Tired of trying to figure out "why" you're so anxious? In this episode, I explore the science of anxiety and offer practical strategies to calm anxiety and overcome it. Learn how to:
Manage physical symptoms like racing heart, sweating, and difficulty breathing.
Challenge negative thoughts and break free from obsessive thinking patterns.
Cultivate a calmer mindset through mindfulness and meditation.
Key Topics:
The science of anxiety
The importance of focusing on the "how"
Mindfulness and meditation
Self-care strategies
I’ll share practical tools and techniques that have helped me overcome my own struggles with anxiety that will help you manage anxiety too. Get ready to discover a new, calmer, and more confident and resilient you.
Podcast Transcript: Overcoming Anxiety
Welcome to Episode Five. I cannot believe that we are here already. I have no idea how I'm already on Episode Five. But I am having so much fun recording this, and learning the ropes on how to put together a podcast. This is the process because I've never done this before. Like all the editing and the things and I'm getting better, right? It's a learning process. So thank you for hanging out with me. I wanted to create today's episode, to try to help you understand why the "why" that a lot of people have including myself about feeling anxious might actually not matter. And for some people who have experienced a traumatic event that sticks in their memory, the answer might be really super obvious. But for other people like me, maybe like you, I've spent way, way, way too much time trying to figure out where this anxiousness came from. And so if this sounds like you, you're on the right place. And this is what we're going to tackle today. That sounds good. Yeah. Okay. Let's get to it then. So have you ever asked yourself questions like, "What did I do to deserve this?" Or, "Do I have some kind of repressed memory that scarred me?" Or "What makes me feel anxious all the time?" If you have, I've been there. I was there for like 30 years, so I've done this. And I've asked so many of these questions just trying to get to this why? Why do I feel like this? While I'm asking myself why, I did pretty much everything imaginable to stop feeling so miserably anxious. All of this questioning, and this desperation and clawing and crawling was in this effort to be able to solve a problem, and maybe that's what makes me a good coach, because I've always wanted to solve problems and now I get to do that to help people solve their problems. So I guess it all worked out. But for right now, right here, where we are, in my journey with anxiety, when I look back, I can tell that I thought that if I could just figure out why then I could solve the problem, or figure it out and make everything better. And then I wouldn't be anxious anymore, and everything would be sunshine and rainbows. And that seems really logical, doesn't it? Except that there's this thing that - it doesn't work out like that because anxiety isn't logical at all, is it? There's zero logic in this. And we kind of know that. If you have ever thought I feel really anxious and I know this is wrong, but I also know nothing is wrong. Yeah, there's no logic in it. So trying to find why doesn't make a whole lot of sense. So back to wondering why; if I'm being honest, I still don't have any idea why I spent so much of my life wrestling with this anxiety and the panic and everything else. I have absolutely no memorable trauma, or some switch flipping moment in my life that made me anxious. My grandparents grew old. My parents are still married. I've never been in a major accident, or a house fire. I have no history of abuse or neglect. Nothing. No major illness; nothing. Like no quote, unquote, trauma. And the more I learn about trauma, the more I really understand that my narrow view, like my really super narrow view of trauma isn't exactly correct. In my head trauma was when you had this life altering, huge event, like war, right - or a horrible disease. That would be traumatic. Well, that's not really what it is at all, and I'm going to talk about that in just a minute as well. But I want to go back to the why but before I move on to something that I've found to be a lot more effective, in healing my own anxiety, and helping me feel really, really good getting me to where I am right now recording this podcast for you, from the other side of where I was in the past. There are some whys that really could make you anxious. So when I say the why doesn't matter, that doesn't mean there's not a reason, it just means that it may not be the thing that we need to focus on. Things like being highly sensitive, because I'm highly sensitive guys: I'm kind of a crier. This could just, you know, maybe be like, I need to get thicker skin... maybe if I was tougher and I didn't take everything personally. Or maybe if I didn't cry, in that Sarah McLaughlin commercial with the puppies in the cages; that kills me every time! And then, if you're young, you won't remember this, but there used to be this commercial on at Christmas time. And this guy comes home for Christmas. And he walks in the house, and his mom's all surprised, and she's like, "Peter!", and then they go drink coffee like Maxwell House or Folgers or something next to the Christmas tree and I cry. I cried when I was little on this on and now that I have college kids, it's worse and it makes me cry again. So yeah, I'm highly sensitive. And you know, that's probably part of it. And I want to go back in time to when I remember thinking, Oh, that's like, so sad and happy and crying in this commercial. Okay, so let's back up.
