mind over matter" does not resolve all issues of stress and anxiety. Certain dependencies are inherent, and mere intellect cannot satisfy them all.

For me it was mostly useless. And I have/had quite a bit of background in it. And quite a bit of therapy. Maybe it's because I don't believe it will work? Or more likely, it's how my mind is structured/designed to think.

One must remember that anxiety and stress are necessary components of an adaptive consciousness. They become problematic when they dominate the mental landscape to the extent things take on more importance than is useful.

If you are walking through a jungle known to have large predators, anxiety can help keep you hyper alert and alive. But that same hyper alertness while in your comfortable home isn't of much use.

For me, it feels like all my systems/senses are hyper-alert, most of the time. I get more scared/annoyed/irritated/angry/happy about stuff than most people. I feel like people around me look like they're kinda dead (very calm), sometimes. That's why they don't need a break/escape. I feel like I do. My system feels overwhelmed. I'm not sure if this is anxiety or Asperger's or a combo of the two. The "intense" world hypothesis of autism definitely rings true for me, but I've come across posts of others who question it.