The topic for this blog is worry and anxiety management because it is so relevant to our day to day life. There are so many demands upon us every day ranging from personal and professional that are often multi-tasking throughout the day. Whilst we in some regard may be skilled at multi-tasking and think that it may be necessary in order to get through the things we need to do or may be even expected of us to be effective. The truth is it can be tiring at multiple levels. With so many pressures upon us and trying to stay on top of things, it is understandable sometimes we can feel prone to worrying or being anxious about aspects of our day to day life. It may be that you notice that you are someone who worries and gets anxious even when life is going fairly OK and that’s fine too. The intention of this blog is to give you some ways to begin to respond to anxiety and worry.
There are many triggers to anxiety and worry. Sometimes we don’t realise that we are anxious or worried until we have time to stop and connect with how we are feeling. Feeling very worried can also bring on symptoms of anxiety, which can be emotional, mental and physical. Excessive worrying can also make people feel exhausted and demoralised as this can affect their daily mind-set. Sometimes this can lead to avoiding people and/or situations in order to minimise experiences tat affect them or even turning to substances, such as alcohol or drugs in order to get away from and not feel unpleasant feelings.
Some help way ways to manage anxiety and worry are:
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- ‘Worry postponement’ or ‘worry time’ – this involves postponing worry till later or having a dedicated time to connect with your worries, but from a problem solving and solution focused mind-set instead of just worrying.
- Distraction – using activities and experiences to keep the mind away from worrying. This can help you have a focus on something more pleasant and also help you change your mood to one that is less worried and anxious.
- Routine – having a routine and within that having activities that give you a sense of achievement, some connection to others and pleasure can help you feel more positive and have a balanced outlook on experiences, situations and aspects of day to day life that may mean you worry less.
- Mindfulness – this can help with coping with anxiety and worry. Mindfulness teaches us to be more present in the moment. This can then help change our relationship to our experiences, thoughts and feelings that can then help reduce anxiety and worry.
When trying new things in our life, it can take time to get used to responding or doing things differently to how we normally would. Be patient and kind to yourself and when it feels hard to do things differently, remind yourself that your intention is to help yourself out and if that takes more time and practice to develop a new habit or way of coping then that’s fine.