Shrinking Your Anxiety and Increasing Your Confidence
Anxiety is one of the most common mental health disorders found in adults and teens. Approximately 30 percent of adults struggle with anxiety sometime in their life.
Thirty-two percent of all youngsters will experience significant anxiety sometime during adolescence.
These fears show up in many forms. Panic Attacks, PTSD, phobias, social anxiety,
generalized anxiety, and OCD are just a few examples.
Even though each is different in their own unique way, they also share some common traits. This includes:
Feelings of dread and worry,
Restlessness,
Physical sensations (increased heart rate, shallow breathing, perspiration,
digestive problems, etc.)
Thoughts of impending calamity, injury, loss, or similar heartache.
Those who are frequently troubled by intense anxiety find that it interferes with their job performance, relationships, and even their physical health. What’s more, it’s not unusual for anxiety to eventually lead to depression.
Most people never get professional help for their anxiety, and those that do reach out for help frequently end up settling for medication rather than therapy or some other non-prescription solution.
A Better Way To Overcome Anxiety
Prescription drugs can play an important role in alleviating the symptoms of many psychological disorders, including anxiety. Most people understand this to be true.
What is less well known are the limits of medication.
Although anti-anxiety medication (called anxiolytics) is often effective in reducing symptoms, they do not provide a durable, or long-lasting, solution to the problem. That is, the relief from anxiety does not continue once a person no longer takes the medication.
The ideal intervention would be something that both reduces anxiety and creates significant changes that are self-sustaining without the use of pharmacological agents with their attendant risks and side effects.
Fortunately, there are several approaches you can use to reduce anxiety that are durable and very inexpensive (usually free). In the following, I will describe just one of these approaches… which happens to be one of the most effective as well.
Before we get into the nuts and bolts of this intervention let me reassure you that most people who really devote themselves to giving this a fair trial are greatly rewarded. Anxiety is reduced, a sense of calm begins to grow, and confidence starts to crowd out insecurity.
I really enjoy watching my patients experience this sort of transformation. It’s extremely rewarding to see them discover what life holds when anxiety does not control them any longer.
But be forewarned, many people very quickly give up on the strategy I’m about to describe. After a week or two they find themselves still anxious and conclude “This just doesn’t work for me.”
That is a big mistake. It’s like hiring a personal trainer because you wish to become athletic. After going to the gym two or three times you look in the mirror and conclude “I don’t see a difference, and I don’t feel any stronger. Heck, I’m even worse off because now I’m tired and ache all over.”
If that is your mindset about overcoming anxiety, you’ll never get it under control.
In fact, if that is your perspective, you’re better off taking medication and resigning yourself to using anxiolytics for years to come.
But if you are serious about mastering anxiety so it no longer siphons off your happiness, so that it no longer prevents you from living an exciting and full life, then count on putting in sustained serious work.
There aren’t any shortcuts. I would tell you if there were.
If you are willing to put in the work, however, the odds are on your side that you’ll be successful in breaking free from the control anxiety currently has on your life. Imagine what that will be like. Pretty motivating, right?
Meditation
Yes, the intervention I’m recommending is meditation. Not just any meditation, but rather mindfulness meditation. This is a form of meditation that is remarkably effective in reducing symptoms of anxiety.
The first thing to do when thinking of meditation for treating anxiety is to remove from your mind the idea that it involves sitting in the Lotus position, arms akimbo, incense burning, and the sound of rhythmic chanting echoing softly off the walls of a dimly lit room.
You can meditate that way if you like, but it’s not necessary in order to derive all the benefits that meditation has to offer.
Mindful meditation, which I recommend, is very straightforward. The intention of this form of meditation is to strengthen your ability to be ‘in the moment.’ Some refer to this as ‘being present.’
As this skill improves, anxiety begins to lessen. This makes sense in that anxiety is focused on fears related to what will happen in the future (whether that be an hour away or several years). By refocusing your thoughts on the present, fears related to the future recede.
