Anxiety Can Be Managed Part 2: Mental Skills for Everyone
By Jean Bonnyman - FF/S
Do you ever listen to what you say to yourself in your own mind? We are constantly talking to ourselves, but not necessarily conscious of what we are thinking. Yet what we think to ourselves influences our feelings and behaviors. Without knowing it, we can get into “thinking habits,” and these can be a good influence or they can drag us down in some way, often with an unwanted dose of anxiety and/or depression.
Without being conscious of what we are thinking, like in the case of an emotional response, we can get the wrong ideas from what has happened to us. Add to this some outside influences on our body, like lack of sleep or too much caffeine, and we can be influenced negatively again. Still another influence is our environment, for instance when it is too stressful in some way. Finally, sometimes our brain might not work exactly right, perhaps a bit slow to develop or a little low on an important neurotransmitter. Brain science is still in its infancy, but this much is clear; we can influence our thoughts, emotions, body and behaviors by what we think.
In the first grade, Tim was the only student who couldn’t read. His teacher thought he was lazy and his classmates teased him. The dialogue that began running in Tim’s head was, “I am stupid. I am a loser.” He became depressed because of his environment and the negative, self-defeating thoughts in his head. Fortunately, Tim’s parents took him to a psychologist and also to get educational testing. It turned out Tim was a very bright child indeed; he was simply dyslexic. The psychologist helped Tim change his “self talk” and taught him skills to deal with his environment. Today, Tim is a very successful entrepreneur (dyslexic people often are) and he runs a large business. He always remembered what the psychologist taught him about listening to what he was thinking – stopping negative thoughts and inserting prepared positive thoughts. Anyone can do this for any scenario that causes, or has caused anxiety.
Turning negative, anxiety-producing thoughts into effective, realistic and helpful thinking is called Rational Emotive Therapy. It is widely used to manage anxious thoughts whether you are painfully shy, have social anxiety, panic attacks, or generalized anxiety. This practice is also taught to athletes by sport psychologists to manage stress and improve performance. In most cases it definitely helps to have a trained person as a “coach” until managing your thoughts becomes a habit, but there are also plenty of books available as a starting point. Changing your thoughts (your thinking habits) takes time, patience and persistence, but know that the human brain can change itself, and therefore change your behavior, your emotions, your body, your life!
Perhaps the most important thing to know about anxiety is that you don’t have to live with it. There is so much information available now about brain science, mental skills for happiness and success (in your terms), how to relax body and mind, how to contain worry, improve nutrition and physical health, and how to think your way to any realistic goal. Help is available for those who are willing to try. Sometimes people really do need to take medication to help their brain, but all people can benefit from learning mental skills and embracing the huge amount of help and information available today.
