How to look at anxiety in a completely different way!
When I first set out to research my own crippling anxiety, I wasn’t looking for anxiety relief. I didn’t want the latest drug, herbal tea, essential oil, aromatherapy, or the countless other suggestions I had heard about. I didn’t want to ease my anxiety symptoms with band-aids.
What I wanted was to understand what my anxiety was and how I got to that state. I wanted to find my own way through and being a visual person, it became easier to understand my anxiety if I looked at it in a completely different way.
I now look at Anxiety as a destination.
The starting point can be anywhere. Anywhere can be a worrying thought, a sliver of doubt, an unscheduled meeting, or an unexpected phone call.
When you’ve spent a lot of time travelling to Anxiety, your brain remembers the route and wants to get you there as quickly as possible. Your brain is efficient like that. It knows that every time you think a certain way, you feel a certain way, so it doesn’t spend energy looking for an alternative.
Over time, your brain builds a sort of superhighway to get you from where you are to where you always go. For anxiety sufferers—Anxiety becomes your final and only destination.
But what if you had a choice to get off the highway?
On the journey to research my anxiety, I discovered that I always took the highway and arrived at my destination in record time. Years of taking the same route had resulted in my brain using cruise control to get there. I never once thought I had the power to change my direction or to even stop along the way.
With practice, I could visualize the process. I learned to stop as soon as I realized I was heading to Anxiety and pause for a moment before continuing. Soon I found myself not continuing at all and heading home instead. But that had me thinking…
If I could choose to stop on the highway, could I choose a different route altogether?
As a young child—long before I’d built the highway—I used to take the back roads passing many places along the way. Named Doubt, Worry, and Fear, those places became familiar, but I was afraid to stop there. Afraid of what I would find if I lingered, so I drove on past and didn’t stop until I got to my destination.
Over time I built my own subconscious highway, often finding myself right in the middle of Anxiety without any idea how I got there.
Now after taking the time to explore each place along the way, I am aware of what they look like. I know how they feel and each one adds to my discomfort.
Doubt doesn’t look like much, but it brings a gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach, slowly building with every mile. I see Worry ahead, and my heart beats faster as I race to distance myself from it. By the time I get to Fear my pulse is racing, and nausea is taking a firm hold.
Within minutes—I reach my final destination—Anxiety.
It is here where I’m stopped in my tracks. It is here where I desperately search for a way out, any escape from the terror that surrounds me. I know that on the outskirts of Anxiety there’s a place called Panic and if I wander too far out it gets harder and harder to breathe. All I can do is hang on and wait, hoping I’ll survive with little damage. Anxiety and Panic take a heavy toll, and you always pay the price to leave.
I haven’t driven that highway in a very long time.
I don’t miss it.
Sometimes, I feel myself moving towards Doubt, Worry or Fear. I feel the familiar gnawing in the pit of my stomach, but it no longer scares me. I can stop there and breathe. Inhale. Exhale. I pause and look at where I am. The pause gives me time to examine how I got there. It gives me time to identify the thought that had driven me there.
Was the thought true or was it based on assumptions, beliefs, and lies?
Was I blinded by my own ego? Was I making this all about me?
Addressing those questions and looking for the truth enables me to see the situation for what it is. Those places I had always feared were not really there. I had created them with my thoughts.
When I first tried to get off the highway, I sometimes missed the first exit and kept going. It’s a lot like driving somewhere familiar and not knowing how you got there. But as soon as I realized I was still on the highway, I looked for the next exit.
There’s always a next exit.
Taking an exit means that I can still pass through Doubt or Worry, but I don’t reach Anxiety. I don’t reach Panic.
Over time, I stopped getting on that highway altogether. Eventually, I dismantled it.
I take a different route now.
As soon as I feel that familiar knot in my stomach, I stop at a place called Awareness. It is here where I stay. It is here where I ask the questions, and it is here where I can clearly see things for what they are.
The journey has been full of twists and turns, and I’ve hit the ditch more than a few times, but my new destination has been worth it. Anytime I find myself on the road, I know I have the ability and the power to choose my destination.
Anxiety is no longer a place on the map!
You can read more about my journey here.
