The first person to meaningfully classify anxiety was the Austrian psycho-analyst Sigmund Freud. He divided it into two broad areas which are still accepted today. These are the areas of appropriate and inappropriate. Let’s look at what this means.

When we are faced with threatening situations we need to be aware of the dangers they represent. The way we recognize them as dangerous is by our feelings of anxiety. It can be thought of as a call to action warning us that something is wrong and prompting us to act. This is called appropriate anxiety because it helps us to stay safe.