7 Powerful Ways to Manage Anxiety

In the quest for wellness and living an abundant life, we often overlook the most important aspect of truly thriving: mental health. Anxiety disorders are among the most common mental health issues in America. As a society, we're getting more stressed out and less capable of handling that stress. We're overstimulated and under-supported. We use flimsy distractions and coping mechanisms to get through the day, and only really deal with our mental wellness when we're in a truly dire state that we can't ignore.

We're often reluctant to admit to anyone---sometimes even to ourselves---that we have bouts of acute or chronic anxiety. Even when we do acknowledge it affects us, we usually don't really know how to practically deal with anxiety.

The first step to managing anxiety is to be vulnerable and admit you're struggling with it in the first place. This can be uncomfortable, and it takes both humility and courage. Just remember every single person at some time or another is in the same boat as you. We all struggle at times, and by admitting this, we're able to connect with others to both find support and give it.

7 Powerful Ways to Manage Anxiety:

Recognize anxiety is how the body & mind communicate something is off balance.

We tend to think of anxiety as something that's "bad" because it sure as hell doesn't feel "good." Here's the thing: anxiety is actually a useful tool if we learn to tune into why we're feeling anxious. Uncomfortable feelings and sensations are how the body and mind communicate with us. If you are religious or spiritual, please do not view anxiety as a lack of faith or trust in your higher power. Anxiety has nothing to do with spirituality. It's a sign nervous system is dysregulated, which is essential to understand.

Nervous system dysregulation occurs when this critical processing system reacts to a situation, threat, or trigger and becomes overwhelmed and overstressed. The result: a state of physical, mental, emotional imbalance, disorganization, and dysfunction.

Meet your most basic and urgent need first: Ground yourself.

Part of the reason why it’s so difficult to talk ourselves off of a ledge when we experience anxiety is that your nervous system has hijacked higher cognitive thinking. Anxiety throws us into a basic, visceral “survival mode” of fight or flight. It also disconnects us from feeling grounded and stabilized within our body. 

We have to meet our basic need for safety and security before we can go the route of higher thinking, logical analysis, or spiritual considerations. We usually go about this in reverse order: anxiety hits, and we try to TedTalk ourselves out of it and to a place of feeling stabilized. Sometimes, that process can get us out of our frantic headspace, but it can be far more effective to work with the nervous system and do simple techniques to ground yourself first. "Grounding" is really just another way to say "regulate".

Picture your nervous system as a bird: an event triggers anxiety, which flings the bird into a relentless gail force storm. The bird is frantically flying about trying to find  a safe landing point  as it's badgered by the force of the wind. We can learn to create these safe landing points for ourselves, like a branch to rest on and find safe harbor. 

The key here is to remember that we have to meet our basic need for safety and security before we can go the route of higher thinking, logical analysis, or spiritual considerations. We usually go about this in reverse order. Anxiety hits, and we try to TedTalk ourselves out of it and nto a place of feeling stabilized. Sometimes, that process can get us out of our frantic headspace, but there is a much more simple way of creating that “branch” for the nervous system.

Simple & Effective Grounding Techniques:

• Highly regulating breathing technique: [inhale-inhale-roar breath out and repeat several times]  Take a HUGE breath in, followed by another immediate big inhalation. Open your mouth and loudly sigh it out in a sing-song ahhhhhh, or, literally roar the breath out. This strongly stimulates the vagus nerve and helps switch the nervous system from freak out mode to feeling settled.
  

• Tapping + breathing: sit up tall or lie down. Bring awareness to whatever points of contact you feel on the ground and find one thing to look at or close your eyes. Then, using your index, middle, and ring fingers, lightly but rapidly tap-tap-tap your sternum while you deep breathe. You can use a 4-4-4 count, breathing in for 4 seconds, holding the breath for 4 seconds, and exhaling for 4 seconds. Or, you can simply inhale deeply for however many seconds and exhale the same amount of seconds. Just make sure you’re counting the inhale and exhale, because this gives your mind a little dristi (focus) point, which is like a tiny lifeline when your in an anxiety tornado.

• Grounding: lie down on the ground. Outside is even better, but we can’t always sprawl out on the grass during a 2am anxiety attack. Firmly place one hand on your heart and one hand above your naval. Slow and deepen your breathing and simply begin noticing the feeling of the ground beneath you, perhaps even describing it to yourself. Then bring your awareness to the beat of your heart beneath your hand and the rise and fall of your chest as you breathe. It can be highly effective to regulate the rhythm of your breath by counting the inhalations and exhalations (example: inhale 2-3-4-exhale-2-3-4)

Sit with the feeling. 

I always hated this advice from my meditation teachers and therapists throughout life, but it's necessary. Don't immediately try to push it away, ignore it, or pretend like you're not feeling a certain kind of way. Ask yourself what is your body and/or mind trying to tell you? There is usually a specific reason (or reasons) for your anxiety.

The key here is to recognize anxiety is actually not random, but rather a reaction---whether or not it's logical to you, it is to your nervous system. This reaction is like the body's internal alarm system, signaling that something isn't quite right and is perhaps even dangerous on some level to your wellbeing.

You might be picking up intuitively about a person or situation, or suppressing a gut reaction something isn't authentic fit for you. We can lie to others; we can lie to ourselves even. We can never fool our spirit. Anxiety is often simply our spirit screaming for our attention. We tend to ignore and gaslight our intuition and deeper insight to such an extent that we only pay attention when our mental health goes haywire.

