ABSTRACT
Anxiety functions to alert us to the fact that something is dangerously wrong with our world. The unpleasant quality of this experience agitates us into taking the necessary steps to remove ourselves from harm’s way. Accordingly, one may identify anxiety as a necessary and normal part of the human condition. Anxiety has a purpose; it may serve above all else to protect those beliefs and practices which give meaning and value to our existence (May 1977). Moreover, on this view, it may well be conceived as the inspiration for artists and great thinkers to create new ways of giving form and expression to their life. Indeed, Kierkegaard contends that ‘the more profoundly he is in anxiety, the greater is the man . . . [for] whoever is educated by anxiety is educated by possibility’ (Kierkegaard 1980: 155-6).
