11 Tools to Control Fear and Anxiety (part 1)
One of the curses of being able to think and reason is the ability to feel fear and anxiety, even when neither are warranted. Fear and anxiety can serve as helpful cues that there may be a situation that deserves caution, but after this is accomplished, they actually cause more harm than good.
You create your own fear and anxiety. You can also create your own peace and serenity.
In this article I want to list the first six ways to learn how to control fear and anxiety in your life. We will follow in the next blog the remaining 5 ways to learning how to control our fears and anxieties.
Choose to minimize the effects of fear and anxiety in your life:
1. Breathing is the fastest way to derail fear and anxiety. When faced with fearful thoughts or situations, we begin breathing quickly and shallowly. This begins a cascade of physiological events that result in feelings of fear and anxiety. It’s possible to circumvent this process by breathing deeply and slowly.
· Try breathing quickly and shallowly for 60 seconds and see how you feel.
2. Act normally. Continue behaving as you would if there were nothing to fear. You can communicate to the fearful part of yourself that everything is okay. If you can act as if everything is fine, your brain will begin to believe it.
3. Spend time with supportive friends and family. A night on the town can work wonders to relieve stress and anxiety. A long, meaningful talk over a cup of coffee can be very beneficial.
4. Have positive expectations. Fear and anxiety are the result of expecting the worst. When you expect the best, you can’t feel afraid. You’ll feel excited instead.
5. Start small. Example: afraid of spiders? Look at photos of small, harmless spiders until you feel calm and relaxed.
6. Let it go. It’s common for fear and anxiety in one part of your life to bleed over into other parts of your life. A rough morning meeting with the boss could ruin the rest of your day if you let it. Once the event is over, decide to let it go and move on.
Now that we’ve listed these six ways to control our anxiety and fears, it’s time to apply it. If we don’t apply these techniques, they will never do us any good just written on paper.
You and I become experts in learning our fears. Sometime just sit down and write down your fears. This will make a great prayer list. We also get so wrapped up in our feelings that we learn the things that bring us anxiety. Let me challenge you to take the things that have listed above and actually practice them on purpose. If you will endeavor to work on these things, your life will change for the good. Your fears and anxieties will not seem near as big as they were at before.
