I love discovering and learning new things, making friendships etc, but there’s always the undercurrent of anxiety which stops me from doing these things. I spend too much time at home and hardly ever socialise. I am always worried about how I look when I’m in public, if my clothes are daggy, if I look troubled/unfriendly… I’m letting life pass me by, and I have irregular sleep times. I hate going to bed because of the feeling that I’ve wasted another day. I’m always ruminating about the ways in which I’m not good enough.
Perhaps there is a struggle inside you, a desire to be out there in the world and anxious habits which plague you when you get there. Anxiety is both a temperamental predisposition (some people are naturally more anxious than others), and a set of habits of body and mind (eg the ruminating) which like any habits we can work to change. When wanting to reduce anxiety, it is useful to consider habits in three areas, habits of body, mind and behaviour.
Our bodies express and reflect our emotions. Mental and physical agitation are closely linked. If we can learn to calm our bodies, it has a significant effect on our thoughts and feelings. Given that we can only attend to one thing at a time, focussing on calming our bodies shifts us out of the constant worry habit. On our website we have some very good audio downloads of relaxation and awareness exercises. Doing an exercise like this at least once a day would be of great benefit in lowering your anxiety.
Worrying about how you look and how you have wasted another day isn’t useful self talk. The fact that you are aware of your self talk is a good first step; every time we think in a certain way we reinforce that particular neural pathway. But these thoughts are no more “true” than positive things you could be saying to yourself, merely a. habit.
One new habit that many people find helpful is to end the day by listing three things you can be grateful for in that day, looking for the positive, rather than the negative. It might sound cheesy but it works! It is a ritual that helps you to shift your focus.
The third area to consider is behaviour. Every time we avoid something, we think we have let ourselves off the hook. But in fact it just lurks there, often as a failure to be pondered, or something we know we will have to eventually do. Avoiding also escalates, it leads to more and more avoiding. It is vital to approach, rather than avoid the difficult things, even if that is in tiny steps. Then we gain confidence and feel good about ourselves (fuel for the positive self talk).
You would be welcome to bring these concerns in to counselling. Alternatively check out some our website resources on anxiety, self help for anxiety, and panic as well.