My anxiety started when I was about eight. And I feel like I need to give you the backstory, so that you can understand a little bit about where I'm coming from. When I was in third grade, I remember going down to this little glorified closet that we called the sick room at my school. I went to this tiny little county school, from kindergarten all the way through eighth grade, and I would not feel good, and I just wanted to go be in this room. I want to lay in there and sleep or just cry because I wanted to go home. I didn't really like school at all which is kind of funny because I grew up to be a teacher. But I really... it's funny when I think back. I wanted to make bulletin boards, which is such a crappy part of teaching. But at that point in time, I'm like, "Wouldn't it be so cool to make bulletin boards?" Live and learn. So I didn't like school, when I was in school, I was bored. I was super self conscious, and I just wanted to be at home with my parents. And I also remember that it was always worse if my dad had to go out of town. He had to go to meetings, and he was only gone overnight occasionally, and he was always back the next day. So it wasn't, it wasn't a big deal. From my adult perspective, it wasn't a big deal. But that little me- I was always... I would get really nervous that he would get in an accident. And the doctor gave me the doctor was a family friend, and he said, Oh, well, when she feels sick, just give her this little pill and it'll make her so she doesn't feel nauseous anymore. I have no idea if those pills work, by the way, I don't really remember thinking that they worked. Maybe I didn't feel nauseous anymore, but in hindsight, when I'm looking back now, I'm like, "Oh, hey, wait, that was anxiety! I didn't know. At that time, I thought something was really wrong with me but I also knew there was nothing wrong with me. I remember also getting this stack of papers back from my teacher that year, and a sticky note fell out and that sticky notes had always sick on it. And I remember thinking that was really crappy, and that's not true at all. Because I knew I wasn't sick, you guys. I just knew I didn't feel good. So there was that little bit of intuition in there. Like I'm not sick. But I feel really sick. Something is really wrong with me.
So anyways, I thought I was always sick. But I also knew I wasn't sick. And that's how it started. It's also really important to know that I was born in 1975, so I guess I was a child of the 70s and 80s and 90s. I"m going to say the 80s and 90s because I don't think that you get to experience actual childhood until you're like five because the rest of it - yeah, you learn most of those like really important life skills when you're younger, but to have like those childhood experiences where you're out doing things kind of starts when you go to kindergarten. So, let's say 80s and 90s. The point is that nobody talked about mental health back then. And I literally thought I was the only kid on the planet that ever felt this way or that was this scared all the time. And I am blown awa when I hear from people who are my age who admit that they felt the exact same way. In my head, I'm thinking, "where the heck were you?" I needed a friend that understood this and I didn't really tell very many people because I didn't want people to think I was crazy. Does that sound familiar? That was that was kind of my life. So I thought I was the only kid that had these problems. Anyways, I had my first panic attack at that same building, I was in the seventh grade, I can tell you exactly where I was sitting in the library, exactly what I was looking at, I can tell you everything about it, because it stuck in my memory. And maybe this was trauma. I don't know, because if reading a Time magazine can cause trauma, then that's what I experienced. So then moving on to high school, I had some more panic attacks, and then I went to college. And it all just fell apart and I was a disaster. But nothing actually stands out to me as being something to make me anxious or cause trauma. I have the most incredibly boring normal life and guys, I'm a Gen Xer and I can't even claim that I was a latchkey kid! My mom was home, like, zip, nothing! So certainly, this is not true for everybody. Some people have major trauma to work through and that breaks my heart for you. If this is your story, please go talk to a licensed therapist and work through that trauma. You don't have to stay in that past there are so many new ways to help people who have trauma and to help you live without that past horrifying experience taking over your present. So the situations that would be in my brain is trauma. The things that I would consider trauma that I mentioned before would be things like abuse and neglect, sickness, accidents, kidnappings, death, all those things that absolutely stay stuck in there. But for the rest of us, though, for those of us that didn't even claim latchkey status, or that are like, I don't know, my life is so non traumatic, that it's boring. I'm gonna offer a new thought so stick with me here. Somewhere, there is a wonderful therapist that probably thinks I should shut my mouth and not say anything else. But here I am, and I'm gonna say it. What if why doesn't matter? What if it really doesn't matter why you are anxious? And the reason I asked this is because the short answer is for every single one of us handling anxiousness, the way you feel the thoughts you think is done in much the same way no matter why you are anxious. Anxiety is a biological response that everybody has. Literally everyone beyond newborn status on the planet has been anxious. Some of us take those feelings and turn them into problems and overthink the feelings in our body. And here's why. You ready? This is the "why". If you want to know why I'm going to give you actual reasons why. We don't need to get any more basic than this. If you're out walking around and feeling like absolute garbage and anxious and like Why Why? Why? Here's why.
