Does anxiety trap you in an unhelpful reality?
I was reading about Corby Schapelle today. She is in prison in Bali for allegedly smuggling drugs into the country in her surf board bag. It seems that she is emotionally very low and has become extremely fearful and paranoid of everyone around her. This can be caused by extreme stress. Of course her innocence or guilt has been debated since she was tried. In any event, what a difficult time she is having coping with her situation.
I’m currently completing my NLP Master Practitioner training. NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) can be described in lots of ways, and one of those is that it is a behavioural science. It has so many applications in business and everyday life, helping enormously to improve communication. One of the principles of NLP is that an important part of communicating with others is to understand their map of the world so that you can join them in their reality. Once you understand their reality you can communicate with them much more easily and effectively.
One of the exercises we did during the weekend reminded me of a couple of experiences I have had over recent years when I got really anxious and it has lasted for several days. On each occasion something triggered me – a real fear I had about something was brought to the surface, and somehow that fear grew and grew, almost feeding itself. I became more and more anxious and my reality became more and more removed from everyone else’s. The problem was that at the time I didn’t realise what was happening and thought that the thoughts in my head were real. In fact I thought my thoughts WERE me. The first time it happened I was alone in a strange country and that added stress to an already difficult situation.
It took me a long time to realise that I had in fact created a reality based on my fear and then continuously looked for, and found of course, the evidence that confirmed that fear. It became a self-fulfilling prophesy.
So what’s my point? Well, firstly that there are many versions of reality. They are based on what is going on in a person’s head, their beliefs and values, and what they have experienced in their life so far. Some people’s versions of reality are much more supportive of their life than others. The person who looks for the good in events and people is much more likely to find exactly that than the person who looks for the bad.
The other point is that being aware of how you create your own unuseful reality is very helpful. When you know how you do anxiety, you are more likely to be able to stop it getting out of control. If you know how to do something, you know how not to do it. You are less likely to be fooled by the “voice in your head” which tells you all sorts of ghastly things. (On our course we call this voice Brian!)
I realised that I had created my own unhelpful reality by going into a downward spiral of worry triggered by some event. I have a few things which really manage to get me going! Once the fear had been triggered, and worried about for a while, I just added more and more fears on top – the voice in my head went – “well first this will happen, then that will happen. Then what if that happens. Well then that will happen. And that will be really terrible. And I will never cope.” And so on
Being aware of what was going on in my head really helped me to deal with it. I developed resilience by finding and using some good coping strategies. Now I know when I have signs of anxiety I need good sleep, good food, water and exercise. I know I need the company of good friends who understand what I am experiencing and are willing to support me without judgement. I know I need to distract myself by listening to music or going to a good movie, spending time with friends and increasing the endorphins (these are the body’s ”good mood” chemicals) in my body as soon as possible. I challenge my own thoughts by asking “is that really true” or “what else could that event or behavious mean”. I also need to remind myself that the anxiety will pass. And it always has.
Some of us are better at finding what’s wrong with the world than others. That’s not always helpful. Seeing life through more positive glasses can be developed – it’s a matter of developing new habits which will in turn create new pathways in our brain that make seeing what’s good increasingly easy. I can help you develop more positive thinking habits. Contact me here for information about my coaching services
