How To Overcome Anxiety in Ely: 5 Steps To Regain Calm

If you’re struggling with anxiety here in Ely, then you are far from alone. Anxiety is one of the more prevalent mental health challenges and has always been the main thing that I successfully help people overcome. In this article, I’m covering five steps that can help you to start regaining calm.

Having been there myself, I know how debilitating, limiting and uncomfortable anxiety can be. It dominates your thoughts and sends them in all sorts of negative directions. You feel tense, agitated and overwhelmed. Week in and week out, I work with people who describe feeling anxious, even when they know there is no obvious reason to feel that way. There is always something to worry about and they struggle to switch off. Even the good times are tainted by the possibility that the anxiety could strike at any moment.

Anxiety makes everyday tasks and situations feel harder than they should. Sometimes the anxiety takes over completely.

Anxiety runs on habitual, repeated patterns. In similar situations and circumstances you experience anxious thoughts, feelings and behaviours. With the right strategies, tools and support you can interrupt and redirect this pattern. You can calm your mind, take back control over your thoughts and feelings and start feeling more capable and confident.

In this article I’m covering five simple steps you can use to start overcoming anxiety and feeling calmer again.

 

Overcome Anxiety and Regain Calm

Here are five steps to help you to overcome anxiety. These are the same kind of things that I cover with my anxiety clients in Ely, Newmarket and online (although we include a lot more besides these too!).

 

1. Recognise What Is Happening

Some people choose to ignore their growing anxiety or seek to rely on just avoiding things that lead to uncomfortable feelings and unwanted thoughts. The problem with anxiety is that it can start to spread and grow into more areas of your life. Or you reach the point where you just can’t avoid the things you’ve hidden from for so long.

Anxiety is a normal human reaction. It’s your mind and body’s way of trying to protect you and keep you safe from harm, threat and danger. We are all designed to experience those thoughts and feelings when faced with danger. However, problematic anxiety is like an oversensitive alarm that has got stuck in the ‘on’ position. You are stuck in alert mode ready to deal with a threat that isn’t there (except maybe inside your own perception and thinking).

Start to think of your anxious thoughts and sensations as being just signals. Your mind and body are overprotecting you. When you think of it as a faulty signal, you can start to respond with a sense of calm awareness rather than fear of frustration. This starts to help you to calmly take back control.

Many clients find that even ditching the label ‘anxiety’ helps. After all, it’s just shorthand for a whole load of stuff without ever actually saying what you are experiencing. Instead break it down into thoughts, feelings and behaviours. It can feel easier to change if you break it down into what you are doing and how you are doing it. After all, you have hundreds of non problematic thoughts, feelings and behaviours every day so you know you can do things differently.

Start describing things in actual terms such as ‘my chest feels tight’ or ‘I notice I am imagining a future scenario in my head’. Shifting to actuals can make a big difference to how capable you feel to make small positive changes.

 

2. Breathe And Ground

Two things happen when you feel anxious. Firstly, your breathing rate accelerates and becomes shallow and quick. Your body takes in the oxygen you need ready to tackle the perceived threat. This can feel disorientating and uncomfortable. It feeds the cycle of stress and tension.

The more you manage your breathing, the more you control how you feel. Start practising breathing techniques. A simple one is to breathe in for a count of 7 and out for a count of 11. The key is that the breath is longer. Practice this when you don’t even need it so it becomes second nature and you get good at it. Then, at the first sign of rising anxiety, you’ll be able to nip it in the bud by quickly controlling your breathing.

Secondly, when anxiety strikes, your thoughts start to race off to future imagined, worst case scenarios. You need to interrupt thoughts by bringing your focus back to the present moment.

You can use the 3-3-3 rule for anxiety that I’ve covered here: 3-3-3 Rule For Anxiety

Or, alternatively, try the 5-4-3-2-1 method for anxiety that is explained here: 5-4-3-2-1 Method for Anxiety

These strategies help ground you in the present so that your mind doesn’t get lost in imagining the worst happening in the future.

