by Janelle Legge | Jul 23, 2020 | Anxiety
Anxiety coping strategies for uncertain times lead to good mental health, more awareness, resilience, happiness, inner peace and calm. There’s the old saying “knowledge is power” and I’d add to that for today “awareness” is not only power, but the most potent way for you to disengage from collective fear and panic that’s just not serving anyone.
Never before has it been more critical to become more self aware, educated and informed so that you can take a more objective and constructive view of things.
When you’re being presented for months on end with statistics without any kind of meaningful or relevant context you have to step back and ask “What’s not being said/explained?”. Why aren’t the improvements, the recoveries and mildness of 98% of coronavirus cases being highlighted also? Why isn’t the fuller context being given?
You have to wonder about the level of consciousness of the people generating and broadcasting such negative messaging night after night – messaging that’s potentially far more harmful because of the mass fear and anxiety it creates which as we’re seeing has devastating mental, wellbeing, economic and societal impacts.
It’s widely known now how harmful stress, worry and negative thinking are to our immune systems and overall physical and mental health. The quality of our thoughts have a direct impact on our health, productivity, self-confidence and relationships.
5 Anxiety Coping Strategies For Uncertain Times
#1 Stay focused on the present moment and what’s going well
Let’s choose instead to focus on the present moment and the positives – where you have the most power and agency. Looking after yourself mentally, spiritually and physically so that you’re more present for yourself and the people who depend on you.
#2 Be the gatekeeper of your mind and focus
Key to this is taking care of your daily mindset and mental health – being the gatekeeper of the quality, accuracy and usefulness of the information you expose yourself to so that you’re not being bombarded and assaulted each day with alarmism which perpetuates feelings of fear and powerlessness and becomes addictive and hypnotic for some.
There are more positive and constructive sources of information out there if you use discernment and switch off from the nightly drama of sensationalist style news.
#3 Develop critical thinking skills
And if you don’t use critical thinking skills or listen to your own instincts and commonsense, particularly when you’re in uncharted terrain, you’re constantly giving your power away and that’s when you can slip into feelings of helplessness and inner despair.
#4 Take time out to detox your thinking, replenish and reboot
Even if you can only grab 15 minutes alone time for yourself each day, it’s worth the effort. Regular time out allows you to turn down the noise, clear out repetitive, negative thoughts and connect in with yourself and your own inner wisdom and guidance. For some people that’s having time out at their local cafe, for others it’s yoga, swimming, running, walking in nature or regular journaling. Find what works best for you and make it a regular date with yourself.
#5 Believe in yourself and learn how to hold the longer view
What you say to yourself every minute of each day is powerful. Staying grounded and at the same time optimistic and confident in your own abilities are vital skills during uncertainty. Regularly reminding yourself that you are strong, capable, healthy and resourceful builds self confidence and self belief. As does developing the stamina and resilience to be able to hold in mind the longer range view – that this situation will eventually become yesterday’s news. It’s about focusing on how you can use challenging situations to emerge healthier, more resilient and more aware.
Tags: Anxiety Coping Strategies, Anxiety Relief, Coronavirus, COVID 19, Fear, Health, How to back yourself, Mental Health, Mindfulness, Positive Mental Attitude, Positive mindset, Power of daily rhythms, Practice Self Care, Present moment, Purpose led living, Rewiring your brain for success, Self Awareness, Self Empowerment, self-care, Toxic Thoughts, Wellbeing, Worry
by Janelle Legge | Aug 16, 2016 | Anxiety |
Knowing how to make good decisions that support you is vital to living a fulfilling and self-directed life. It’s how you reach, and then exceed your potential. So if you’re constantly being pushed around by fear-based, anxiety driven thinking, it’s time to stop listening to your Lizard fear-brain and start making decisions from a more empowered place.
Fear-based thinking seems to be on the rise. This makes sense given what’s going on around the world. We’re living in incredibly fast-changing and dynamic times. Change is something that your Lizard brain, the more primitive part of your brain that takes care of fight, flight or freeze responses, just doesn’t like. But when you’re letting this survival-driven part of your brain run the show and inform all of your important decisions, you’re dramatically limiting the scope of your choices in life. And when you constantly do this you end up stagnating. You feel even more frustrated, anxious and uncertain.
Knowing how to make good decisions in life that aren’t subconsciously driven by fear is the antidote to resisting change and getting stuck at your current level of success.
Flipping From Fear To Self Confidence: How To Make Good Decisions
#1 Centre And Ground
The first essential step to learning how to overcome fear is knowing how to centre and ground yourself. This instantly puts you into the present moment. And when you’re fully in the moment, you’re not ruminating on the past or constantly fast forwarding into the future. You’re then able to self-reflect.
Here are some effective ways to do this:
Breathing techniques, moving meditations like yoga, drawing, painting, gardening, swimming, body work – any activity that gets your attention fully immersed and engaged in the now and that grounds your energy is always the first step in disengaging from your Lizard brain’s fear-based, worst case scenario thinking. It’s getting out of your head and into your body and the Now.
#2 Trust Your Intuition and Gut Feel
When you know how to stop getting caught up in negative thinking and self-defeating scripts you’re able to screen out all the noise and tune into your intuition and gut feel on what’s best for you. Often you already know what’s going to bring you the most joy, fulfilment and opportunity. But when you’re constantly letting your Lizard brain butt in and tell you why it’s not such a good idea, you end up doubting yourself, and can’t see the woods for the trees.
That little voice deep down inside of you is there for a reason.
The more you listen to it and take what it’s trying to tell you seriously, the stronger and more valuable it becomes. Intuition is a valuable source of data. An energetic, non-verbal read on what’s going on within and around you. Most successful people totally get the value of it. But it often gets dismissed as ‘woo woo women’s fluff’ in the West because it’s not logical or considered to be evidence-based. Yet the more you ignore your intuition, the more frustrated and unfulfilled you end up in the long run. So stop listening to the limbic-brain, fear-based people around you, and start paying attention to what your intuition is trying to tell you. It will change the quality of your present and future life.
#3 Surround Yourself With Positive Self-Confident People
To maintain a positive mindset so that you’re able to make good decisions, you need to have self-confidence and self-belief. If you’re struggling to take control of your Lizard brain and learn how to make good decisions in life that support and nourish your body, mind, and spirit – then you need to seek out positive can-do types who already know how to do this.
This is the fastest way to learn any new skill. Subconsciously you’ll start to absorb and model aspects of their behaviours, mindset, attitudes, and beliefs. That’s also why you need to be discerning around who you choose to spend the most time with. Because you’re impacted the most by the 3 to 5 people around you each day. So make sure they are people who are positive self-actualizers.
Don’t waste years buying into a part of your brain that’s just not designed to encourage you to seek out new opportunities and growth. Irrational fears, inner-resistance, and anxiety-driven faulty beliefs are the biggest success killers around. They create all kinds of maladaptive, negative thinking habits and behaviours that can be tricky to dismantle and replace with more realistic and supportive ones if you’ve been holding onto them for years. Save yourself time and sort it out now so that 10 years later you’re not in the same spot, feeling frustrated and exhausted.
