What to do with Anxiety in Your Body - Day 24 Break the Anxiety Cycle

Therapy in a Nutshell

Therapy in a Nutshell -Emma McAdam

Mental Health, Education, Health & Fitness:mental Health, Self-improvement, Health & Fitness

4.8 • 658 Ratings

🗓️ 28 March 2024

⏱️ 8 minutes

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Summary

Break the Anxiety Cycle in 30 Days: https://courses.therapyinanutshell.com/anxietyskills It’s common that when you feel anxiety, you have uncomfortable sensations in your body. An upset stomach, tight muscles, cold or sweaty palms, a headache, or fast breathing or heart rate. Our natural tendency is to try to make these feelings go away. To run from our body’s messages, to distract ourselves, to stay busy, to avoid these feelings in any way we can or to try to force them to change. And while this can work in the short term, or might feel less uncomfortable in the short term, it actually perpetuates the cycle, training your body to be more keyed up, more avoidant, and essentially afraid of itself in addition to whatever outside thing you were worried about. So, what can you do instead? In this video you’ll learn what to do with anxious sensations in your body. Looking for affordable online counseling? My sponsor, BetterHelp, connects you to a licensed professional from the comfort of your own home. Try it now for 10% off your first month: https://betterhelp.com/therapyinanutshell Learn more in one of my in-depth mental health courses: https://courses.therapyinanutshell.com Support my mission on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/therapyinanutshell Sign up for my newsletter: https://www.therapyinanutshell.com Check out my favorite self-help books: https://kit.co/TherapyinaNutshell/best-self-help-books Therapy in a Nutshell and the information provided by Emma McAdam are solely intended for informational and entertainment purposes and are not a substitute for advice, diagnosis, or treatment regarding medical or mental health conditions. Although Emma McAdam is a licensed marriage and family therapist, the views expressed on this site or any related content should not be taken for medical or psychiatric advice. Always consult your physician before making any decisions related to your physical or mental health. In therapy I use a combination of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Systems Theory, positive psychology, and a bio-psycho-social approach to treating mental illness and other challenges we all face in life. The ideas from my videos are frequently adapted from multiple sources. Many of them come from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, especially the work of Steven Hayes, Jason Luoma, and Russ Harris. The sections on stress and the mind-body connection derive from the work of Stephen Porges (the Polyvagal theory), Peter Levine (Somatic Experiencing) Francine Shapiro (EMDR), and Bessel Van Der Kolk. I also rely heavily on the work of the Arbinger Institute for my overall understanding of our ability to choose our life's direction. And deeper than all of that, the Gospel of Jesus Christ orients my personal worldview and sense of security, peace, hope, and love https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/comeuntochrist/believe If you are in crisis, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Hotline at https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org or 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or your local emergency services. Copyright Therapy in a Nutshell, LLC

Transcript

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0:00.0	Understanding mental health struggles can be tough. That's why I created therapy in a nutshell to help make complicated therapeutic topics easy to understand and learn.
0:09.0	I'm Emma McAdam, a licensed marriage and family therapist, and this is the Therapy in a nutshell podcast.
0:15.0	These episodes don't replace the need for mental health professionals or the advice given by doctors, but they provide options,
0:22.1	resources, and skills that can help you in your journey to better your own mental health
0:27.3	or help those around you who may be struggling. If you want to find more resources or if you
0:32.9	want to learn about courses I offer on specific mental health topics, please stop by my website at
0:37.8	Therapy in a nutshell.com. Now let's jump in to this week's skill. It's common that when
0:43.0	you feel anxiety, you have uncomfortable sensations in your body, like an upset
0:47.9	stomach, tight muscles, cold, or sweaty palms, maybe a headache or like fast breathing or rapid heart rate. And our natural
0:58.6	tendency is to try to make these feelings go away, to run from our body's messages to distract
1:05.9	ourselves, to stay busy, to avoid these feelings in any way we can, or try to force them to change.
1:12.6	And while this can work in the short term, or it might feel less uncomfortable in the short term,
1:18.6	it actually perpetuates the cycle, it trains your body to be more keyed up, to be more avoided and essentially afraid of itself in addition to whatever
1:28.7	outside thing you were worried about. So what can you do instead? In this
1:34.4	video you'll learn what to do with anxious sensations in your body. Okay so your
1:39.8	tendency when you feel your stomach getting upset or when you feel your
1:44.0	heart beating fast when you feel your stomach getting upset or when you feel your heart beating fast,
1:45.2	when you feel these anxious sensations is to escape to perpetuate the anxiety cycle by avoiding
1:52.1	your body's own messages and sensations. But the more we struggle against our sensations,
1:57.8	the more intense they usually feel. That's because we're essentially telling our brain that these sensations, the more intense they usually feel. That's because we're essentially telling our brain
2:03.3	that these sensations are dangerous, that this feeling is going to harm us. Now, that's not working
2:10.1	right. And if we look at the anxiety cycle, we have this stimulus, like maybe an anxious sensation,
	...

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