3 Self-care actions to help you calm your anxiety and reclaim your life
In this week's podcast we're sharing three of our favourite self-care actions to help you calm your anxiety and reclaim your life.
1. Read
Read inspiring books, spiritual books, uplifting stories of triumph over adversity. Avoid drama, or sad real life stories. Instead, look out for books that will feed your mind engaging and encouraging words.
Anxiety will say you don't have time. Anxiety would rather you scroll on Facebook, or play Candy Crush, or watch TV. Anything to engage you in a mindless passing of the time, trying not to think.
The truth is, we all have the same amount of time. Try reclaiming some time for reading by swapping TV or scrolling time for picking up a book instead.
Ananga: I have a friend who reads loads by reading every day with her breakfast. She has a book stand in her table with the book already open and I'm surprised at how many books she gets through.
What are we reading?
Ananga:
Lost and Found in India by Braja Sorensen
100 Days of Solitude by Daphne Kapsali
Shann:
Warrior Goddess Training by HeatherAsh Amara
Dragonfly in Amber by Diana Gabaldon
The Subject Tonight is Love: 60 Wild and Sweet Poems by Hafiz
Some of our recommended reads for self-support:
The gifts of imperfection by Brene Brown
Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Won't Stop Talking by Susan Cain
2. Write
Buy two notebooks: one to use as a brain dump, and one for collating the nuggets of hope and wisdom you from your reading.
The brain dump journal can be as simple and cheap as you like. Keep it with you and use it for noting anxious thoughts that run through your mind.
Whatever comes up, write it out of your head and onto the page. There are no rules, you can make it messy, detailed, and personal. This is for your eyes only.
If you feel you have too many worries, to keep writing them down, then make a pledge to write out one or two a day. The idea is to get into the habit of getting your thoughts out of your head and on to the page.
The other journal is your book of hope, gratitude and happier thoughts. Use this journal to record quotes, daily gratitudes, and personal triumphs (no matter how small).
You can make it as simple or as beautiful as you like.
Anxiety sufferers also tend to be very creative people, so feel free to decorate your journal. Use colours, images, stamps, anything that engages you in expressing your creativity. You might like to look at Pinterest, or YouTube journaling tutorials for inspiration.
Getting creative will help engage your mind and leave less room for anxiety.
3. Release Using EFT Tapping
Tapping can help you put your brain dump journal to work in reclaiming your life from the grip of anxiety.
Here's how...
Read through your writing and underline the parts that hold the most emotional intensity for you.
If you're not already familiar with EFT, go to our EFT page and get our Tapping diagram.
When using Tapping you use some words to focus in on the area you want to release. You brain dump journal is the perfect place for finding the right words and working with your emotions.
For example: let’s say you wrote about a situation that made you anxious earlier in the day. Something like: “I felt anxious on the train today, I’m not comfortable being shut in with other people so close to me.”
You could turn your entry into a Tapping setup like: “Even though I felt anxious on the train, I deeply and completely love and accept myself.”
or “Even though I’m not comfortable being shut in on the train with other people so close to me, I deeply and completely love and accept myself.”
Then start tapping the EFT points through, as shown on our diagram. As you start Tapping, you will begin to feel more calm about the situation. You may also find ideas come to you about how you might handle it differently next time.
Discover how to master EFT Tapping with our EFT Tapping for Anxiety Relief course
