According to anxietycentre.com, anxiety disorders affect 18.1 percent of adults in the United States. That's ages 18-54 and also not including teens. It's extremely likely that someone in your family, someone you work with, and the people that surround you is affected by an anxiety disorder. It is more common that you can imagine and the average person with anxiety battles a few attacks a day. You might not notice, and you might not even know- a lot of people learn to take charge of their anxiety, and keep it under control. While it is tricky, and very hard to do, it is possible. Living in NYC and taking public transportation basically everywhere I go, it is not easy to keep my PTSD at rest. I've learned that every persons's anxiety is completely different, however there are universal ways of working to calm the angst and worry. These are not tips and exercise to be practiced on the spot, but also at home or in a calm place so that you can become very good at not letting the anxiety take over you. Let's be honest, anxiety can have physical components that can leads to light headedness, dizziness, and sometimes you can even pass out. If you learn the whole "mind over matter" scenario and take charge of your mind and muscles, I promise the next anxiety attack will be better than the last.
Here are just a few tips on how to handle your anxiety, before it handles YOU:
Progressive Muscle Relaxation: is something I learned in therapy. It can be very useful as it is meant to relax your muscles that seem to tense up when you become nervous/anxious/worried. When you feel your anxiety is coming on, quickly recall the steps and routine to progressive muscle relaxation and hopefully it will distract you and or relax you. You might even want to record yourself on your phone taking yourself through the steps of the routine and pop your headphones in while you are anxious.
Here is a great guide to progressive muscle relaxation:
http://www.cci.health.wa.gov.au/docs/ACF3C8D.pdf
Also, here is a great video:
Mindfulness breathing meditation: sometimes when we tense up, we forget to breath, causing our breaths to be shortened rather than elongated. This will also make your heart pump faster, and who needs a fast heart when you're already anxious? If we can practice deeper and longer breaths, we might distract our mind, but most importantly reduce our anxiousness and all we did was remember to breathe properly.
Here is a great guide to mindfulness breathing meditation:
http://www.mindful.org/a-five-minute-breathing-med...
Here is a great video for mindfulness breathing meditation:
http://www.mindful.org/a-five-minute-breathing-med...
***DOWNLOAD THE APP CALLED BUDDHIFY- YOU CAN HAVE MEDITATIONS AT HAND FOR ANY SITUATION***
I highly recommend this app.
MUSIC: music is a great distraction if you don't mind noise. I know I'm the complete opposite and hate music when I'm anxious because I like to be super alert. However, like I said, everyone is different and some people might prefer music in order to take their mind off of things. In that case, maybe you can try some classical music, nothing TOO strong and TOO sad. It should always be happy, uplifting music to lighten the mood.
Just to reiterate- these are techniques you should commence once you feel your anxiety coming on. This is supposed to be done when you are at levels 1-5 of anxiety. This is so we do not allow our anxiety to grow so big that we surrender in the moment.
Take a self defense class: I have not done this yet, but I plan on it. I know a lot of people (friends and family) who have anxiety and have taken self defense classes. What this does is increase your confidence and strengthens your mind. In an anxious situation you might feel better knowing you can protect yourself if something were to happen.
The last thing I can suggest is a two step process, but it has helped me many a times...
The place I feel most uneasy is the subway. Whenever I ride the subway I feel almost trapped and prepared for the worst situation.
What I've learned to do is accept the situation, even though my mind strolls through a bunch of "what ifs?"
Say these things to yourself:
"I accept I am on the subway."
"I accept that something might happen to me."
"I accept something might not happen to me."
"I accept I can be at risk."
"I accept the people around me."
Because this is a mind over matter ordeal, you might actually trick your mind into thinking things are going to be okay.
The next part of this is thinking about your destination. Picture it in your mind. For me, that means safety, that means security, so I associate my destination with those things and I feel better. If you're on a plane, picture the place of your holiday or your home or wherever you may be going.
These are not certified techniques and I am no doctor, but I just hope I can extend a helping hand to those struggling with the same things I struggle with.
Best,
D
