Using Mindfulness To Help Control Anxiety
Before writing this post I went on a bit of a research mission so I could describe in more detail how mindfulness can help in anxiety situations. Fat lot of good that did! Details, facts and figures do nothing to help people deal with anxiety day to day, so what I am going to do is simply write this post from the way I see things and how mindfulness has helped me. I hope that you can understand where I am coming from!
Have you ever faced a situation where your mind played out scenario’s in your head that had you all tense and stressed before the event had even occurred? Maybe it was going for a job interview or facing up to someone that you had been arguing with or even stepping out the door and going about your daily life brings on these thoughts and feelings of stress.
Nobody is immune to anxiety and it does serve a purpose in life. If we were completely oblivious to it we could find ourselves in situations that may be life threatening but it is when the anxiety causes irrational thinking and behavior that it becomes a problem. How we are able to cope with these thoughts and feelings determines how much it affects us, some people cope with it quite well and seem very confident and secure in themselves but some of us are unfortunately controlled by our feelings of anxiety.
How does practicing mindfulness increase our ability to deal with anxiety? The art of living mindfully involves taking a break from the thoughts doing the rounds in our heads and seeing everything for as it is. That is not a great definition but it is a hard concept to put into words. In essence though what we try to do is to remove any emotion or feeling from the situation we are in and take everything on ‘face value’.
That’s great Craig, but how the hell do I do this? Glad you asked! (Sorry, I am in a particularly funny mood tonight. I have been struggling for a couple of days with my back pain and all my frustration is coming out here!) The first skill we need to develop is to recognize when we start feeling uncomfortable or anxious. Once we can identify these feelings at an early stage we have a better chance of nipping it in the bud before it becomes an issue.
The next step is to remove yourself from the situation – not physically and certainly not when your complete concentration is required. All of this takes practice and mental strength, I have been applying these methods in my life for over six months now and I am nowhere near getting it right one hundred percent of the time yet but persistence does pay off. Anyhoo, back to the subject at hand.
Once you have the chance to ‘remove’ yourself it is time to take a few deep breaths in and out. Now for the tricky bit, pick something to concentrate on. I like to concentrate solely on the rise and fall of my chest as I take the breaths. I also find that in the beginning I needed to close my eyes for this to work but please yourself. No falling asleep though!
As you focus your concentration on the one thing you have chosen you will notice thoughts come and go in your mind. That is perfectly ok, what we aren’t trying to do is suppress our thoughts. What we are trying to do is let those thoughts come and go but not pay any attention to them what so ever. Certain thoughts will enter our mind and what we were concentrating on will be totally forgotten.
All of a sudden that thought of what Mr. XYZ really thinks of us will come flooding back into our mind and we are back to square one again. The trick is to catch yourself before that happens and simply let that thought of Mr. XYZ come in and most importantly flow out of our mind without even a second glance given to it.
I have found that with practice I can clear my mind within a matter of minutes and once the feeling of calm comes back it is simply a matter of returning back to what you were doing. Make no mistake this does take a fair bit of practice and mental strength to achieve but I do know from experience that it does make life a great deal easier.
I truly hope that this post has made some sense to you, my writing skills are far from great but if even one persons life is made easier from this my job is done. If you feel that you need a better explanation I recommend that you take a look at the Mindfulness for Beginners CD which will give you a far better understanding of the concepts involved. If you are suffering from anxiety I wish you all the best in finding a solution that works for you, life is hard enough without having to deal with this type of thing. Keep you chin up and don’t ever forget that the sun will shine again and soon!
Craig
July 26th, 2008 at 4:07 am
I would like to say thank you for the encouragement. I have only (within the past few days) begun to understand and even try this. Prior to this, I would just sink into despair feeling guilty, feeling as though I had let everyone who loves me down. It was horrible. It IS difficult to put into words how you practice mindfulness, but it’s actually easier to put into words than it is to get people to follow how it can help. It involves a level of accepting yourself (faults and all) and many people including me will not allow themselves to be accepted, forgiven for past indiscretions, and so on. Mindfulness, if I’m to understand it correctly and if I’m doing it correctly, even though so far has not drastically reduced my anxiety, it has sort of taken me off the circular track of thinking. Instead of the automatic response of “here comes that feeling again” or the obsession to fact check for some possible cause or solution to my condition, I just observe the present…anxiety and all. Instead of it being “that dreadful feeling” I see it as “a sensation of nervous stomach for reasons I can’t understand, but it’s not as intolerable as when I fret over it.” Something like that.
Maybe I’m not fully there yet with understanding this, but it has begun to take me out of a depression and anxiety state that is horrible. I have felt so bad for my wife having to listen to me constantly obsessing or withdrawing completely from her because I could not get my mind off of my pain. It is time to make amends. I thank you for this affirmation.
July 26th, 2008 at 5:09 am
Hi JT,
I am so glad that you have found Mindfulness useful. You are absolutely correct when you say that it simply allows you to accept that the feelings are there but removes the ‘dreaded feeling’ element to it and allows you to process these feelings in a completely new and different way.
I wish there was an easier way to put it into words but you are definitely on the right track. I found that is does take a certain amount of ‘discipline’ to implement every time the ‘dreaded feeling’ comes along but once it becomes a natural reaction (and it will) it makes life so much better!
I wish you all the best.
Regards,
Craig
August 15th, 2008 at 8:40 am
Great post. My doctor has prescribed mindfulness meditation as part of my treatment for an anxiety disorder. I have found that when I am able to drop into that state, which is hard to describe, that not only do I allow my mind a body a few minutes of escape from the never ending anxiety but I have also had some of my greatest insights into my condition while in mindfulness meditation.
July 21st, 2009 at 6:32 am
Hi guys, I know it is unlikely anyone will be checking this since it was published over a year ago, but for those of you dealing with anxiety problems I would absolutely recommend “The Mindfulness and Acceptance Workbook for Anxiety” by Forsyth and Eifert. It also comes with a CD that talks you through meditations and exercises.
I think the key to mindfulness is not that it will cure you from anxiety, but it will show you another way to approach and deal with it.
Mindfulness, plus a good stretch of CBT, can make a big difference in living with an anxiety disorder.