1. Hormones. There's a why for you, hormones. For sure. Let me tell you that puberty, after you have a baby, perimenopause, menopause, and dudes, you're not off the hook here because guys have testosterone drops. Anytime there is a hormone drop, you can feel anxious, because your brain is literally doing its job. Your brain was designed to keep you alive and the fact that you feel anxious and alert to danger means that your brain is just doing his job. There's nothing wrong. So there's why. Here's another one.
Another reason that you could be anxious for a long time, you might have built up cortisol in your system. You can build up cortisol, for lots of reasons and it takes a while to get it out of your system. You have to move it out, you have to burn it out, you have to sleep it out, you have to eat correctly. If you're carrying around a ton of extra stress, you might have cortisol and that can make you feel anxious. There's a why.
Or it could be the adrenaline from something that scared you or something that your brain interpreted as bad. Adrenaline makes your body go into hyperdrive, so that you can fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. It makes your eyes see blurry, it can cause tunnel vision. It can make your arms and legs feel numb or heavy or weak. It can make your heart beat fas. It can make you want to throw up. It can make you have diarrhea. It can make you sweaty. It can make you not be able to breathe deeply So yeah, adrenaline could be why.
And if you're lucky enough to be highly sensitive like I am, and there are lots of us running around, by the way, you can feel anxious over somebody glancing at you... which really is inconvenient, because sometimes then you get attuned to what people are looking at, and what are they thinking? That's a fun thing, isn't it? Your brain interprets things. And when people look grouchy or angry, you might think that some that it's something that you did, or that something outside of you is going wrong. "Oh, my God, something's going wrong. That person looks scared." You don't know you can't read their mind. Unless you are a sparkley vampire. You cannot read people's minds. Please keep that in mind. If your heart breaks over coffee commercials, I feel you. And that could be part of the reason that you're anxious. Isn't it lovely?
If you haven't gotten enough sleep, and your brain is already tired, and your body is tired? That could be why you feel anxious.
If you eat junk food all day, and your gut biome is wack, you will feel anxious! This is coming up next week, so you're definitely going to want to pay attention in Episode Six w hen I start talking about the gut biome. No, no, no, I'm not going to tell you that you can never eat your favorite junk food again, because I'm not a jerk, but I might rock your world a little bit. And it's going to be super important. You cannot talk about anxiety, and not talk about your gut. You just can't. So we'll talk about that next week. So definitely tune back in them.
