One of the most frequent questions I hear from people considering CBT is: “Can you help me get rid of my anxiety?”

I wish I could answer with an unqualified “Yes!” But I’m a psychologist, not a purveyor of snake oil, and professional ethics require me to set reasonable expectations for treatment.

Wiping out anxiety completely isn’t a realistic therapeutic goal. It’s also not in anyone’s best interest to aim for total mental control. Like it or not, anxiety—whether a hard-wired physical response to an objective threat or the product of an over-active imagination—plays an important role in everyone’s emotional repertoire. So we all need to negotiate a peaceful coexistence with it.

A few weeks ago I had the chance to test out my own advice about meeting fears head on. I was at the highest point in LA’s Runyon Canyon enjoying the vista of the city spread out beneath me and the Hollywood sign in the distance on a perfect Southern California day. I sat on a rock soaking up the warmth of the sun and giving the experience my full, mindful attention. Then I started on the descent.

That’s when the panic gripped me.

Heights have always made me nervous, and I’ve never liked hiking downhill. But this time I wasn’t just cautiously inching my way down the slope in my typical fashion. I froze completely. My heart pounded. My mouth dried up. I felt dizzy. I couldn’t figure out how to put one foot in front of the other.

The steep dirt path littered with jagged rocks made my anxious brain conjure up images of slipping and plunging forward and cracking open my head and lying in a pool of blood. Not likely. But it could happen.

Oh, wait! It had happened —just a few months earlier, on a perfectly flat walk only two blocks from my house when I tripped on an uneven patch of sidewalk and landed in the emergency room.

OK, so my fears weren’t entirely irrational (an argument I hear frequently from people with anxiety reluctant to approach triggering situations). But, still, I had to make my way down the mountain.

So I decided to recruit the mindfulness skills I’d just been practicing. I didn’t try to relax. I didn’t tell myself I had nothing to worry about (because, really, how could I possibly reassure myself given the evidence to the contrary?). I didn’t try to push away the gory images. I didn’t attempt to slide down on my butt crab-style, a technique I’ve employed in the past to navigate precipices. I didn’t try to take a calming breath or grab onto my husband’s arm for support (not a viable option anyway because he was focused on his own worries about slipping and dropping his camera).

What did I do? I gave myself permission to be scared. I decided not to care about how slowly I was going and made room for the faster hikers to pass me. I looked down at the path in front of me. I concentrated on finding a place to plant my foot and took a step. Then another. And another. Until I finally reached the bottom.

And the next day, I went back and climbed to the top again. The view was breathtaking