5 Tips for Quick Anxiety Relief in Your Body and Brain | Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Tools

Hey there everybody, and welcome to Today's live presentation, 5 Tips to Calm youm Anxiety. I'm your host, Dr. Donnelly Snipes. Five Tips. Now, there are a lot of different ways to process your anxiety or calm your anxiety, but let's talk about a few that I find particularly helpful. Number one, recognize anxiety for what it is. Anxiety is part of the fight or flight response. It's your body's way of identifying the fact that there might be a threat. I've made the analogy before that it's like your body's smoke alarm. Smoke alarms are not always 100% accurate. They can be set off by a steamy shower or by a really strong wind or whatever. You can get a lot of false positives with smoke alarms. Same thing's true with our anxiety and our anger. Sometimes when we experience a situation similar to one we experienced in the past that was threatening, we may perceive it as threatening now, even though the situation is totally different, it's similar, but it's actually not a problem now. So it's important to recognize that it's your body trying to tell you there might be a threat and give you the energy through that activation of the HPA axis. Give you the energy to actually get up off the couch and check and see if there is a threat. It doesn't mean that you have this energy and that you have to run, that you have to fight. It means it's just allowing you to have the resources you need just in case. Learn your anxiety. Vulnerabilities and Triggers Vulnerabilities are things that make you more likely to react to a situation with a stronger than normal reaction for you. So vulnerabilities can be like being overtired, being sick, being in pain, being in a large crowded area, or being in an area where there's a lot of hubbub going on or where you feel just completely overwhelmed. Vulnerabilities can be physical. Like I said, sleep deprivation, sickness, pain, et cetera. Low blood sugar. It's another one. Vulnerabilities can be affective. If you're already anxious or angry or depressed or overwhelmed, then you're already primed to react to stress when with a more intense reaction. Vulnerabilities can be cognitive. If you are in a negative frame of mind where you are interpreting most things as catastrophic, then that can put you in a place where you're probably going to be more likely to have a more intense response. Vulnerabilities, as I mentioned, can be environmental. If you are one of those people who doesn't like to be in the middle of all the stuff. Stuff. And being in the middle of, for example, a classroom of six year olds is overwhelming to you, then that might cause you stress because you've got, you know, little ones running around everywhere. So you might be more likely to react with a more intense irritability or reaction. And finally, relationship vulnerabilities. If you are feeling bad about yourself, your self esteem's low, or if you are feeling unsupported, or maybe you're just around somebody who gets on your very last nerve, let's just put it out there. Then that may make you more vulnerable to respond to mild triggers with a more intense reaction. So vulnerabilities, it's important to be aware of these because a lot of them you can mitigate or you can prepare for. So let's take the example of if you didn't get enough sleep and you're not feeling your best, you have got to volunteer in your kid's kindergarten classroom where there's a bunch of little five year olds running around everywhere. And that's not really your thing to be managing 15 children. There are a lot of vulnerabilities there. So what can you do to to prevent your vulnerabilities from resulting in a more intense reaction? Breathing ahead of time, maybe calling in and saying, you know what, I can't volunteer in the classroom today. Sometimes you just gotta tap out. Triggers are the things that activate your anxiety or your anger. So when you're vulnerable, triggers are more likely to prompt an anxiety response. But again, your triggers can be physical. What physical things trigger your anxiety? Physical sensations, for example, what affective things trigger your anxiety? Maybe if you start feeling depressed, it might also trigger your anxiety because you start worrying that people are going to judge you for being depressed. Triggers can be cognitive. If certain things that you think or certain things that you learn trigger your anxiety triggers, a lot of triggers can be environmental sights, sounds, smells and relationships can also be triggers. Again, if you're around somebody who is stressful to be around, that can be a trigger for your anxiety. Or if you're around somebody and you have a fear of abandonment, then certain nonverbals that they have may trigger your anxiety. But being aware of those is important because as soon as you're aware, then you can take steps to more effectively evaluate. Is this a threat in this particular situation at this time? Number three, develop a relationship with your anxiety. I know that sounds really weird. Instead of trying to get rid of it, it's there to protect you. Develop a relationship with It. The first example I'll give you is Piglet. If you remember from Winnie the Pooh, Piglet had some anxiety. Let me tell you what. And, you know, it could kind of be stressful, I think, to be around Piglet, because he was always worried about stuff. However, getting to know Piglet and developing a relationship with him allowed he and Pooh to get along just fine. Recognizing that Pooh recognized that sometimes Piglet would get upset about stuff that Pooh didn't really see as threatening. Your anxiety is the same way. Sometimes your inner Piglet is going to get upset, and you look around and you go, you know what? It's not such a big deal. Mine is Lenny. And when I start having high levels of anxiety, my chest starts to feel tight. And I've named it Lenny. I literally call it my name. And I'm like, you know, Lenny's sitting on my chest today. And by doing that, it separates the anxiety from me. I don't have to be that feeling. I recognize that Lenny's there, and Lenny's not doing anything, but, you know, sitting on my chest. And Lenny will go away. But that's, you know, kind of how I personify it. In order to unhook from those feelings when you start feeling anxious. Scat. And when I say scat, I mean, like, scat, Scat, get away. Not scat, what animals leave on the ground. I recognized after I did that mnemonic that it could be taken either way. But scat stands for check to see if you're safe. Get mindful, look around, go, am I safe at this point in time? Is there any imminent threat to me in this context? Am I safe? Okay, so once you recognize that you are safe, then you can start taking steps to address those triggers that might be contributing to your anxiety. Smoke alarm going off, calming your anxiety isn't just about feeling anxiety and starting to breathe and going, okay, if I breathe for long enough, I'm gonna feel relaxed and the anxiety is gonna go away. No, as long as that amygdala is, you know, fired up and saying, hey, there might be a threat, it's gonna be hard to tone down that anxiety. So being aware of your triggers, developing a relationship with it so you don't feel like you have to react. You know, just because Pig was anxious doesn't mean you have to be anxious. And then addressing those triggers in the moment, looking around and going, okay, that's what's triggering me right now. What can I do about it? And finally develop an anxiety response plan that includes distress tolerance and square breathing. Now remember, square breathing. Inhale for four, hold for four, exhale for four, hold for four and repeat a couple of times. And this doesn't do everything, but it can help manually override the stress response. Like I said, in and of itself, that's not going to do everything. Because if you're still feeling anxious, if your brain is still screaming at you, hey, there's a problem, then they're going to be in competition. Distress tolerance are things like thoughts that you can have that encourage yourself to recognize. Okay, this sucks and I can get through it. I feel anxious and it won't consume me or I recognize that I feel anxious, I see no threat, therefore I'm going to engage in some other distress tolerant activity. But those are five things that you can do in order to handle in general. Handle anxiety sort of on the fly. Instead of fearing anxiety, instead of fearing fear, recognize its purpose, get to know it and help your brain become more accurate. Fine tune that smoke alarm over time so it gets triggered less often.