Let me start by saying that the problem of Anxiety and depression is one of the most pressing mental issues facing most humans today. The sad thing is that not everyone knows they are dealing with anxiety and depressions in one way or the other. We have a lot of tips on the internet today which suggests ways to overcome this toxic emotion. But the fact is that these tips are only a guide to help you to deal with anxiety on the surface level. It’s just that any mental health related tips you read aren’t going to be tailored to you, they are easier to ignore than someone who you have to chat to every week, and they don’t offer the same kind of support as an actual real-life person can in a one-to-one session. Dealing with a cancerous and complex emotion like anxiety, needs professional assistance.
Nonetheless, these tips which we come across on the internet these days, might as well be very helpful when it comes to treating anxiety which is in its early (green) stage. But when you notice that your anxiety level is quiet enormous and more frequent, you should opt in for a professional treatment of this mental condition. You need professional help in the form of a therapy session where you have a one-on-one discussion session with a psychiatrist who is well equipped to deal with your mental issues. It is pertinent to adopt this therapeutic solution because medication doesn't fix everything.
From my vast study of tools to help me get through my moments of anxiety, i have come in contact with one very effective tool which is called Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT). Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is a talking therapy that can help you manage your problems by changing the way you think and behave. It is commonly used to treat anxiety and depression, but it can be useful for other mental and physical health problems.
CBT is based on the concept that your thoughts, feelings, physical sensations and actions are interconnected, and that negative thoughts and feelings can trap you in a vicious cycle. CBT aims to help you deal with overwhelming problems in a more positive way by breaking them down into smaller parts. You learn how to change these negative patterns to improve the way you feel. Unlike some other talking treatments, CBT deals with your current problems, rather than focusing on issues from your past. It looks for practical ways to improve your state of mind on a daily basis.
So, again, these tips aren’t a replacement for therapy. But I’ve found them helpful, and hopefully they’ll be helpful for anyone else who is struggling and needs techniques to deal with anxiety while they’re waiting to get professional help.
1. Record your anxiety
When you are feeling anxious, when you have a Panic attack, when you’re feeling low, take a moment to write down what’s going on. Draw four columns, titled: situation, feelings, thoughts, behaviour. Situation is as simple as what’s going on around you. You don’t need to analyse what has triggered your feelings at this point. Just write down the situation you are in so you can look at it later. Feelings can be physical or emotional. Maybe your heart’s racing, maybe you are feeling panicky. Write it down. For thoughts, is best to be specific. If you are feeling panicky, what’s your brain telling you? Worried? What about? Be as specific as you can. In the behaviour column write down how you’ve dealt with the negative feelings and thoughts. Have you tried to ignore them? Did you escape the situation? Did you lash out? Did you shut down? Writing all of this down is helpful for a bunch of reasons. It helps you to calm down and process things (writing things out is always cathartic), and it makes you question exactly what’s going on in your brain and body – beyond the standard ‘I feel anxious’ response. But also, once you’ve done this for a week or so, you’ll be able to recognise patterns in both triggers and behaviours. And once you’ve learned your patterns, you can work on fixing them.
2. Look at the facts
This one has: situation/trigger, feelings (both physical and emotional), unhelpful thoughts/images, facts that support this unhelpful thought, facts that provide evidence against this unhelpful thought, more balanced and realistic alternative perspective, and outcome/re-rated emotion. Essentially, this means that after recording what you’re going through, you have to look at the facts. So let’s say, like me, you Worry a lot about getting fired, and you’re in an anxiety spiral. You’re obsessing over a little mistake you made and are convinced you’re getting the sack. The facts that support this would be that you’ve made a mistake. But there are probably more facts that don’t support this – you are good at your job, other people have made similar mistakes and people have understood, you dealt with the mistake quickly. Once you’ve looked at the facts rationally, you’ll have a more balanced perspective, and you’ll likely feel a little less panicked as a result. Hooray!
3. Ask yourself how you’d talk to a friend in the same situation
Anxious people tend to be hard on themselves. We tell ourselves we are sh*t, we catastrophise, and we never give ourselves the same level of understanding we’d give a friend. When you’re facing a problem or your brain’s telling you nasty stuff, ask yourself how you’d respond if a friend was saying what your mind is telling you. You’d probably be a lot more reassuring. You’d tell them what’s happening isn’t the end of the world. You’d be a little kinder. Be your own friend. You don’t deserve to be spoken to like crap, even when it’s coming from your own brain.