When I was struggling with constant anxiety and panic, I fought like crazy to feel better. All I wanted to do was to make myself feel normal and to take care of this racing heart problem, and that I couldn't breathe, and my arms felt heavy. And then I had all these obsessive thoughts that I couldn't stop. And I'm gonna say something now with a little bit of an understanding here, that I've never ever been diagnosed with OCD, but in hindsight, looking back with what was happening in my brain when I was anxious, it might have been thing. So I had health anxiety. Health anxiety is where you worry about your own health or the health of someone that you love, incessantly. And every little thing is a death sentence. I had health anxiety and health anxiety has a way of causing compulsive thoughts, and there can be compulsive checking. So for example, if I had a mole that was too dark, or if I had a bump or a bruise, I would check it. And sometimes I would check it to the point where it would get swollen and red. And that sounds a little OCD to me. I'm not trying to self diagnose but I'm definitely self diagnosing. But I definitely did have obsessive thoughts and they were the worst because I could not stop thinking. The more I felt, the more I thought, the more I felt, the more I thought. And then you know, of course, like the more I tried to stop thinking or said, don't think about it, don't think about it, then the more you think about it, because that's impossible. That's just the way your brain works. That would be kind of like if I said, don't look at anything that's blue. And all of a sudden, it seems like everything around you is blue. Like why is there so much blue in this room? And the same thing goes for anxiety, the more you try not to think about the thing that you don't want to think about, the more you're actually thinking about it. And that's what I was doing. I would think, "No, I don't want to think about that! It's scaring me, I don't like it! I don't want to think about it! Why am I thinking about it?"
Maybe that's why I was anxious. And it really means or what this really means. And why this really matters is that why doesn't matter. It doesn't matter which one of these reasons you are anxious unless you have something where you are reliving an experience from the past, over and over on a larger scale, because I suppose technically, all anxiety is reliving something that you've experienced before. I'm talking something like trying to work through a huge past event, okay? I'm not talking about high functioning anxiety here. I'm talking about, like PTSD, and big time traumas stuff. That's different. But when it comes to working through anxiety and all that comes with it, it's all about how, forget the why! Think about the ho! How do you move forward? How do you calm your body down? How do you distract yourself so that you don't think about not thinking the things you don't want to think? How do you create a life that you love, instead of one that you are terrified of living? It's all about how. Play a little game with me here for a second, okay? I want you to imagine a tiny you. Think of your favorite baby picture of yourself or a favorite picture of you from elementary school. And if you're judging on yourself, you just put that away for a minute because that kid! "Oh, they're so cute." I used to kind of poopoo this because I am an all around skeptic on most things. I'm a big time skeptic actually, who am I kidding, I am skeptic. I really thought this inner child stuff was garbage, but I have learned so much.
Even without needing to know a why I just want you to just picture younger you. Even if you don't know what happened, or if anything at all happened to you, literally nothing may come into your head and that is totally okay. I'm in the boat with you. But somewhere inside of you, there is a little kid screaming and crying and throwing a temper tantrum about something. Or maybe a whole lot of things. Depending on your situation, it could be something that was misinterpreted, or something that you didn't understand, but it scared you and set off an alarm in your body and that alarm got stored in your body. This little kid inside of you is forever frozen at the age they were when they got scared; they don't grow up. The kid just stays stuck in your brain scared. That is what your little child is! Your brain just goes back to that moment over and over and over again. Your brain stores things almost like a file on your computer or like a pop up browser where it knows what happened in the past at some point, and it just pops back up, Every time it does the same thing. You don't have to know the day it happened. You don't even have to know really what happened. That little you is still in your brain taking care of you. And that little you remembers because it's still living in that exact same moment over and over and over again. That kind of that's really sad, you guys. And when that happens! Your brain just interprets it as the current state of events. This is happening right now. Your body gets flooded with all of those fight or flight hormones again. Are you following me here?
If this is all really confusing, there's a really fantastic book, it's kind of heavy, but it's called the Body Keeps the Score. It's been around for a while. And it does this incredible job of explaining how your mental health is basically trapped in your nervous system. All of our memories get, kind of, nicely fashioned to a nerve or a point in your body or an organ. All these different things. Think about being in your kitchen for a second now. Take it put the little kid let the little kid take a nap or whatever.