Work with the fear: Identify the root cause + patterns. 

Try to be specific here. Instead of "work is stressing me out", name the situation at work that's bringing up anxiety. An unstable or toxic relationship with a partner or friend? Name the specific behavior or conversations. Retrace your steps, so to speak. If there's a start point (and there is), figure out what it is, because the staring point is what the created earthquake that launched your anxiety tsunami.

More often than not, there's a consistent pattern with our anxiety that gives us a great deal of information about why we're actually feeling unsafe on a deep level. For instance, someone with a fear of abandonment will repeatedly feel anxious when they experience situations that trigger that fear. The way to address it is to work with the fear and begin building safe harbor for yourself in regards to fears of abandonment. Someone who feels enormous anxiety at work might realize they have enormous fear of failure. That becomes the root fear to begin addressing with loving-kindness.

Respond instead of react: Ask yourself if what tangible, small changes you can make, and what is within your control.

Once you identify the trigger, hand-write 1-3 small but tangible changes you can implement in response to the triggering situation. This often brings an instance feeling of relief and healthy control.

Identify what is within your power to control and change, and keep the list short so you don't feel even more overwhelmed. Writing items down is actionable, and taking action greatly helps with anxiety, even if the action seems fairly unsubstantial. Research has shown the act of writing on paper (not the computer) is both therapeutic and soothing for the mind.

Example, if you have a friend that constantly calls and stress-dumps on you, small changes you could enact would be 1) recognizing it's neither your responsibility nor in your power to regulate another person 2) preparing both a compassionate response and exit line in advance 3) Text a caring response instead of answering the phone and providing free therapy at the expense of your mental wellbeing.

Example: I'm stressed about work, because I feel overwhelmed by this presentation I have to so, and I don't feel prepared. I'm worried people won't receive it well. Tangible change: I will organize and review my outline, add research some key points so I can make sure I have some strong material to present. I will run through the presentation two times and then set it aside. I can't control how people respond or receive my presentation, but I can control how I use my words, tone of voice, and word choices.

When you find something you can actually do to improve the situation, it can help lessen the anxiety. Doing can be a pressure valve for pent-up anxiety. Anxiety can make you feel overwhelmed and paralyzed, so tell yourself over and over again: it is always within our power to make changes (however small or large) in any situation to make it feel less stressful.

Identify your strengths, and how you can apply them to the situation. Know your weaknesses, and give yourself grace. 

Using the example of feeling stressed about a presentation: I'm good at speaking to a group of people and I really know this topic well. I excel at researching and organizing ideas. I struggle with needing things to be perfect, so I will give myself grace and allow myself to not make this about my own merit or garnishing any kind of recognition.

Be honest about what is not in your power to change: Let go of the things you can't control. Honey, I repeat, let that sh*t go. We are not meant to control all things at all times. It's not always easy to mentally disengage from situations and potential scenarios outside our control, but it's necessary.

When there is something I'm stressing over that I can't/shouldn't try to control, I'll mentally picture myself picking up the situation and offering it up to a higher power to control. I will often say out loud: "This is too heavy for me, so please hang on to it and manage it for me." For me, this higher power is the Divine. Whatever it is for you, at some point, we have to let go and recognize all things work together for good. This is called faith. It's not a feeling, it's a belief in something more than ourselves.

Show yourself loving-kindness.

Buddhist teachings emphasize the “four immeasurables”: loving-kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity. Honestly, this entire list feels pretty darn difficult to embody when mental wellness is taking a hit. And, that's the exact time to mindfully practice them. I think it's interesting loving-kindness starts the list off, because it's the cornerstone of everything else in life.

One of the things that seems to be consistently true for people (myself included) during highly anxious moments is how unkind our thoughts and inner narrative can be towards ourselves. We don't even realize how brutal we're being to ourselves until we start paying attention and taking stock of our mean thoughts and dialog. If you wrote them down on a piece of paper and put them in a jar for one day, you’d be surprised at how full that jar would be.

Essentially, that’s exactly what we with our unkind thoughts towards ourselves: our mind writes them down on a spiritual piece of paper and store it away in our hearts. And the heart, though expansive and resilient, only can store so much. There is only enough spiritual square footage for a certain amount of thoughts, feelings, dreams, and hurts. Our four chambers can hold a great deal of darkness or a great deal of light. It is ours to choose. We can be emotional hoarders, cramming our hearts full of a collection of harsh labels and lies we've come to believe about our lack of worth, or we can clean house and decorate our inner home with compassion, joy and equanimity.

Silence the inner critic with "and...".

Part of mindfulness is simply being aware of how you're talking to yourself about yourself. This is your inner critic, the condemning passenger you've carried with you throughout all of your life. You can decide if you want to continue fueling those thoughts and interacting with them, or you reframe them in an empowering way.

I find the word "and" is very powerful when dealing with the inner critic, because we can acknowledge something while holding a stronger truth next to it. Things are rarely---if ever---black and white. We can be many things all at once, and experience multi-levels and nuances in any given circumstance. We can acknowledge how we feel or perceive things, then add a empowering sentence next to it. Remember, the weakness you're beating yourself up about is just the flip side of a strength.