Generally, coping with anxiety is a journey that requires a lot of determination. This is because anxiety is a condition that persists for a long time. Do you feel your heart racing faster following a stressful situation?
Or maybe, your palms get sweaty whenever you face an overwhelming event or task. These are some of the symptoms of anxiety and intense nervousness.
Several situations can make us feel nervous. As we both know, life is full of challenges. We have situations beyond our control, such as family issues, social issues, or financial problems.
Most of our anxieties are self-imposed either by trying to live at a tempo we can’t maintain or poor decision-making. However, the issue isn’t if we feel anxious, but how are we coping with the anxiety.
After reading this article, you’ll be able to know how to cope with anxiety properly. The following 5 tips are for people suffering from anxiety. In most cases, anxiety requires expert treatment. However, with these tips, you will be able to reduce the severity and rate of your concern.
5 Helpful Tips for Managing Anxiety
Wondering how to cope with anxiety? First, you have to understand the very nature of the condition. Anxiety is having a heightened sense of fear, nervousness, or uneasiness. While anxious, you may feel uncomfortable or tense physically. Also, if severe, the physical feelings you’ll experience can become stronger, like feeling chest tightening or feeling sick.
Furthermore, it can affect your thinking or imagination. When you’re anxious, the world, in your view, can be frightening. Every circumstance can feel laden with fear, and your mind can make you do things beyond normal.
Here are the five (5) steps for coping with anxiety:
Exercise is Very Crucial
Psychologically, exercise is vital to boost your mental health. Yoga, for instance, is effective in controlling your mind and connecting your body and soul. This type of exercise will help you manage your anxiety if you’re consistent with it.
Naturally, there are other alternatives for managing anxiety. For example, there are therapies, medicines, herbs, and even relaxation techniques. However, before you do anything else, you’ve to start exercising.
Generally, anxiety and exercise have many links:
- Exercise is usually ahead of any anti-anxiety medications.
- Also, people who don’t exercise are likely to exhibit anxiety disorders.
Furthermore, when you exercise, your body releases natural chemicals (endorphins) into the brain to uplift your mood. These chemicals are as potent as most of the leading anti-anxiety medications available today. Also, exercise calms the heart, regulates hormones, and reduces excess energy.
Exercising regularly helps your brain manage your whole mental and physical well being. This is arguably an option you don’t want to ignore if you’re looking for useful anxiety treatment tips. If you’re going to start today, you can start with a daily walk around your environment.
Coping with Anxiety isn’t About Activities
It’s crucial to clarify a myth about coping with anxiety. There are many tips for stress management activities, such as meditation, yoga, etc. These activities are useful for managing anxiety and are an excellent anxiety treatment tool. Also, these techniques will help your brain to adapt appropriately during stressful times.
However, your choice of activities for anxiety management must be dependent on the long term goal. Yoga is good for the body and breathing under stressful situations and benefits people with anxiety. However, the long-term aim of yoga activities is to ensure you get over your fear faster.
Therefore, it’s not about what you do or how you go about it. The most important goal is that your activities boost your mental and physical wellbeing. However, if it persists, you can visit a professional anxiety treatment center near you.
It’s Better to Share than to Hold Back Sometimes
You can experience anxiety whenever you’re around others or when you’re facing a large crowd. You may feel embarrassed about your anxiety, causing more fear, hence retreating into your mind.
Generally, people can pick up on body language and anxiety. Apparently, it’s almost impossible to hide it as quickly as you may want. Chances are if you withdraw due to fear, others may notice that something is wrong.
To cope with such feelings of anxiety, it may be better to express exactly how you’re feeling. However, this doesn’t mean you have to share your ordeal with strangers or your boss. It’s better you share it with family or friends that care about you.
If you feel you’re having an anxiety attack or anxiety, don’t be afraid. You’ve nothing or little to lose, and opening up is exactly what you need in coping with anxiety.
Find a Healthy Distractions
One of the best tip for those looking for how to cope with anxiety is finding healthy distractions. Do you often feel like being alone whenever you’re anxious? Or that you want to get over your thoughts while anxious? These feelings are natural.
However, feeling lost in your mind while overthinking can create more anxiety. Usually, your thoughts are what create anxiety, preventing positive thinking over time. Although spending some time alone is helpful, you need to reschedule your daily routine to accommodate healthy distractions.
You can try spending some good time with family and friends. Engage yourself in fun activities immediately after work. Listen to your favourite music and try out some new dance moves, try new games, puzzles, etc.
These distractions aren’t going to end your anxiety. However, they will reduce the amount of time you spend focusing on your anxiety. This will allow your mind to gain some self-control and strengthen your stress control levels.
Find a Way to Make Stress Fun
If you feel you often have recurring stress, find a way to make it fun. A typical example is your workplace. If you work in a toxic environment, there’s a high chance you may experience constant stress. How do you overcome such a problem?
Well, it’s either you stand up for yourself or standstill while stress gets the best of you. However, you can turn your stressful work into a fun routine by doing things like:
- Creating a bingo card of events that stresses you the most, then give yourself a treat after every bingo
- Turning your daily task into competitions against yourself
- Engaging coworkers in fun activities during or after work
These and many more are quick ways you can turn stress to fun at your workplace. Once you enjoy working, stress won’t have much effect on you again. This tip for coping with anxiety can be applied to other stress inducing situations too.
Conclusion
Anxiety is one of the most treatable conditions around. There are several techniques of coping with anxiety that are easy practices. Some of these include engaging in healthy exercise, feeling good about yourself, etc.
Generally speaking, we all experience difficult and stressful times. However, it’s crucial to develop a healthy set of coping strategies. You can choose to enhance your resilience to stress or reduce the negative influence of life’s challenges. If you feel you have trouble coping, consider seeking a support group or a therapist.
Lastly, not all anxiety treatment is perfect, and there are setbacks sometimes. So, if you’re feeling anxiety or panic symptoms, you can reach out to our anxiety treatment experts in Toronto.
Here at Addiction Rehab, we will discuss any concerns you have, give you a diagnosis and discuss our treatment options. For more information, contact us today!
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