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Understanding and managing anxiety A
nxiety tends to carry negative connotations, even though it is a completely normal emotion that we all feel every now and then. Which poses the question: what is the real purpose of anxiety? It can be said that all our emotions serve us in one way or another, so perhaps feeling anxious is our bodies’ way of checking if we are prepared for any level of danger that might occur. However, many people enjoy the experience of fear and anxiety when they participate in all sorts of activities, such as rollercoaster rides and sky diving. The interesting paradox here is the fact that there are so many people spending thousands on therapy and medication to mitigate the feeling of anxiety, yet also spending money for the sole purpose of experiencing this feeling. So, if common anxiety and fear are not inherently bad emotions, what makes it such a negative experience? The challenge comes in when we don’t know how to get off the rollercoaster ride within ourselves; when the feeling is experienced unintentionally. In order to make sense of this paradox, we need to know what the possible causes of anxiety are. Anxiety manifests in a variety of ways and can have multiple triggers for different people; however, the event itself is seldom what causes our experience of anxious feelings. The thoughts that go along with anxiety are generally future-oriented – we worry about our health, relationships, success and other outcomes. We can even mistakenly believe that
our anxious thoughts are helpful in preventing these undesired outcomes, but anxiety feeds itself – we worry a little, we get stuck in our anxious thoughts and we end up worrying even more. Then we experience more of the bodily changes that go along with anxiety. These can be intense and can easily be mistaken for other illnesses, which may explain why people with anxiety tend to go to the doctor more often than others. Good news, though. There are many ways, supported by research, to reduce and manage anxiety, perhaps making anxiety more “treatable” than any other mental health challenges. So what could we do when we’re right in the middle of an anxiety attack and need a fast-acting anxiety stopper? Firstly, we all know about breathing into a paper bag to stop anxiety and even panic in its tracks. But why is this so effective? There are a few reasons: Each emotion that we experience has a recipe that we need to follow in order to produce it in our bodies. First, you have to focus on very specific things and you need to visualise how things are going wrong for you. It is a well-established idea that your mind does not really understand the difference between things that you visualise and events that are actually taking place. This is why you can watch a movie and experience almost all the emotions of the events on the screen – even while knowing consciously that nothing is real and the projections on the screen are not even of real people. In the same way, when you imagine an event in the future where things are going right or where things are going
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wrong, you will feel the emotions that go with that. The second component is self-talk. What are you saying to yourself? What are the questions that you are asking yourself? Are you asking questions such as: What can go wrong? What will people say if I fail? Or are you asking what can I learn, what if I succeed or how will I grow from this experience? In order to feel anxious, there are certain bodily actions you need to take: you have to go into tunnel vision to truly experience anxiety, and you have to take fast and shallow breaths. Deep diaphragmatic breaths would make it very difficult to experience anxiety. Another component is the experience of anxiety itself. People who frequently experience anxiety may also have a fear of feeling anxious and that fear could set up a thinking loop that makes it all much worse. Disrupting any of these internal actions will make it a lot harder to experience anxiety. When building your anti-anxiety action plan, it’s good to keep a couple of things in mind: • Everyone benefits from different strategies. Just because research has shown such-and-such strategy reduces anxiety, doesn’t necessarily mean it’ll be the right fit for you. You’re the best judge of how something is making you feel. • We benefit more from strategies that we will stick to. Even the most effective strategy won’t help you unless you’re willing to do it. That’s why creating an effective anti-anxiety action plan is all about finding things that work for you and that you like doing. • Try as many strategies as you can. By
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having a greater number of tools in our toolkit, we can more easily reduce anxiety in a greater variety of situations and circumstances. Tools to manage anxiety could include: 1. Keeping a journal to record the thoughts, emotions, physical sensations and behaviours that arise when we’re anxious. This can help us gain more awareness about, and perhaps a greater sense of control over, our anxiety 2. Breathing exercises can help you relax, and is one of the best ways to lower stress in the body. This is because when you breathe deeply, it sends a message to your brain to calm down and relax. 3. Regular cardiovascular and weight training exercise is a good way to increase parasympathetic activity (and feelings of relaxation) in the longer term. 4. Eating foods that are naturally rich in magnesium and zinc, foods like salmon which are high in omega-3 fatty acids and foods like sauerkraut or kefir, which are high in probiotics, appear to help reduce anxiety. 5. Limiting your intake of caffeine and opting instead for herbal tea, or decaf or dandelion coffee instead of regular coffee. 6. Listening to calming music can lower your levels of the stress hormone, cortisol after experiencing something that arouses anxiety. 7. Anxiety not only makes it hard to sleep, but a lack of sleep can also contribute to more anxiety, creating a cycle that’s hard to stop. So it’s super important to do whatever you can to get a good night’s rest, including exercising earlier in the day, not drinking caffeine after lunch (or not at all) and turning off TVs, computers and smartphones at
least half an hour before bed. 8. While anxiety is often characterised by a desire to avoid the things that induce fear, mindfulness is, in some ways, the opposite. It involves turning toward our emotions or the things that cause our emotions with focused awareness and compassionate acceptance. It involves noticing what is happening all around us and inside our bodies in a non-judgmental way. 9. Combat anxiety with joy and gratitude, by focusing more on positive things. By deliberately focusing attention away from the negative things and onto positive and neutral things, we may be able to reduce anxiety and the bodily responses that go along with it. 10. Put a stop to rumination, when you just keep replaying the same thing over and over again in your mind. You probably know these thoughts aren’t helpful, but they just keep going on a loop, leading you to get anxious about something in the past that you have no control over. One of the most effective ways to stop rumination cycles is to distract your mind with solving an unrelated problem. Finally, a considerable amount of research has found that confronting your fears (often with the help of a coach or psychologist) is a highly effective way to reduce them. For example, if we’re afraid of heights, going to a high (but safe) place and staying there until our anxiety subsides teaches the body and mind not to be afraid. Confronting chronic anxieties is a bit more complex, but can still be helpful. Depending on the severity of your symptoms of anxiety and how much they are interfering with your life, getting professional help can be the best solution. - By Ferdi Appelgryn, C Beyond Health
