Anxiety is the state that we experience when we do not feel safe. That means emotional, mental and physical safety…sometimes all at once or one at a time. We can identify not feeling safe in a few different ways such as feeling out of control, worried, fearful, stressed, overwhelmed, frustrated, threatened…that whole range of thoughts and sensations that seem to invade our bodies. All people get anxious at times. We can feel anxious when we have a big test coming up and we are nervous about how we will do. We can feel anxious when a loved one is ill and we are worried about their recovery or when our child receives a poor report card and we are concerned about their future. In all of these examples there is a clear reason for our anxious feelings. When the situation that is causing concern passes our anxious feelings fall away.
There is a different kind of anxiety that is much more problematic. It is a feeling that often does not have a clear reason and the sensations that we experience when we have anxious feelings do not go away or they are frequently recurring. We humans have a built in detection system that triggers when we are not feeling safe. We don’t have to get too technical because the neuroscience of anxiety is a bit complicated but it is helpful to know what is happening when the symptoms of anxiety occur. Our brain has a prefrontal cortex that is considered the location of our executive functions such as decision making, critical thinking and short term memory. Within the brain is the amygdala which is responsible for recognizing changes in the environment. It is called “the brain’s early warning system” (Wehrenberg & Prinz, 2007). The amygdala communicates with the limbic system which creates the context for a sensory system. Once this system is triggered the sympathetic nervous system regulates the arousal of the brain and the body. When danger is detected the sympathetic nervous system releases adrenalin and it is this natural chemical that causes all the uncomfortable sensations that are associated with anxiety: increased heart rate, tension in the muscles, elevated blood pressure, tension in the jaw, disorientation and lack of focus, shallow breathing to name a few.
What sets off the warning system? This is the interesting part because all of it is completely in your control to manage and, in some cases, eliminate. The system is triggered by your thoughts. A negative self-defeating thought sends an instant message that things are not right, that you are not safe, and the systems that I described above go into action. The adrenalin is released to give you more energy and strength to fight off, run away, or overcome the danger. You may have heard of this as “fight or flight”. That is the very simplistic description of what is going on in your mind and your body. When your alarm system is going off most of the time it can be very difficult to relax and renew.
The most effective way to deal with an anxiety driven life is
to address what is happening with your body and change the thoughts that are re-triggering the alarm. The quickest and most common tools for reducing the symptoms of anxiety are deep breathing. I suggest doing ten deep breaths from the diaphragm twice a day, morning and late afternoon or evening whether you are feeling anxious or not. Clinical studies report that when we breath properly and deeply the body releases a chemical that is calming. We also oxygenate our blood when we breath properly. In our modern busy world people are defaulting to shallow breathing causing fatigue and scattered thoughts.
We have so much positive evidence that exercise is the magic bulletin when it comes to mental wellness. I also hear that a sedentary lifestyle is the new smoking in terms of physical and mental health. We also need to eat well and regularly. You don’t need to live on kale salads but you do want to eat fresh food with healthy snacks every two hours. The Canada Food Guide recommends plant based foods so your snacks can be nuts and fruits. You want to make sure your body has enough fuel to keep you moving forward. Sleep is an essential ingredient to a healthy life. Reset your sleep schedule with a regular bedtime and rising time. Prepare yourself for bed by staying away from electronic devices for an hour before bedtime. Try listening to music or reading a book. Calm yourself so that your body can relax for sleep.
Changing your thoughts requires learning the strategies that will assist you to manage how and when your body gets triggered. The default thinking for anxiety and depression is negative thinking. You experience this through your self-talk. The most common and effective way to deal with your thoughts is cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT). Quite often your doctor will suggest this therapy for both anxiety and depression. Essentially CBT is the relationship between thinking, feeling and acting. What I think causes me to have a feeling, causing me to have an action/behaviour. This is a cycle that we all experience but when we start the cycle with a negative or irrational thought resulting in a negative (bad) feeling it can perpetuate the anxiety cycle of worry, fear, threat and then adrenalin release brining with the uncomfortable and sometimes scary symptoms of anxiety.