Think about being your kitchen, and you're making breakfast. Let's say you're making eggs and toast and the smoke alarm goes off, because you burnt the toast. Have you ever done this? Or bacon, maybe you burnt the bacon and the smoke alarm goes off. We're gonna say toast though, okay? You burnt the toast, the smoke alarm goes off in the house. The smoke alarm is going off, whether you're burning the toast or the house is on fire. It's a smoke alarm; it has a job. This is what's going on in your body and in your brain qhen you're anxious. The body feels anxious from all of these hormones, the cortisol and the adrenaline and all these other stress hormones that come out, and it sends off an alarm just like the fire alarm in your house. The brain is hearing the alarm and assuming the house is on fire. It has no idea that you just burnt toast. The brain doesn't know that there's nothing wrong, it just reacts. And it will feed you the most garbage thoughts that you've ever had. And yes, it will absolutely make you believe them. Tell me that you are not absolutely convinced that either everyone hates you, or you're going to crash your car, or you're going to have a heart attack, or that you have all the diseases, or whatever else your fear is! It feels real, doesn't it? They're super believable. Its just doing its job and we can't even get mad at it because there's this little you inside crying because it's terrified or scared of things that you know, it thinks it did something wrong or whatever. And nothing may have happened that you can remember. So again, why it doesn't matter. If you're trying to move forward, and you're trying to deal with these feelings and these thoughts, focus on the how. This is where coaching comes in. I'm not about finding hidden trauma. If you know you have trauma I want you to heal from that trauma. I want you to find an incredible therapist that you can trust. From my stance how you deal with this is the same no No matter what your anxiety is focusing on; it doesn't matter why. It's a process of understanding how your body feels, learning how to let those super uncomfortable and really super scary feelings mean absolutely nothing, and how you move on. It's super simple! Super duper simple. I mean, it's not easy, because if it was, you'd already be doing it, right. But it's simple. I'm going to tell you how. And you might want to take notes. So take a minute and go ahead and feel free to pause the podcast if you need to. You can come back and write this information down the super journaling content. If you've wanted to start journaling, and you don't know what to write about, I'm about to give you a few really good prompts. Okay, hit pause, come back. And I'll be right here.
First, I want you to know about how you react when your body sounds the alarm. And I don't mean, once you've gotten to the point where you're in full on panic, or really super anxious, I mean that the very, very first signal that your body gives you that something's up almost a whisper, like a twinge. The tiniest bit of adrenaline has come out and you're like, Whoa! And maybe you feel it in your throat, or in your solar plexus, or maybe in your arms. Wherever that spot is for you. It can be really, really tiny. This takes some intention to notice this - you actually have to maybe get anxious again, until you notice it and then you'll be like, "Oh, that's how that felt." Pay attention to that. That is your smoke alarm going off. That is really, really important. Because when you feel that, what do you do? What is your reaction? Or even, when you don't know that feeling when you start to feel anxious? What do you do? Do you freak out and cry and call your parents like I used to do? Do you take a Xanax? Do you go for a jog? Do you just get in bed and try to sleep so it'll go away as quickly as possible? There is no wrong answer. Just notice. What do I do? Do I flip out because I'm scared to death? Maybe, It's okay, be gentle with yourself or just being curious here. We're learning we are learning what our anxiety is saying inside of our body into our brains. You can't be judgey if you're going to be curious, you'be just got to be curious. When you react in that way, what do you want to happen? Not what is already happening, what do you want to happen? But then what actually does happen? Be honest, you can't lie to yourself. I mean, I suppose you could, but it's not going to do you any good because you know that you're lying. Right? Just be curious. And if you're writing in a journal, or you're writing this down, brain dump, there is zero judgment. There's no right or wrong. It's just what we know. Get really curious so that you can start recognizing what happens in your body and what your habits are. You have to know what's going on before you can make different decisions. How you make these decisions is very important. So for me here, let me give you an example. When I first noticed that I'm feeling anxious, and this is still true for me, because remember, anxiety is normal, everybody feels it. I notice that a lot of times either that I feel like I can't take a deep breath, or I notice that my forearms and my hands feel really heavy or fuzzy or weird. Maybe that makes sense to you, or maybe it doesn't, but that's my feeling. So my reaction used to be the I would - I felt this often in college, so I say I would call home and I called my parents a lot because I was having multiple panic attacks a day sometimes. So I will call home. And I wouldl call and I would ask my dad to tell me I was crazy. That was my plan. My phone was, "Dad, please... I need you to tell me that I'm crazy." And he would be like, yeah, for sure, you're crazy.
