Anxiety Through the Lens of Inside Out

Payton Conklin

Undergraduate Student, Stockton University

@GrowingMindsetTherapy

Anxiety can be a really difficult and confusing feeling that we start feeling as we grow up. It’s more complex and difficult to get a handle on compared to some of our other emotions. Not to mention, there is not a lot of accurate representation of what anxiety is throughout the media, especially in our developing years when we begin feeling it, so it oftentimes can feel confusing and isolating. 

Inside Out 2  gave life to several new emotions, those including Embarrassment, Envy, Ennui, and most importantly, Anxiety. Each of these characters come about as Riley hits puberty and develops new emotions while facing difficult life changes at her hockey camp. She has to decide what matters more to her, her friends from the past who are moving to a new school, or her possible new friends on the high school hockey team. This is where Anxiety becomes the main antagonist, taking control over Riley's emotions and choices in hopes to protect her from failure in the future, while kicking out and “bottling-up” her older emotions.

Though this movie is fiction at its core, Disney did a great job at explaining complex emotions, specifically anxiety, through a digestible lens for both children and adults to see and relate to. This way, adults can feel seen and understood, while children can be prepared for what it means to grow up and develop emotions that are harder to handle.

What does Anxiety do?

Anxiety’s role and introduction in the film is similar to how anxiety forms in ourselves as we grow up. Suddenly, we no longer feel fear over things in front of us and things that we see. Now, we are afraid of things we cannot see. This was how Anxiety introduced herself in the film, giving a clear image as to the difference in her role and fear’s role. Most of us have caught ourselves fearing for our future, whether we focus on a structured timeline we must follow, our future career, how we envision ourselves and our family. We worry about things that we cannot have control over in the present. Thus, anxiety forms.

Once our anxiety forms, what does it do with our questions? In the film, the original crew travel into Riley’s imagination in hopes to get back to headquarters. This is where they find that Anxiety has used Riley’s imagination against herself. Here, she plans for every possible situation and scenario, mapping youtube what would have to happen in what sequence to then create failure. Since Anxiety creates panic, most of the scenarios planned resulted in Riley failing, either in hockey and/or societally. With these plans, Anxiety tries to create a perfect route for success. One thing about life though, is we cannot be perfect, and every route to success has ups and downs.

We see Anxiety in other little things that Riley does through the film, one of them being the way she hyperfixated on her arms swinging. Anxiety wants to avoid embarrassment and failure, as said above, so to avoid that, she looks at every way that Riley could face those. 

In Anxiety’s brain, if Riley swings her arms weird → the hockey team will think she is weird → they won't want her on the team → Riley will be a failure with no friends. 

In reality, we know that this isn’t how failure and success works, but to Anxiety, this is a very real possibility.

The Hockey Game Scene

If you have ever seen this film, or ever seen posts about it online, you likely have come across the discussion of the hockey game scene. In this scene, we see the boiling point of what Anxiety can do to Riley, especially when Anxiety is not handled or treated in any way.

Here, Riley begins to have a panic attack. On the external side of the scene, Riley is bouncing her leg, holding her chest as she hyperventilates. Her eyes become unfocused and blurry while she runs her hand through her hair and down her face. One other action Riley does is hit herself in the head with her stick while repeating “snap out of it”. On the physical level, Riley is entirely in her head. Her eyes defocusing shows the viewer that she cannot see into her own reality, and is only stuck on the anxious situations and ideas in her head. Her only attempt to ground herself is to hit herself in hopes the pain will bring her back to reality. These signs are often seen in individuals stuck in a panic scenario.

The intern side of this scene is groundbreaking for a children's film. We see how anxiety reaches this boiling point to a painful realistic detail. Anxiety begins to repeat the mantra “I can fix it” to herself in a fast, frantic manner, all the while in a similar frantic, fast motion, slamming every button, switch, and lever available on the console. Here, Anxiety creates a chaotic storm of herself and of worry, panic, and hopelessness. No one can break into the strom she has created for herself. The other emotions attempt to try, to break Anxiety out of this spiral and to help Riley, yet no one can.

Joy is the only one to really try. Outside the storm of anxiety, it is loud, windy, and intense. Once Joy breaks through the panicked cloud, it is silent. It is just dead air, Joy, and Anxiety. Anxiety though is not moving. She is stuck in time, pressing everything she can on the console, so quickly though, that no one can see her movement. “If Riley fails, this was all for nothing”, she slips though the repetitive “I can fix it”.

Joy tries to stop Anxiety by telling her that she needs to stop, continuing the belief that Anxiety is an antagonist trying to hurt Riley. Though, she realizes, like above, that Anxiety is there to try to help. She was only trying to protect Riley from the bad, and it fell out of control. That is when Joy finally says “You need to let her go”. This is when all of the emotions in the film realized they cannot choose who Riley becomes, and rather, need to let her develop and become her own person. This is what calms Riley down, and also breaks Anxiety out of her panic.

Why does Anxiety do this?

We as the viewer see the damage that Anxiety is going to Riley. We understand what Anxiety is doing as a negative thing that is hurting Riley, so why does Anxiety do it? After all, she is a part of Riley.

One of the most important things to understand about Anxiety both in the film, and in reality, is that anxiety was not formed to hurt us. Every emotion we have serves a purpose, and no part of ourselves wants to destroy itself. Everything has a function, and anxiety has exactly that. We feel anxiety to protect ourselves from future negative circumstances. Anxiety protects us from so many things, including examples like,

• Walking down a sketchy alley at night

• Studying for an exam

• Practicing our sport once a day to become better

• Wearing a seatbelt while driving

• Wearing sunscreen at the beach

Without anxiety, we would not be protecting ourselves from danger, and would constantly be at risk for our mental health and physical health. Even at the end of the film, we see that anxiety has learned her own calming techniques. She learns to focus on what she can control in the present, drink tea, sit back and relax as much as she can. It’s important to think of your own ways to ground yourself when you are feeling anxious, whether it is going on a walk, hanging out with pets, or journaling.

It is important to have a representation of what Anxiety is, especially in children's films. This is a real feeling that can become dominating in our lives if we don’t know how to battle it and face it. If we don’t know grounding techniques, we can often find ourselves stuck in the same storm Riley was in during the hockey game. If you are experiencing any feelings of anxiety, or want to learn techniques of how to battle it, we are here for you. You can contact Growing Mindset Therapy at growingmindsettherapy@gmail.com  for more help or sources.

DISCLAIMER: This article is not intended to treat, or diagnose and medical conditions, nor is it a replacement for mental health or medical treatment. Many individuals require lifelong support, and this article is written for those who are seeking episodic support, and not intended to discredit the experiences of those needing longe term care. If you or someone you know is in need of clinical support, our team is able to provide therapy services to those in NJ and FL. Contact us to learn more. If you or someone you know is in need of immediate support please contact emergency services. U.S. Mental health crisis line: dial 988 ; medical emergency dial 911