Excitement and anxiety share important characteristics. What are the differences between excitement and anxiety, and how can we use this knowledge to create an anxiety-free life?

Let's take a look at what happens when you are excited about something you look forward to.

Melanie LOVES roller coasters. She looks online and discovers that the nearby amusement park has a brand new roller coaster -- the biggest, fastest one yet. It's the big one she's been waiting for all summer.

She loves the anticipation as she's driving to the amusement park. She feels the rush of adrenaline from the fight or flight response. Melanie's heart is pumping fast; her breath becomes shortened, her blood pressure rises; and riding the roller coaster is all she can think about. Butterflies are doing flip flops in her stomach as she arrives and makes her way to the roller coaster. 

Melanie isn't worried because she knows that's how her body reacts when she gets excited.

After waiting in line for what feels like forever, it's her turn to ride. She straps herself in and gets ready for the ride of her life because she knows it's going to be fun! Two minutes later the roller coaster comes to a halt. The feeling on top of that hill was amazing. It was so freeing, so amazing! Melanie can't wait for another ride.

Let's take a look at the same experience with the same roller coaster with Jana. The difference is that Jana has a fear -- extreme anxiety -- about riding roller coasters.

Jana has been dreading going to the park with her friend all summer. She hates the negative sense of anticipation (dread) as her friend drives her to the amusement park. Jana is certain that things will turn out horribly. She feels the rush of adrenaline and wonders what's wrong with her that her heart is pumping so fast. Jana's breath becomes shortened and she feels like she's choking. It's all she can think about. Jana feels the same flip flops in her stomach as Melanie. However, unlike Melanie, Jana can't believe these physical sensations are happening to her and she feels horrible.

In the waiting line, Jana's thoughts are racing. When it's her turn, she almost doesn't go on the ride, then at the last minute straps herself in next to her friend and hangs on for dear life. She hates it. When she gets off she swears she's never going on another roller coaster ever again.

What's happening here? Both women were on the same roller coaster and experienced the same physical sensations of the fight or flight response (nature's way of protecting us from a perceived threat). Yet these two women had two completely different experiences of the roller coaster ride. Both women experienced the butterflies, the adrenaline, the shortened breathing, and so on. What's going on?

You might be shocked to learn that physically excitement and anxiety are the same thing. They are both simply the fight or flight response in action.

What makes excitement and anxiety different is the inner game -- in how the fight or flight response is PERCEIVED. Melanie perceived it positively. She accepted the physical sensations as a natural part of excitement and had a sense of positive expectancy about riding the roller coaster. Her mental expectation was that it would be fun.

Jana, on the other hand, viewed the fight or flight response as negative and that it meant something was wrong with her. She anticipated that the roller coaster would be a negative experience, and it became a self-fulfilling prophecy.

When you change your inner game -- how you view the fight or flight response -- the result is that anxiety turns into excitement. It's a mental shift. Changing the inner game means changing your sense of expectancy from negative to positive.

I invite you to create a sense of positive expectancy in your life. The next time you start to look at something you fear with negative anticipation, flip it around. Choose to expect something POSITIVE instead. Play with replacing the word 'anxiety' with the word 'excitement' and see how that feels: "I'm feeling very excited about going to the dinner because it's a chance to connect with my friends. I'm confident I'll have fun." instead of "I'm feeling anxious about going and know it will turn out negatively."

You get to decide whether to view the fight or flight response as anxiety or excitement. After all, the fight or flight response is the same. It's our inner game that determines the end result.