Because God bless him, he's not anxious, and he'd be like Megan, it's fine. Get over it, you're fine. And really, it actually kind of made me feel better, but not at all. It made me feel better to know that my dad was doing the only thing he knew to do, which was tell me what I wanted to hear, which was telling me that I'm crazy. And you would think that that was good, but I guess I felt like being crazy was better than dying. So I wanted my dad to tell me I was crazy and he always obliged. Thanks, Dad. And I wanted my mom to tell me it wasn't dying. So I would have my dad tell me I was crazy, and then I would have my mom say, o you think I would say, "Do you think I'm sick?" "Do you think I'm dying?" "Do you think I need to go to the hospital?" "Do I need to go to the doctor?" "Do you think this is a bad thing?" "Do you see the spot?" and my mom would say, if you're really worried, go get it checked out and prove to yourself that you're fine. And this is still my thing, and it used to be a terrifying situation where I would make my mom go with me. And now I'm like, Screw it, I'm going to the doctor, I'm gonna get this cleared up and get out on with it. But I knew my parents loved me and I knew they wanted me to be safe. And my mom, if she thought something was wrong with me, she would say get your butt to the hospital. And my dad would still probably say I was being crazy, but he would call and check on me later, so. So I would hang up and I was, and I would feel a little better. For like, 10 whole minutes, maybe. And then I wasn't fine again. And this was my habit. And at that point, you know, I felt good for a minute. And then I went back to the same scary thoughts, because my body was still incredibly anxious. And then I would repeat the steps but sometimes I would call them back like a half hour later. And all I wanted to do was feel better. And I didn't understand because it was just getting worse and worse. And that's what happens. I was just feeding the monster. And what I mean is that, when you buy into a scary thought, and you go ask someone else to make sure you're okay, you're actually telling your brain that something is not okay. So it repeats the cycle, it gets bigger and stronger every time you go and call for help. Every time you do that little side poke thing like, "Isn't that so weird that I would think I have liver cancer?" and you just look around and hope somebody says that is insane. That's seeking reassurance. It's just like a sneaky, like sly way to ask for reassurance. And let me tell you, I've done that too. That just tells your brain, that there's actually something wrong that you need to take care of. It's kind of painful, isn't it? Like you're just trying to find some help out herea nd it makes everything worse. It's really important to pay attention to how you think about those feelings inside your body when you feel anxious. When you figure out where you feel it in your body first, before you fall apart; when that smoke alarm is going off, this is when you step in. And this is super duper important. Getting familiar with your body and getting to know your anxiety better, instead of trying to chase it away, takes away its power. So go back to the thought of that cute little kid that stuck inside of you; the one that screaming and crying. This is right before they lose their mind. They are giving you every sign you need to know that something's going down. This is the moment when you get to tell your brain hold up. This is anxiety. I know this feeling. I've felt this before. I'm fine. And I feel like total crap. I know where this is going and I feel horrible but I am safe. I know that I am safe. And I have felt this before. This is your Bring It On moment. When you feel your body move into anxiety mode, call it out. This is a really important part of working through letting your anxiety go.
So getting to know this anxiety a little bit better, allows you to steal its power, knowing what it feels like, how you usually react, and then deciding what you are going to give it and what you are not going to give it is powerful. The goal here is just to intentionally allow that anxiety to be there and not mean anything. We're not saying oh crap, it's here, I have to force it out of me or shut it down or kill it or whatever it is. To just know that it's a feeling that you've experienced before and it's only your body filling with hormones. Your brain is going to want to argue otherwise. You know this. Your brain is going to convince you that you're probably dying, or something else is really super wrong, but that doesn't mean it's true. It just means your brain is doing its job. It's trying to get you to fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. You get to choose otherwise, even though it feels like that's impossible. I promise it's not. Your brain has a pattern and it likes to do the same thing over and over again. That little kid that stuck inside of you throwing the fit. That kid is doing the same thing over and over again. It's like Groundhog Day for this poor kid. It can't get out. It likes to think the same thoughts to be sure that you are safe, and sometimes it doesn't let go untill it finds another scary thought to latch onto. And this is where that weird cycle begins, you know which one I'm talking about. It's like a whirlpool and quicksand combination, and it sucks you down and swirls you around, and there's just no way out, because as soon as you think you're gonna get out, it sucks you back down again. So you might wonder if it wasn't that one thing that I thought was wrong with me, then it's got to be this other thing. And oh, I'm fine with that, so it must be this next scary disaster that's wrong. Your brain will offer up all the suggestions in the world on why you are likely in danger. Does this sound familiar? This is when I used to jokingly say that I've had every disease under the sun and absolutely none of them because my brain would offer up, "Oh, Megan, you don't have liver cancer. But you know what, you probably got this other scary thing. Instead. You should check." This is what I did. What do you do when this happens? How do you handle this? What do you do to put the brakes on? This is important!
