Your pattern of anxious thinking likely includes many different automatic appraisals, but not all appraisals are the same. Some appraisals cause you to feel more anxious than others, partly because some appraisals have scarier meanings than others do. The scariest appraisal that is, the appraisal that’s at the heart of your anxious response is the hot appraisal or hot thought. It’s essential that you learn to identify the hot thought that drives your anxious response.

312