It’s hard for me to get out of bed in the morning, I can’t stop thinking about what anxiety is going to do during the day. It feels like there are little people inside my head telling me that everything is going wrong and I’m never going to be able to fix it. And maybe they’re right? But life has been so much better since I started doing this one thing…
The average person will experience some type of anxiety disorder at least once in their lifetime, so chances are you or someone you know could use this information!
In the book, The Anxiety and Phobia Workbook by Edmund Bourne, he teaches how you can turn down your anxiety. One of his methods is called “the quieting response”. It’s a four step process where you take deep breaths from your diaphragm (right below your belly button), tuck in any loose clothing around your waist to give yourself more room for breathing and focus on relaxing every part of your body from head-to-toe with each breath out. You repeat this process until you feel calm or centered again.
I try not to think about what work I have coming up – it just stresses me out but if there are deadlines that need to be met then sometimes I will make the time to work on it. I’ll also give myself a set amount of time that I can spend on any one task, and then when that timer goes off, stop what I’m doing and take a break for at least five minutes before going back to whatever project I was working on previously.
I find journaling helps me turn down my anxiety because you are able to release all your pent-up thoughts onto paper which gives you relief from carrying around this weighty burden in your head. When writing these feelings out, they don’t seem as big or bad anymore – just kind of there instead of being oppressive like they were before! It’s easier than running them over in my head again and again with no end result. I also learned that when I make the time to work on projects for myself, it can lower my stress levels because then it doesn’t feel like I’m neglecting what is important to me (e.g., creativity). Sometimes we get so caught up in our obligations that we forget about ourselves and how our mental health affects everything else.
Anxiety can be a terrible thing. The way it affects your mood, productivity levels, and quality of life is not something you should have to deal with alone. I used to think that the best solution was just taking deep breaths or pushing through anyways – but then things would get worse further down the road because there’s no time for breaks when everything else seems so important! It became really hard for me to write blog posts about anxiety relief because what do you even say? In fact, this post probably wouldn’t exist if I didn’t take some time out from my “must-do” list and focus on myself first! One day in particular had been especially difficult where I had to turn down a ton of commitments, and I was just feeling really anxious about everything.
I had two options – push through or take some time off? Well for me it’s pretty easy because my health affects everything else so not only did the mental aspect feel like something that needed attention but the physical level as well! Anxiety can make you tired more easily than usual which is why also getting enough sleep at night is important too. So in order to turn down anxiety and still get stuff done, taking breaks when necessary has been key for me. It might seem counter-intuitive on paper but once I started doing this kind of work schedule where I’m giving myself time every day between tasks then suddenly there’s nothing left over to be stressed about!
eling really anxious about everything. I had two options – push through or take some time off? Well for me it’s pretty easy because my health affects everything else so not only did the mental aspect feel like something that needed attention but the physical level as well! Anxiety can make you tired more easily than usual which is why also getting enough sleep at night is important too. So in order to turn down anxiety and still get stuff done, taking breaks when necessary has been key for me. It might seem counter-intuitive on paper but once I started doing this kind of work schedule where I’m giving myself time every day between tasks then suddenly there’s nothing left over to be stressed about!
I’ve also had to learn to say “no” more often. It’s hard when you want people around and they need help but sometimes it can be better for everyone if I turn them down! That way, I’m not spreading myself too thin trying to do everything which is just a recipe for more anxiety later on. And of course the best thing about saying no is that then there are NO regrets 🙂
This has been one of the most helpful things for me in reducing my anxiety because now both my mental and physical health are being taken care of while still getting stuff done at work – something that was impossible before with how much overtime I’d be putting in without breaks between tasks or turning down extra projects.