 

3. Challenge The Anxious Thoughts

Anxiety loves to creep in with the ‘what if’ stories. What if something goes wrong? What if you make an idiot out of yourself? What if they realise you aren’t good enough? What if I can;t cope? The stream of negative thoughts can seem endless.

The more time and space that anxious thoughts have in your head, the more they expand. Thoughts grow through having time, space and attention. You get caught up in the fear creating, worst case scenarios and your anxious feelings increase.

You don’t want to just let anxious thoughts do their own thing inside your head. As I often tell clients, never leave anxiety to do it’s own thing. Using Cognitive Behavioural Hypnotherapy and Solution Focused Hypnotherapy, I help clients to learn how to challenge, dispute, change and dilute those thoughts rather than automatically engaging in them.

Start holding your thoughts up to some scrutiny. Ask yourself whether the thought is based upon fact or fear. Start to weaken the grip of anxiety and gain a clearer perspective. One of my favourite approaches to negative thoughts is to consider whether what I am thinking is fact, with solid evidence to support it, or am I just making it up in my head. We all make up lots of things without ever noticing we are doing it. And if you undermine anxiety by realising you are doing so, then you can start to make up more beneficial, helpful and empowering things instead.

 

4. Take Time To Relax and Reset

In the context of our busy lives, it can sometimes feel hard to take some time out to relax and reset. With anxiety, the need to relax gets greater but finding the right way to do it can feel harder. Anxiety is mentally and physically exhausting. You need to give your brain some time off from all those racing thoughts.

Hypnotherapy is a powerful way to calm your mind and body. You can learn to feel more calm, balanced and in control. Through guided self hypnosis you train your mind to relax more deeply. Like any skill, the more you calm your mind and body, the better at it you get. It’s an effective method for quietening anxious thoughts and developing inner calmness. Even better, the positive results start to ripple into the rest of your life too.

There’s a brief guided self hypnosis for calm and confidence here: Guided Self Hypnosis for Calm and Confidence or you can instantly access my free Rapid Relaxation hypnosis download here: Rapid Relaxation Hypnosis Download

 

5. Get The Right Support

Sometimes, anxiety can feel too overwhelming to manage alone. That’s where expert professional support can make a huge difference. You get help to focus on the right aspects in the most effective way to quickly and effectively get beneficial results.

Because going to a therapist can sometimes seem like a big step, I always encourage you to come for a face to face free consultation as the first step. I’m not a fan of telephone initial consultations. If you are going to work with me then I want you to have already met me in person and seen my working environment. I believe it’s a key factor in us successfully working together to overcome your anxiety.

In our sessions here in Ely and Newmarket, I use a combination of hypnotherapy, CBT, NLP, Time Line Therapy, coaching and a whole load of other therapeutic techniques to help you reduce anxiety, build confidence and move forward with calm control. You can take a look at what other people have said after their sessions here: Reviews

 

Help To Overcome Anxiety in Ely and Newmarket

If anxiety has been holding you back then please do keep a sense of hope, you absolutely can change how you feel. With the right approach, calmness, confidence and clarity are very possible for you.

You can learn more here: Overcoming Anxiety in Ely – Find Calm and Confidence with Hypnotherapy

Or do get in touch today to book your free initial consultation and discover how we can work together to help you overcome your anxiety. Call now on 01353 886158.

 

To your health and happiness, 

Dan Regan

Help To Overcome Anxiety in Ely, Newmarket and Online

 

Help to overcome anxiety in Ely, Newmarket and Online: Could use some help to tackle your anxiety? Struggling with anxiety, stress, worry and fear and need some help? Find out how I can help with a Complimentary Hypnotherapy Strategy Session. Learn more here: Appointments

Find out what hundreds of other people have said after their anxiety hypnotherapy sessions with Dan: Hypnotherapy Testimonials

And check out these popular and powerful hypnosis downloads that can start helping you right away with anxiety, confidence and more: Hypnosis Downloads