Episode 1: Anxiety and Me

One of my favorite books as a child was Robert Louis Stevenson's A Child's Garden of Verses, and one of my favorite poems in the book was "My Shadow."

He hasn’t got a notion of how children ought to play,
And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way.	10
He stays so close beside me, he’s a coward you can see;
I’d think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!

Okay, well, maybe the verse doesn't translate well in a blog.  Robert was quite the spoiled little brat, wasn't he?  But he was wonderful.  Of course, I've known about my shadow for as long as I can remember, including in a Jungian sense, but it amazes me that I have only at this relatively advanced age recognized that a certain shadowy coward called anxiety has made a fool of me in every sort of way, staying close beside me, throughout my life.