Our childish anxieties always have a grain of truth to them: there is danger in the world and pain that

can come from venturing too far. But the anxiety we feel makes us exaggerate the danger, focus unnecessarily on the threat and causes us to stop moving out into the world. This at least gives us the illusion of control. If we stay within the circle of what is warm and familiar we can protect ourselves from hardship and sufferingor so it seems. In adolescence we add a new layer of fear. We look beyond our family to our peers. Our greatest anxiety is to be ridiculed and excluded from a group, which now represents to us a new circle of warmth. We seek their approval. Our personality becomes formed around this desire. We smooth away our rough edges, what makes us an individual, and become obsessed with what people think of us and how we can please them.