Anxiety - What is it and how to manage it

Anxiety is an emotion we experience when we’re thinking about something bad that could happen in the future. 

• Unfortunately, our brains often can’t tell the difference between actually living through this bad thing and just imagining it. This means if you find yourself overthinking about something to try to avoid a problem before it happens, this just makes you more stressed and can leave your nervous system seriously dysregulated. 

• It’s usually not worth it, either, since most of the situations you’re overthinking to try to prepare yourself to deal with won’t actually happen. This is because anxiety loves to overestimate how difficult a problem will be and underestimate your ability to deal with it - how often does the worst-case scenario actually happen, and how many stressful situations have you not gotten through?

• There are different types of anxiety, like health anxiety, social anxiety, sleep anxiety, and plain old general anxiety. Whichever type of anxiety you experience, and whether it’s acute or chronic anxiety, it can show up differently for everyone. 

• Being able to recognize anxiety for what it is and where it’s coming from gives you a better chance to address it before it snowballs and ruins your whole day.

Sneaky symptoms of anxiety in the moment:

• Your brain feels like it’s running a marathon

• Your heart rate goes up and you’re breathing faster, seemingly out of nowhere

• You can’t sit still - legs start bouncing, or hands start shaking

• You get chills or goosebumps but you’re not cold

• You sweat but you’re not warm

Sneaky symptoms of chronic anxiety:

• You have chronic indigestion

• You’re hyper-self aware/self conscious

• You experience frequent headaches

• You feel irritable or brain-foggy

• You second-guess yourself or feel the need to seek reassurance from others

• You feel a lump in your throat

 *Note: these are non-exhaustive lists of common anxiety symptoms, and your anxiety could look and feel totally different 

Ways to calm anxiety fast

• meditation & breathwork to focus on the present instead of the future

• move your body to release anxious energy

• journal your thoughts to slow down racing thoughts

Why this works:

On their own, emotions only last about 90 seconds. When we fuel them with our thoughts, it makes them last so much longer. If you can learn to sit with the anxiety, by journaling about it or just focusing on your breathing for that minute and a half, you’ll see firsthand that it won’t last forever, and you might even get bored.

Ways to control anxiety naturally long-term

• prioritize sleep

• avoid endless social media scrolling

• reduce caffeine intake

Why this works:

Poor sleep quantity and quality can make anxiety symptoms worse, so getting enough sleep is important for managing chronic anxiety. Unfortunately anxiety can also make it harder to get a good night’s sleep, creating a cyclical problem. 

The way caffeine helps you feel more awake and alert mimics the physical symptoms of anxiety. This can trick your brain into thinking you’re experiencing anxiety when it’s actually just caffeine jitters. Reducing caffeine intake can reduce the intensity of this reaction so your body will be less likely to misinterpret what’s happening. Caffeine can also impact sleep, so eliminating caffeine within 6 hours of bedtime can help with getting better sleep.

Doom scrolling can provide a temporary escape from anxiety but it can make things worse in the long run. Getting off social media altogether might be a bit extreme, since FOMO is real and can make you anxious too. There’s not a magic number for how much time online is “right” but becoming more aware of how much time you’re spending online and how this impacts your anxiety can guide you to change your scrolling habits in a way that feels right to you. 

If you're looking for professional support managing your anxiety, I'd love to help you. Book a consultation with me here