If you have anxiety, even if you've had it all your life, can you actually get rid of it? Well, in order to answer that question, you need to answer this one.
Can you think? Because, if you can think, you can change.
If you can think and have anxiety, you can think and NOT have anxiety.
Let's look at it this way.
What happens when you get anxious? Does your breath come in spurts? Does your stomach clench? Do you get a headache? Picture your body going through whatever it goes through when you get anxious.
Look at the TV screen in your mind, put an image of you on it, and imagine or pretend you can see your body going through an anxiety attack.
What's happening to your body? Is it doubling up, shriveling up? When you find yourself going within, you are, in effect, tightening up every cell in your body.
The results are not pretty.
Once your cells start tightening up, they can't stop.
Pretty soon they are shriveled and squashed together, much like a balloon with all the air sucked out.
Wait, it's not that they can't stop.
It's that they can't stop unless YOU stop them.
How do you stop them? You take a deep breath.
Now, look at your body on the screen in your mind.
Watch as you take a deep breath.
What is happening to all of your cells now? They are expanding with the deep inhalation.
Look! They are "un-shriveling.
" If your cells aren't shriveled up, you aren't experiencing anxiety as you knew it! Man, what a revelation! And, if your cells aren't shriveling up, chances are your stomach isn't getting uptight, your muscles aren't bunching, your headache isn't forming, etc.
Now, let's see what happens when you take a deep breath at the very beginning of an anxiety attack.
Breathing is one of the first things anxiety affects.
However, if you are able to take a deep breath, deep breaths are relaxing.
Wait a minute.
You can't be anxious AND relaxed at the same time? Right? Right.
Now, to keep your mind busy, when you take a deep breath say to yourself, "I am taking a deep breath.
" Say it very slowly until you stop inhaling.
Then, exhale.
Say, "I am letting out my breath.
" Say it very slowly until you stop exhaling.
Practice that now.
Think about things that give you anxiety attacks.
Take a deep breath.
Let it out slowly.
Say to yourself, "I am taking a deep breath.
" Say it very slowly until you stop inhaling.
Then, exhale.
Say, "I am letting out my breath.
" Say it very slowly until you stop exhaling.
Repeat the process.
Keep it up until your mind goes to something that doesn't cause anxiety attacks.
That's how successes are formed.
You continually think about the successful technique -- in this case the deep breathing -- and NOT that the anxiety didn't form, but instead think about how peaceful you felt.
TIP: You don't want to think about anxiety in any form.
You want to think about peace.
When you think about success, you aren't thinking about failure.
Failure, in this example, is anxiety.
And, hey, wait, get this! Thinking about anxiety caused more anxiety! So why think it? Thinking about success causes more success! A very important point to remember.
Empower yourself.
Your mind can only think of one thing at a time.
Choose what that thing will be.
Think about the dentist's/doctor's/lawyer's office, think about deep breathing and relax.
If you don't immediately relax, do the deep breathing exercises and think about relaxing until you do.
Think about the hospital's scent that always throws you for a loop, the classroom where you are about to take a test, the bank's office where you are about to apply for a loan, think about deep breathing and relax.
If you don't immediately relax, do the deep breathing exercises and think about relaxing until when? Until you do! After all, you aren't at those places right now, are you? So, it should be really easy to relax now.
Think about any time that upsets you, do the deep breathing exercises and relax.
Get your brain used to relaxing when faced with stress until it does so automatically.
Thanks for reading.