How To Find Relief From Anxiety When Negative Thoughts Make You Feel Crazy And Hopeless And Fearful
Posted: Thursday, September 29, 2011
by Fran Larson
http://www.franniesquotes.com/
Some of us have been there. Actually, maybe more have been there than we would ever know. I am talking about that dark place of anxiety; the negative and scary thoughts that keep racing in your mind and seem to take over your whole life. How could this happen? Is there anything you could do to stop this?
One day you are fine. You love every moment of life. You are laughing with your friends and family; you are thinking how wonderful life is. Every morsel of food that you take in is probably the most delicious thing you have ever eaten. Every sunset is a glorious experience. Life is good. Then, suddenly without warning, a negative and scary thought enters your mind. It just comes out of nowhere. It is as if a gremlin dropped by, placed that thought in your brain and off he goes. It leaves you a little shaken because you can’t understand why you are so taken aback with this silly thought. You reason that there is nothing to be afraid of and try to go about your business.
There is only one problem. The gremlin comes to visit you again; this time with more fury and the thought is now scary. Again, you try and go about your business and now the gremlin comes to visit you at different times of the day. In fact, the very moment you wake up, before you could even put your feet on the floor, he is there. He is waiting for you. He wants these thoughts to begin early in the morning. It seems like a nightmare. You feel oddly. as if you are losing control.
Here is the worse part. The more you try to put the awful and scary anxious thoughts out of your head, either by pushing them back or trying to distract yourself, the stronger the thoughts. You can’t run away from them and pretty soon these thoughts have taken over your life. You have lost your appetite and are no longer interested in anything going on because you have been hijacked by the gremlin.
What Can You Do? Is There Hope For You?
Yes, there is definite hope for you. I ran across a wonderful article and have permission to share part of it with you:
Telling yourself to stop worrying doesn’t work—at least not for long. You can distract yourself or suppress anxious thoughts for a moment, but you can’t banish them for good. In fact, trying to do so often makes them stronger and more persistent.
1“Thought stopping” backfires because it forces you to pay extra attention to the very thought you want to avoid. You always have to be watching for it, and this very emphasis makes it seem even more important.
But that doesn’t mean there’s nothing you can do to control your worry. You just need to try a different approach. This is where the strategy of postponing worrying comes in. Give yourself permission to worry, but put off thinking any more about it until later.
Postponing worrying is effective because it breaks the habit of dwelling on worries in the present moment. Yet there’s no struggle to suppress the thought or judge it. You simply save it for later. As you develop this ability, you’ll start to realize that you have more control over your worrying than you think.
In order to break these bad thinking habits and stop the worry and anxiety they bring, you must retrain your brain.
Start by identifying the frightening thought, being as detailed as possible about what scares or worries you. Then, instead of viewing your thoughts as facts, treat them as hypotheses you’re testing out. As you examine and challenge your worries and fears, you’ll develop a more balanced perspective.
1.This small portion reprinted with permission from Helpguide.org © 2001-2010. All rights reserved. For more information, visit www.Helpguide.org.
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Top-level comments on this article: (1 total)This is great advice, Fran! Thanks for sharing this.
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