Toby2000
17-02-17, 23:42
Okay, well I just thought that I'd make a post here because I haven't in ages, and I thought I could give anyone else suffering some tips for anxiety, and strategies that have helped me pull myself out of the darkest pits of anxiety. I still worry quite a bit, but a few weeks ago I genuinely thought that I couldn't go on, and was even close to suicide. But right now I feel a hell of a lot more positive about life and have realised that I generate problems in my head and create wild, catastrophic scenarios of all different natures. This time last year, I thought my mum was going to die because she had a cough. That was it. But I overanalysed and came to the conclusion that she had a late form of lung cancer, and wouldn't make it to August 2016. Now she's here, still alive and well and I effectively wasted months of my life worrying over this.
Firstly, tell yourself that you're overanalysing the situation. When we worry about something, we often look into the thing/situation/event into way too much detail, more detail than someone without anxiety would, and from this amount of detail we draw what we think are logical conclusions as to what we think will happen. This is called obsessing over this particular worry, and totally picking it apart and dissecting it, which should never be done because it will only create more problems than there were originally- keep in mind that these problems will likely not affect you, or occur the way you think they will, which leads me on to my next point..
You are not psychic. What we sometimes seem to forget is that we can't tell the future. We don't know how the future will pan out, but rest assured that unless you have sufficient (and I mean sufficient) evidence for it, it won't happen the way you think it will, and in reality if it did happen, then you'd handle it better than you thought you would.
The 'worst case scenario' situation will not happen. This is called catastrophising, and essentially in some cases blowing things out of proportion. I'm so guilty of doing this, I mean I thought that my mum's cough was lung cancer. What was it in reality? Not lung cancer, nowhere near. And again, you can't predict the future, but the 'worst case scenario' is always a figment of your imagination (unless you're an axe murderer).
What helped me get through the darkest point of my existence?
Being mindful, and accepting that I can't predict the future. I confess that recently I haven't been practising this as much, but for a couple of weeks I had the strong mindset of living in the present and not trying to speculate about what the future may or may not hold. Doing this really grounds you and will help you realise that your worries are partly, if not all, based off of speculation. Why worry about something that will most likely never happen? This will save you a lot of stress. https://youtu.be/6p_yaNFSYao
I did what made me happy, distracting myself from the worry. For me, I stopped googling and feeding the worry and distracted myself from it, almost accepting it as just a worry, then getting on with something that I was interested in. For me, I watched a load of YouTube videos and binge watched those pointless, but interesting, "Top 10" videos.
Turning the negative into a positive.. I know, this is much easier said than done, but in most dark clouds are silver linings. These silver linings are usually pretty easy to find, but the important thing is to focus on that silver lining. Try and view the situation, event, thing in a positive light, whilst accepting that the thing you're worrying about is just a worry, and take that chance to change your ways if you're worrying about something you did wrong in the past, or in whatever situation, view it from a different angle. This may seem impossible, but trust me, it's possible.
Looking back on past worries. If you use 'mental time travel' for positive purposes, it can be incredibly useful in recognising patterns in your anxiety. In most cases, you'll find that you were just being ridiculous worrying about what you were worrying about and things didn't go as bad as you thought they would. In most cases, these things never happen at all. Then imagine yourself at a point in the future looking back at your current worry, and at this point the worry is over. Just see your what would be past self from above and laugh at yourself, say to yourself "This didn't happen as I thought it would", or "All that time I wasted worrying..". This sort of helped me.
If you want to, open up about the worry. I opened up to my mum and the chat room on here about what I was obsessing/worrying over. That really helped me because I could almost imagine myself in the situation I was worrying about, and my mum was still there for me, supporting me, and she listened to what I was worrying about. Opening up meant the worry had less power over me.
I hope this helps some people who are also worrying themselves to death. I'm not here pretending to be an expert, because I'm not, but I just wanted to share what personally helped me quite a lot.
Thanks :)
Firstly, tell yourself that you're overanalysing the situation. When we worry about something, we often look into the thing/situation/event into way too much detail, more detail than someone without anxiety would, and from this amount of detail we draw what we think are logical conclusions as to what we think will happen. This is called obsessing over this particular worry, and totally picking it apart and dissecting it, which should never be done because it will only create more problems than there were originally- keep in mind that these problems will likely not affect you, or occur the way you think they will, which leads me on to my next point..
You are not psychic. What we sometimes seem to forget is that we can't tell the future. We don't know how the future will pan out, but rest assured that unless you have sufficient (and I mean sufficient) evidence for it, it won't happen the way you think it will, and in reality if it did happen, then you'd handle it better than you thought you would.
The 'worst case scenario' situation will not happen. This is called catastrophising, and essentially in some cases blowing things out of proportion. I'm so guilty of doing this, I mean I thought that my mum's cough was lung cancer. What was it in reality? Not lung cancer, nowhere near. And again, you can't predict the future, but the 'worst case scenario' is always a figment of your imagination (unless you're an axe murderer).
What helped me get through the darkest point of my existence?
Being mindful, and accepting that I can't predict the future. I confess that recently I haven't been practising this as much, but for a couple of weeks I had the strong mindset of living in the present and not trying to speculate about what the future may or may not hold. Doing this really grounds you and will help you realise that your worries are partly, if not all, based off of speculation. Why worry about something that will most likely never happen? This will save you a lot of stress. https://youtu.be/6p_yaNFSYao
I did what made me happy, distracting myself from the worry. For me, I stopped googling and feeding the worry and distracted myself from it, almost accepting it as just a worry, then getting on with something that I was interested in. For me, I watched a load of YouTube videos and binge watched those pointless, but interesting, "Top 10" videos.
Turning the negative into a positive.. I know, this is much easier said than done, but in most dark clouds are silver linings. These silver linings are usually pretty easy to find, but the important thing is to focus on that silver lining. Try and view the situation, event, thing in a positive light, whilst accepting that the thing you're worrying about is just a worry, and take that chance to change your ways if you're worrying about something you did wrong in the past, or in whatever situation, view it from a different angle. This may seem impossible, but trust me, it's possible.
Looking back on past worries. If you use 'mental time travel' for positive purposes, it can be incredibly useful in recognising patterns in your anxiety. In most cases, you'll find that you were just being ridiculous worrying about what you were worrying about and things didn't go as bad as you thought they would. In most cases, these things never happen at all. Then imagine yourself at a point in the future looking back at your current worry, and at this point the worry is over. Just see your what would be past self from above and laugh at yourself, say to yourself "This didn't happen as I thought it would", or "All that time I wasted worrying..". This sort of helped me.
If you want to, open up about the worry. I opened up to my mum and the chat room on here about what I was obsessing/worrying over. That really helped me because I could almost imagine myself in the situation I was worrying about, and my mum was still there for me, supporting me, and she listened to what I was worrying about. Opening up meant the worry had less power over me.
I hope this helps some people who are also worrying themselves to death. I'm not here pretending to be an expert, because I'm not, but I just wanted to share what personally helped me quite a lot.
Thanks :)