Kjdfl kshfwe iwekljfklahdflsh fjlashfklwej. Do you know what that says? Me neither. But that’s how an anxious brain feels sometimes. One intrusive thought makes its way in and suddenly it’s like a pinball machine in your head.
What if this? What if that? Your brain starts spiraling and thinking of so many potential scenarios.
Have you ever seen the movie Inside Out 2? They do a good job of showing how at first, anxiety looks like your brain trying to protect you from potential harm, so you allow it and plan for all possible outcomes. Until it leads to an explosive spiral that torments your mind all day and night.
It’s exhausting and I stinkin hate it. These intrusive thoughts play at your fears and emotions and leave you feeling crippled and doubting the truth and distracted from the present moment.
And what sucks is sometimes you get labeled as distant, quiet, shy, selfish, fearful, etc. One example is that my family would constantly get upset with me for not noticing messes around the house and not taking the initiative to clean it up. The issue wasn’t that I was being lazy. Majority of the time, I genuinely was not aware of it because even though it was in front of me, my mind had me on a roller coaster somewhere else. So what they thought was ignorance and selfishness, was actually me enduring battles of the mind all day and night on a non-stop loop.
It’s hard to explain to people who don’t understand. You fight and fight and try to push the thoughts away, only to be re-triggered from something else and pulled into another endless loop.
I became really good at making it look like I was present in most conversations, when in reality I was 50% there and 50% in battle against the thoughts. It’s not that I didn’t want to listen or didn’t care, I did! I’d start engaged and then BOOM! the thought creeps in and you don’t even realize you’ve drifted. So you try to pull yourself back into the conversation using nonverbal cues like nodding your head or trying to pick up on the last thing they said and get engaged in the conversation again.
I’m in Christian Therapy and they do a good job of acknowledging the spiritual side of anxiety vs the mental side. How the enemy tries to use it as a tool of distraction and confusion and there may be something spiritual that needs to be addressed. But other times it could be related to unhealed trauma that needs to be addressed through counseling and other therapy methods.
Here are some helpful tools that I’ve learned from my therapist that I hope will help you as well when you’re hit with anxious thoughts.
1. Scripture Breathing
- Find a scripture that encourages you. You will breathe in through your nose for 4 seconds. Hold it. Then speak a line of the scripture. Exhale 3 seconds out of your mouth. Then speak the next line. And repeat as many times as you need.
- Breathe in through your nose (1..2..3..4). “The Lord is my Shepherd.” Breathe out through your mouth (1..2..3). “I lack nothing.“
2. Deep Breaths
- Take a long deep breath in through your nose. Hold it. Then take one more quick inhale and hold for a second. Then breathe out through your mouth. Repeat as many times as needed. This helps turn your focus to your breathing and not your thoughts.
3. Color Scanning
- If you catch yourself in a spiral, pause yourself and jump into scanning your environment. Look for a color around you that stands out and call it out to yourself. Continue to look around and see if you find that color anywhere else (or a close color). Call that out. Continue as long as necessary. You can switch up colors or stay on the same one. This helped me take my attention from the what ifs to ground me back in the present moment.
- Blue sign. Blue car. Green grass. Green light. Green shirt.
4. Somatic Release
- If you notice that you are someone that tenses your body when hit with anxiety, you are not alone. I’m learning there is a bigger connection between our mind and body than I knew.
- Clenched fists: Unclench them and wiggle your fingers around.
- Tight shoulders: Open up your chest and push your shoulder blades back, roll your shoulders a bit.
- Tight throat: Massage the area, drink cold water
- Body caved in fetal position: Shake your arms and legs out, stand up, open up your arms/body
- This helps to release tension in those areas and because of that mind/body connection, it can help relieve some of those thoughts.
I hope you find these tools helpful. I’m not gonna lie, these haven’t fixed everything, but they do help lift the load and are a healthy way to cope as I continue my journey to get to the root of the triggers. I am no expert – just sharing what I’ve learned and found helpful from my experience.
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