Many people try meditation once or twice and conclude it does not work. Their conclusion is premature. Becoming good at meditation takes a little practice. So does learning to cook, throw a curve ball, play the guitar, solve math problems and so forth.
Consequently I am encouraging you to practice meditation at least ten minutes a day for two weeks before making any conclusions about whether it can be a help to you.
It would be very odd were it not helpful. That’s true for some people, but rare.
The steps to take for mindfulness meditation are simple. They include:
ONE: Find a place to sit comfortably where no one will interrupt you for a few minutes. Turn off your phone and other distractions. If you wish to chant then go for it, but I suspect it will draw attention and someone may think they need to call 911.
TWO: Set a timer to chime when the allotted time for meditating is completed. If you don’t set a timer you will continue to check the clock. This is not helpful.
THREE: Take a slow deep breath through your nose. Do not hold your breath when you have fully inhaled. Instead, pause briefly and exhale through your mouth. This involves a three or four-second inhalation followed by a similarly protracted exhalation.
FOUR: Mentally picture yourself escorting a judge outside the room where you are sitting. Inform the judge that you need some time alone and he or she can return when you are done meditating. The judge smiles, nods in agreement, and tells you to enjoy some alone time.
FIVE: Resume your slow steady breathing. Now begin to focus on your bodily sensations. The feel of each inhalation and exhalation. The texture of the chair upon which you sit, the temperature of the room, etc.
SIX: Expand your attention to sensations by noticing the colors of the room, the smell of the air, and the sounds that may arise in the distance. Don’t question, just notice.
SEVEN: Expand your attention further by observing with an attitude of detachment the thoughts that come into your mind. Your goal is not to judge the thoughts (remember, you escorted the judge out of the room). Just use the observing portion of your mind to take note of what thoughts arise and let them pass by followed by other thoughts.
EIGHT: Let your attention fall upon any of the sensations you previously took note of, savoring the colors, textures, sounds that come to you, but withholding any judgment about those sensations or any thoughts that accompany them.
By this time the chime will ring. Take one more deep breath, relax, then resume your day.
In order to get a better sense of how this works in practice it would help to take two minutes and run through a guided mindfulness meditation. Click here for a first-hand experience of what this involves.
Research On Meditation And Anxiety
There are numerous studies that substantiate the powerful impact meditation can have on someone’s physical and emotional health.
Just a sample of these benefits include:
Improves sleep quality
Likely helps reduce coronary disease
Appears to slow progression of dementia
Improves immune response
Has been shown to reduce the psychological impact of chronic pain
But to the point of the impact of mindfulness meditation on anxiety, we can look at recent research conducted at Georgetown University that compared the effectiveness of Lexapro (a common medication given for both depression and anxiety) to mindfulness meditation.
The results of this study demonstrated that over an eight-week period meditation provided just as much relief from anxiety as medication.
This is remarkable for several reasons.
The first is that meditation is free of the risks that arise when taking a prescription drug.
Secondly, meditation is cost free.
Third, meditation is 100% under the control of the individual – depending upon a physician for a prescription, or pharmacists to fulfill the prescription, is unnecessary.
Fourth, a bottle of medication eventually runs out and a refill is required whereas the ability to meditate is always available.
Fifth, taking medication shifts a person’s sense of control over their anxiety to an external agent (the anxiolytic) whereas meditation reinforces a person’s sense of their own control.
Conclusion
Mindfulness meditation is a powerful anti-anxiety activity that nearly anyone can learn and implement immediately. When performed daily over the course of several weeks it often results in the marked diminution of anxiety.
The amount of time required to engage in meditation each day is much less than what most of us spend browsing the internet before finishing our first cup of coffee. Put another way, all of us can find the time for a 20-minute meditation.
If you combine meditation with exercise (done separately), getting a good sleep, reducing or eliminating foods that heighten anxiety (e.g., caffeinated coffee, energy drinks, etc.) and a couple other strategies, you’re likely to experience a good deal of relief within a relatively short period of time.
Go give it a try. Don’t put it off. A life with less anxiety and more joy might be right around the corner.
