[del677]

Thank you for the kind reply.

May I ask a question? I'm hazarding a guess at which of the 4 basic personality types you might identify with, and I'm guessing it might be the "Idealist" personality type, which is quite special, about 10% of the population. These people are very concerned with being their "authentic" selves. It's something the other 3 personality types don't really pay much attention to, and even something which doesn't make much sense to them, but for the Idealist, it is very important for them to always be "authentic".

The other thing is I am often very bad at guessing! I probably have only a 10% chance of being right on this!

Anyway, there's a description here:
http://keirsey.com/4temps/idealist_overview.asp

Only you can say if you identify with this or not.

If this happens to be a match, this could help explain many of the issues you have been facing (though not all of them).

(Let me know if I should plan a trip to Las Vegas, or hold off on that because I'm still very bad at guessing.)


(I also agree with aguy that Meditation can be good for reversing anxiety.)