Halloween is a funny time of year. For a few hours, fear becomes something we play with. Children dress up as witches, vampires, or ghosts. We walk through haunted trails waiting for a jump scare. We tell stories about shadows and monsters. I used to love dressing up with my children and taking them trick or treating, and I still go out with my youngest now. I enjoy watching the thrill of kids jumping when someone leaps out of the dark, even if they do not always enjoy it quite as much in the moment.
What strikes me is how different this is from the way we usually treat fear. At Halloween, fear is acceptable, even fun. But when we talk about anxiety, those same feelings are quickly pathologised and avoided. We see anxiety as a problem to get rid of, rather than a part of being human. And yet, the embodied sensations are similar, the racing heart, the tight chest, the prickling anticipation. What if the difference lies not in the feelings themselves, but in how we relate to them?
In therapy, I often work with people who want to eliminate anxiety. It is understandable, anxiety can be overwhelming. But the paradox is that the more we fight it, the stronger it becomes. Tolerating the feelings, learning to sit with them rather than run away, is often what reduces them. That makes me wonder if the way we play with fear at Halloween has something to teach us. By experimenting with safe fear, through masks, shadows, and jump scares, we practise holding those sensations without being consumed by them.
The shadow is a good metaphor here. At Halloween, we let the shadows grow long and imagine what might be lurking in them. In therapy, shadows can represent the parts of ourselves or our feelings that we try to avoid. We often find that the more we hide from our shadows, the scarier they become. But when we turn toward them, name them, and allow ourselves to look more closely, they lose their power.
Families and communities come together at Halloween in ways that matter too. Trick or treating might look like sweets and costumes, but it is also about confidence, belonging, and connection. Children learn to knock on doors, to face the uncertainty of who might answer, and to receive something in return. Adults connect with neighbours and join in a collective ritual. These shared experiences remind us that we are not alone in facing our fears.
So what can Halloween teach us about anxiety in everyday life? First, that avoidance rarely helps. If you avoid every situation that makes you anxious, your world shrinks. I often encourage clients to notice when avoidance is getting in the way of living the life they want. Sometimes it helps to get a little cross with the anxiety, to see it as blocking the things you value, and then to take one small step back toward those things.
Second, that tolerance can be built. Just as children practise feeling scared on a haunted trail, we can practise feeling anxious in safe, manageable doses. Start small. Increase your tolerance gradually. Trust your future self to handle whatever comes, rather than needing to control it all in advance.
And third, that fear itself is not the enemy. The same sensations that make us panic in daily life are the ones we pay to experience in horror films or rollercoasters. Context matters. If we can shift how we frame those sensations, from danger to challenge, from overwhelm to adventure, they become less threatening.
Halloween shows us that fear can be playful, communal, and even joyful. Anxiety is harder, of course, it arrives uninvited, it lingers longer, and it feels less under our control. But perhaps by borrowing something from Halloween, the willingness to turn toward the shadows, to wear a mask and then remove it, to open the door even when we do not know what is waiting, we can learn to meet anxiety with more courage, and a little more compassion.
