Years ago, in a first session, I asked a man when he'd last taken a full day off. Meaning he did not check his email, his team thread or answer a call.

He laughed, and it wasn't because the question was funny. He genuinely couldn't remember.

He ran his own company and was successful by every external measure. Smart, disciplined, deeply admired by the people who worked for him. He'd come to see me because his wife suggested it. He didn't think anything was wrong.

What surfaced over the sessions to follow was the realization that he couldn't rest without a low hum of guilt underneath it.

He prepared for everything, including casual dinners with friends, far past the point where more preparation improved anything.

When something went well, he felt satisfied for about an hour before his mind moved to the next thing that could go wrong.

And when someone praised him genuinely, his instinct was to deflect it, redirect the credit, and change the subject.

He didn't think of himself as an anxious person. He thought of himself as driven and disciplined with high standards, and that's exactly how everyone around him would describe it too.

But underneath the drive was a nervous system that had never once been given permission to feel safe without earning it first.

That's what high functioning anxiety looks like. It rarely announces itself as anxiety, because it shows up wearing the costume of excellence.

And it's especially good at hiding from the person living inside it. You can be brilliant at reading a room, or at reading your kids, or at reading your team, and still be almost completely blind to what's running underneath your own behaviour.

So today I want to help you spot it in yourself, in real time.

Inside this podcast episode, I walk you through:

• The six signs of high functioning anxiety, starting with the one most people mistake for discipline

• Why chronic over preparation is managing something other than the outcome

• What the post-success crash is, and why the drop arrives right after the win

• The difference between genuine high standards and a nervous system that learned achievement gets rewarded

• What your children are absorbing from all of this, long before they can put it into words

• Four questions to run yourself through honestly this week

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Dr. Shyamala Kiru is a former psychotherapist of 20 years and the founder of Kiru Psychotherapy Clinic and the Cognitive Freedom Method™.

Through her work in leadership development, practitioner training, and clinical practice (now retired), she teaches a structured framework for understanding and transforming the cognitive patterns that shape how we think, lead, and relate.

📘 The Emotionally Intelligent Woman Available on Amazon and Chapters Indigo

🎧 The Dr. Shyamala Show Listen on Apple Podcasts and Spotify

Learn more at:

• Grab Our Free Parenting Guide: https://drshyam.myflodesk.com/parenting-guide

• https://kirupsychotherapy.com

• https://www.cognitive-freedom.com/

Real freedom begins when you understand your mind.

Where to Connect:

• My Clinic: Kiru Psychotherapy: https://kirupsychotherapy.com

• Learn More About The Cognitive Freedom Method™: https://www.cognitive-freedom.com/

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