The Anxiety Monster

Your heart beat kicks up and your palms start to sweat, it seems like all the cells in your body are made of lightening, pulling you in many different directions all at once. Your brain races and you fidget, flicking your nails, tapping your foot and biting your lip with a nervous concentration. Nothing at all has prompted this, but something had suddenly made you very anxious. Something that people would normally perceive as normal; an off-hand comment, a school presentation, graphic images in a movie, or any combination of things. This could be a minor case of anxiety spiked, or this could be a full blown panic attack.

First and best thing you can do for yourself if possible is to temporarily remove yourself from whatever you perceive to be the possible source of your anxiety. Just to take stock and help regulate it so that the condition does not continue to get worse. This is not something to feel anxious about, if you are with somebody just casually express that you need to go use the restroom, or tell them upfront that you need some space, they should understand, if they do not, they might not be a good companion

A panic attack is when people experience physical symptoms of anxiety so intense that they may feel sometimes as though they are dying. Sometimes these side effects, include: dizziness, nausea, heavy breathing, accelerated heartbeat, sweatiness, headaches, vertigo type symptoms, lightheadedness, fainting, etc. Of course there are physical remedies to these types of symptoms, breathing into a paper bag to inhale CO2 can help if you are hyperventilating. This is because it can help return some of the much needed CO2 to the bloodstream. Having too low CO2 can reduce oxygen, and lead to low oxygenated blood flow to the brain. Medical professionals however do not recommend you use this method for more than 12 minutes at a time.

There are other more meditative techniques that you can use to help recenter yourself in the present moment, since anxiety is usually caused by a hyperactive brain. Hyperactivity in the brain can cause you to become overindulged in what is happening in your brain and not truly present where you are in your body at the present moment. By using the 5-4-3-2-1 technique you can help recenter your attention and fend off some of the effects of anxiety.

5: Identify 5 things you can see

4: Identify 4 things you can touch

3: Identify 3 things you can hear

2: Identify 2 things you can smell

1: Identify 1 thing you can taste

and repeat as needed.

This is just one of many techniques to recenter yourself in the present moment, the leading cause of anxiety is worrying too much over the future or obsessing too much over past experiences that can no longer be effected. The best way to combat anxiety is therefore finding ways to return consciously to the present. One trick to help cultivate this awareness and a technique that is as old as time is meditation. Meditation despite popular belief can be done anywhere and at anytime, you do not have to recite any special mantras, or believe in the spiritual culture that is tied with meditation. Meditation is simply the act of becoming acutely aware of your surroundings, and more specifically your breath and your body. Some aspects of anxiety have people becoming disassociated. Disassociation is a coping mechanism to trauma and anxiety in which the person essentially checks out and feels as though they are disconnected from their body. Meditation is great for disassociation, and general anxiety alike, in the way that it helps to draw the attention back to the present moment. Earlier in the article we established the leading cause of anxiety is worrying about the future or obsessing about the past, so the remedy is finding oneself in the present moment. To start, find a comfortable safe space and a comfortable way to sit, kneel or lie down, find a position where you will not fidget much and settle in. Then close your eyes. With your eyes closed, start to pay attention to the noises around you, and listen to them deeply without trying to comment on them mentally, just let the noises pass through your consciousness and then let them go. While you are in meditation, thoughts will pop up in your mind, the goal of meditation is to let the thoughts come into your mind, acknowledge them, and then let them pass on. If you continue to practice meditation you will notice that letting the thoughts pass gets easier, and it will be easier some days than others, that is okay. The importance of this is that you are bringing your conscious awareness to your thoughts and then letting them go. If you feel as though you are advancing in your meditation practice you might find yourself paying attention to areas of your body and then attempting to feel them. By this I mean you would put your attention on your feet, and without moving them, looking at them or touching them, you would feel where your feet are, and in this way you are becoming more conscious of your physical body, which will assuredly help to ground you further and help tame any anxious tendencies. This is an excellent practice and one I would recommend to anyone suffering with anxiety. I have practiced meditation for 4 years now and the results and the difference I've seen has been outstanding, it has helped me so much in my personal life and the way that I think about and interact with the world.

I would like to point out that in addition to meditation there are other ways to achieve something similar to meditation without doing it as commonly described. Some people achieve a meditative space while playing an instrument, painting, playing a sport, reading a book and a variety of other ways. Thus, I will say another word of advice to help with the pesky anxiety demons, is to try new things! Try to push yourself beyond your comfort zone, while maintaining awareness to the best of your ability, don't forget the tools we've discussed earlier in the article. Maintain the present moment, try new things and here might be the biggest thing of all: DO NOT BE AFRAID TO SET BOUNDARIES. Sometimes you won't feel like going out and doing the thing, some days you'll need to take a few extra hours to recharge, in that time think of things that help to center, breathe, and remember to put yourself first, do not spread yourself too thin for the benefit of others.

Anxiety is the crucifix in which we hang ourselves, we persecute ourselves for our infinite potential and allow ourselves to have nothing.