How you get back to feeling normal again, and like your old self, is based on this moment, because it's not uncommon to get something that I like to call an anxiety hangover, where you were incredibly anxious one day, and you still feel it the next. Just just like the day after you drink too much, you drink too much, you wake up the next day feeling like absolute hell. So an anxiety hangover is very similar. And you wake up and you feel anxious, and it's like, Oh, my God, I don't want to do this. Again, I just want to go back to sleep, I don't want to do anything. You can get a really nasty anxiety hangover because your body still has some of those hormones in it that don't burn off quickly. Adrenaline is a quick burn. Cortisol, it likes to hang on a little bit. And when your body already has that energy stored in there, and you wake up, and it's the first thing you feel, of course, you go right back down that path, because you're believing how your body feels. And as soon as you buy into that your brain goes right back at it, because it thinks something is dangerous. This isn't uncommon, like you may even have noticed it and be like, Oh, I didn't know that's what was going on. And if you don't have a certain period of time between one anxiety attack and the next, then that cortisol, from the anxiousness or the constant stress, even if you've never had an anxiety attack, or a panic attack, constant stress builds up cortisol. And you can have high functioning anxiety and be miserable, walking around, absolutely miserable, and it's not going to go away until you burn it out.
Teaching your body to relax and your brain not to buy into those feelings is crucial. This is the stuff that we use to create change. Teaching yourself how you feel and that the feelings mean nothing is step one. It is uncomfortable, it is scary, and you are absolutely safe. This is what we work on coaching and this is where it gets good because I get to work with people who've lost their confidence and their motivation, because anxiety is just pretty much taken over. It's all the time; the thoughts the way their body feels, it's out of control! So they're going through the motion of life, and missing life! Going to work and school and doing all the things where they feel like they're gonna throw up or crumble any minute that is not living. That's surviving. It's a horrible way to live and it doesn't have to be that way. This was me for like 30 years. So we, you and me, in a coaching container,... we create safety and this clarity by understanding how your body actually feels and how it reacts through habit change. You actively sit in, and move through the anxiety, by creating some new responses when your body feels like crap. And when your brain starts to offer up scary thoughts. Because while your anxiety is completely normal, and completely biological, and completely scary, your response to those feelings and those thoughts is a choice. You do not have to freak out. You do not have to believe that something is wrong. You absolutely can choose to be uncomfortable and think thoughts like bring it on instead of Oh crap. And when you challenge that anxiety, it starts to shut up and it shrinks away. It's just a bully.
Okay, if you are ready to start choosing new reactions, if this makes total sense to you, if you really want to start calming down your body and use so that your brain can calm down to go to the show notes, click the link, and schedule a consultation with me. Consultations are free. They are super powerful, super duper fun, and you're going to be thrilled at what you learn after just a consultation call. You're going to know more about what's going on inside of your brain and body in one hour - and then you get to choose what comes next for you. It's all a choice. I know it seems crazy, doesn't it and ridiculous. And it might sound a little bit impossible right now, but if I can do it, so can you. And if I've done it, that means it's not impossible! I know it may not feel like a choice because who the heck would ever choose to feel this way? But it is, and you get to make it.
Okay. I will be back next week to talk to you about food. And who the heck doesn't love to talk about yummy food. So I will see you then. And in the meantime, you take care and you make it a great week. I will talk to you soon.
Komentarze