Knowing how to stop anxiety would allow countless millions of people to cope with everyday life. One of the best ways to stop anxiety would be simply giving in to it. Now this may sound counterintuitive, but resisting or fighting the initial symptoms of anxiety is likely to only make them worse.
When you begin reacting negatively to anxiety your muscles become tense and you may begin gritting your teeth. Here is a four step approach I found by popular author Claire Weekes in her book titled “Hope and Help for Your nerves and Peace from Nervous Suffering”.
Face the symptoms of anxiety rather than running from them
When you attempt to suppress or hide from the early symptoms of anxiety it is a way of telling yourself that you cannot handle a particular situation. When this happens it is only going to create more anxiety and it is going to lead to more severe symptoms.
You will need to develop a more constructive mindset in order to cultivate a different notion. One excellent way of doing this is talking to yourself in a positive way when you notice the onset of anxiety. Once you’ve done this once it will be easier to do the second time around and so on.
Except what your body is doing rather than fighting against it
If you want to know how to stop anxiety one way of doing it is to accept what your body will do when you begin to feel anxious. If you attempt to fight your anxiety your body will simply tense up against it. You’re going to become even more anxious and you are going to enforce a negative attitude.
Your body is going to be in full control and you will suffer from such things as heart palpitations, chest constriction, sweaty palms, dizziness, and so on. By accepting what your body is doing when you feel severely anxious these symptoms will be kept to a minimum and will ultimately go away.
What you can do is watch or observe your body’s state of physiological arousal. No matter how intense the situation becomes do not react to it with further fear or anxiety.
Float with a wave of anxiety rather than trying to force your way through an episode
There is a strong distinction between first fear and second fear. First fear involves physiological reactions that cause anxiety. Second fear is when you do things to make yourself more anxious by talking to yourself in a negative way.
There isn’t very much you can do about the first type of fear, but you can get rid of the second type of fear by simply flowing with a wave of anxiety rather than reacting to it in a fearful fashion.
You don’t want to scare yourself about how you are feeling. What you want to do is move along with it by talking to yourself in a positive way in order to get yourself under control. Ultimately the wave will pass and you will become better at this with repetition.
Allow time to pass when feeling anxious
Knowing how to stop anxiety involves knowing how to control adrenaline. Severe anxiety and social phobias are created by a sudden surge of adrenaline. If you learn how to float with certain bodily reactions created by a surge of adrenaline then much of it will metabolize and be real reabsorbed in 3 to 5 minutes. 3 to 5 minutes is a very short time, and this can allow anyone to keep themselves well composed.
Anxiety and panic attacks will peak before they subside. But in order for them to pass by quickly you must not do anything to aggravate the condition further. If you try to fight against the wave of anxiety you will create even more fear. This is the second fear Claire Weekes was referring to in her book “Hope and Help for Your Nerves and Peace from Nervous Suffering”.
How to stop anxiety using coping statements
It is not enough to tell you that you should use positive self talk when faced with something that causes you to feel anxious. You need a few examples of coping statements you can use. Below are a few to get you started.
This feeling isn’t comfortable or pleasant, but I can accept it.
I can be anxious and still deal with this situation.
I can handle these symptoms or sensations.
This isn’t an emergency. It’s okay to think slowly about what I need to do.
This isn’t the worst thing that could happen.
These coping statements are powerful when faced with anxiety and the symptoms that come about because of it. You can learn how to stop anxiety in its tracks by implementing these and letting waves of anxiety die down quickly.