You’ve now developed AWARENESS of when your anxiety comes up, along with your Chronic Stress Response (CSR) or survival response, and where the anxiety originates from: is it amygdala-based or cortex-based? (refer to blog post: How to Live Well with Anxiety: part 4). Now, it’s time to start taking steps to change your CSR and alleviate your anxiety symptoms, in body, mind and spirit.

 

STEPS to RESET:

1)AWARENESS: be the ‘objective observer’ of your thoughts and when they become negative, anxiety-producing or head in a downward spiral or loop. This is the first step and, often, the hardest. You may want to set an alarm to go off 3 times/day and do your conscious check-in. Become an objective observer of your thoughts. If you find that your thought is not true, after questioning it, then it’s time to move on to your next thought. If it’s true, you can start the ‘worst case scenario’ exercise. There are so many simple exercises and tools to use. Just keep practicing and repeating them!

 

2)’STOP’: When you become aware of negative and unhelpful thoughts coming up, say aloud and with increasing energy and movement, “Stop; stop; stop!”

This gives your body and mind a ‘signal’ to stop and make a change. When you increase your emotional, mental and physical energy and keep repeating, you start to change the neural pathways (and circuits) in your brain.

 

3)REFOCUS: Next; it’s time to start refocusing your thoughts. You want to stimulate the ‘rest and digest’ response of your parasympathetic nervous system (PNS), to create a new and different thought and therefore, experience (not anxiety).

Your Reticular Activating System (RAS) gets stimulated to help your brain focus more specifically (ie: seeing red cars all over the place, when you’re thinking, and focusing, about buying one).

 

EXERCISE: Visualization for your Peaceful Place: close your eyes and, in your mind, visualize your own place, real or imagined, where you feel calm, centered, relaxed. Use all of your 5 senses. Let’s say you’re at a beach. Visualize seeing the ocean, smelling the ocean air, feeling your feet in the sand, hearing the seagulls and tasting the salt of the ocean air on your skin.

What you want here is to break away from your CSR and visualization helps! Your subconscious mind doesn’t recognize the difference between imagining something (visualization) or the reality of it really happening.

Once calmer, you can start responding and making decisions through your prefrontal cortex (responsible for rational thinking, decision making and executive functions), rather than through your limbic system, amygdala included  (responsible for your emotions and feelings).

 

4)If your anxiety originates in the amygdala, which is part of the limbic system (amygdala-based), then you want to concentrate on calming your body (refer to blog post: How to Live Well with Anxiety: part 4). Of course, calming your body allows your mind to calm.

 

TOOLS (for amygdala-based anxiety): deep breathing techniques, ‘hugging’ yourself, laughing, taking a cold shower or gargling with cold water (stimulating the vagus nerve, part of the PNS), shaking your body or dancing around, shaking off excess stress, tension and unresolved trauma held in the body. You want to do something to stimulate your PNS (rest and digest system) which, subsequently, calms your body. Then, your mind follows suit.

 

TOOLS (for cortex-based anxiety): which causes overthinking (which many of us recognize):

A) Questioning your Thoughts: “Is this thought true?” “Can I be absolutely sure that it’s true?” “How does my body feel, when it’s true and when it’s not?” If your body feels neutral or relaxed, your thought is, most likely, true. If your body senses tension, tightness or speeding up, then your thought is probably not true.

Just so you know; approximately 97% of all our thoughts are just NOT true, even though we think and believe they are………Also, around 95% of our fears and fearful thoughts, never come to pass. Have you noticed this? Remember it!

 

B) Refocusing and Reframing your thoughts. You want to STOP and change the negative Chronic Stress Response feedback loop, repeating itself in your brain.

 

Some TOOLS for Refocusing and Reframing:

A) specific morning routine ( and other tools and exercises), combining emotional, mental, physical and spiritual energy and effort.

B) evening routine: of gratitude(3 things you’re grateful for, big or small) and self-gratitude (3 things you’re grateful for about yourself).

C)thought and action reframing, using the tools of Mindset Coaching and/or Hypnosis.

 

You may want to set an alarm to go off 3 times/day and do your conscious check-in. Become an objective observer of your thoughts. If you find that your thought is not true, after questioning it, then it’s time to move on to your next thought.

As with all of these tools, the more you repeat and practice, the faster the neural pathways and circuits in your brain will start rewiring and you’ll find new, more positive and helpful thought patterns. These tools are simple and repeating them 3 or more times/day, will allow your brain to change over time (with repetition and practice), therefore changing your body to a calmer, less anxious state. You’ll begin to make decisions which are less based on anxiety and more based from the more rational part of the mind, the prefrontal cortex. It doesn’t matter what kind of anxiety you have, whether it be from trauma, chronic symptoms, fatigue, pain or excess stress.

You can change your brain and mind to change your life. Hello to more joy, calm and contentment and to the authentic you (in your calmer growth mindset)………. ready to live your biggest, boldest and most fulfilling life!

 

With smiles and love,

Dr Gigi

 

PS: Learn more about these tools and how you can live well with Anxiety @www.gigiarnaud.com or DM me!

You can do this! I’ve got you……..!

 

Change your Mind (Thoughts) to Change your Life!