4. Accept that anxiety will happen
From my careful examination of the moments of anxiety i experience, i realised that a lot of my anxiety is about being anxious. I’m so scared of obsessive thoughts and having panic attacks that I panic more, working myself up and trying to escape the situation before I actually feel uncomfortable. I have been training myself to work on realising that a panic attack or a bout of obsessive thoughts isn’t the end of the world. If it happens, it happens, and it will pass. Don’t work yourself up about your own anxiety. Try to be in the moment and let any panic wash over you and pass, rather than worrying about what it means and what everyone else thinks.
5. View your anxiety as an outside observer
This goes along with tip four. View your patterns of anxiety as though you are a scientist analysing a subject. Any negative thoughts, feelings, and behaviours are all evidence you can analyse, so you can work on doing things differently. This way of viewing things gives you a little distance and makes negative emotions less terrifying. If you end up having a panic attack, it’s not a bad thing – it’s evidence you’re gathering for further analysis.
6. Schedule your downtime
One of my patterns is that when I’m busy at work, anxiety, obsessive worries, and depressive thoughts rarely come on to my radar because I’m focused on other things. I’m distracted from my own brain and I feel like I have a purpose – there’s no room in there for my brain to tell my I’m rubbish or that I left my door unlocked. It’s when I get home and haven’t got rigid plans that my brain takes over. I’ll spend hours in bed sobbing, telling myself horrible, awful things, or obsessing over home invasion and house-fires. I’ll worry that I’m wasting my time, I’ll panic over the fact that I can’t sleep, and I generally descend into a pit of stress, depression, and anxiety. It’s not great. Before CBT, my method for dealing with this was to try to stay as busy as possible so I’d avoid having to go home and be alone with my brain. I’d stay late at work. I’d make plans even when I really should sleep. I figured out that i needed to create some structure to my downtime, to make sure I know what I’m doing, and I can’t spend hours doing nothing but hating myself. So I’ve scheduled my evenings hour by hour in my planner. Now I know that when I come home, I’ll do household stuff like tidying, or doing laundry. For thirty minutes I’ll have ‘worry time’ (I’ll get into that in a bit). I’ll have forty minutes of admin and work stuff. Then I have an hour to relax, read a book, or watch TV before getting ready for bed and preparing for the day ahead. Just having that schedule makes me feel busy even when I’m not. It means I can’t spend hours in bed, because I have set things to do. It sounds silly, but it’s hugely helpful, and being able to tick off simple things like tidying up and washing mugs makes me feel accomplished when I’d usually be beating myself up for lying in bed doing nothing.
7. Make times you know will be stressful as easy for yourself as you possibly can
I know that my mornings tend to be stressful. I oversleep, I panic about what to wear, and I’ll rush out of the door without taking in the knowledge that yes, I’ve turned off all the switches in my house and no, I didn’t not leave the door unlocked. I help myself out by making sure I get enough sleep, choosing an outfit the night before, and giving myself a little bit more time to get ready in the morning. Easy. I know that social events can be difficult. So I can tell a friend that I’m feeling anxious, work out a plan of action if I feel panicky (usually that will just be giving myself permission to leave the area, be alone for a bit, and come back), and establish security so I’ll feel more comfortable (like making sure buses are running, having enough money on me, having a snack in case my blood sugar drops). It’s about knowing when situations are triggering, working out what would be helpful, and putting these little things into place.
8. Set up worry time
Okay, so this one might sound counter-intuitive, but bear with me. If you’re a worrier, set a time in your planner that you have dedicated to worrying. Try to make sure it’s not right before you go to bed, as you’ll end up staying awake all night obsessing. Then, throughout the day, when you feel a worry pop into your head, write it down. You’re not allowed to worry about it throughout the day. You’ve written it down, and now you can worry about it later, in designated worry time. This means you’re not dismissing your worries. You’re accepting them, acknowledging them, but refusing to allow them to disrupt your day – they’re only allowed to be thought about during worry time. By the time worry time comes around, the day’s worries often don’t feel like a big deal. But even if they still do, that’s fine. You’ve got permission to worry, and obsess, and ponder. But once the time is up, you’re done worrying and have to get on with other things. No, this probably won’t completely stop you from anxious thoughts throughout the day, but it’ll help to stop you spiralling.
Chat with me on Facebook about all things mental health if you fancy, but, obviously, I am not a therapist or expert of any sort – just someone going through not-so-great stuff, mentally. Let’s get better together.
