Izzy Kiver shares practical ways to manage anxiety spikes: first, try leaving the stressful situation if you can. If you can't, pause and breathe deliberately, then use phrases like "this too shall pass" to remind yourself the feeling is temporary. Recall times you've handled harder things.
Is there a way to manage anxious thoughts better and easier? The first thing I would recommend, anytime you are facing a situation where you feel that anxious thoughts are coming to you quite often, is to change your environment, change the situation which you're in in order to avoid being triggered or
placed in those situations. Sometimes it could be going out into the woods, hiking, doing something out of nature, away from the environment that's creating the stress and anxiety. Sometimes that's not possible, right? Sometimes you can just leave a crying baby, you can go out and ignore your responsibilities, and you're still stuck with the anxiety of what's next, of what do I do in this situation? In those cases, a very powerful technique I have found, is taking a moment
to breathe,
stop for a moment, and realize that this is okay. This too shall pass, and it's not
going to be forever. Whether you're on a plane with a
crying baby,
whether you're stuck in traffic, or you're in a situation where you feel like this is the worst moment of your life,
remind yourself, this too shall pass. You've gone through more difficult things, I'm sure, and you'll get through this as well. Another really powerful thought that comes to mind is that if you are in a relationship with someone or you are
in any sort of internal conversation and
one person gets upset at you, maybe over the phone, through text or otherwise, you can focus on your own emotions without automatically getting wrapped up in the other person's emotions. What this looks like is typically if someone starts to fight with you, or they blame you for something you may want to defend, or you start feeling anxious at that moment, it's important to realize that you're able to detach yourself from the other person's emotions and feel okay not responding or not reacting and just being okay with yourself in that moment. And this is very powerful because oftentimes in relationships, things escalate because we're creating anxiety for the other partner. Now, if you can be strong and stop for a moment to focus, understand this is the other person's emotion, and that's okay.
