Control your anxiety before it controls you.
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Uncontrolled anxiety is a loop of worry that prevents you from living normally and communicating with people, prevents you from doing your job, and even causes suffering. That is why it is important to control it.
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Take these 14 simple ways to reduce anxiety and share them with your loved ones and friends.
Read also: 10 things to know if your partner has anxiety
1. Let it go!
When anxiety begins to interfere with you and take over your life at the most unwanted moment, do breathing exercises until the last symptoms of anxiety leave your body.
Inhale slowly and deeply, count from one to four, and exhale slowly. Repeat this simple breathing exercise until the anxiety subsides. By the way, you can repeat this exercise even when there is no anxiety. This is great for preventing anxiety.
2. Imagine that anxiety is a wave
Yes Yes. This is another great exercise for reducing anxiety. Imagine that your anxiety is a wave in the ocean. Don’t stand and fight the wave, but sink and swim under it.
Do not resist anxiety, do not prevent yourself from feeling it. But remember that she will not harm you. Tell yourself you can handle it, let the wave wash over you and pass you by, crash on the shore.
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3. Divide your responsibilities into smaller tasks
Do you have a lot of worries about work and you can’t start it because the tasks are big, and you can do less than necessary? Break your work into small tasks, plan them, put them in the planner and cross off what you have done. With small steps, you will be able to accomplish everything you have planned for yourself.
For example, you can use the tomato method to regulate the process of working on anything: work for 25 minutes, and then rest for 5 minutes.
Read also: 12 symptoms that indicate an anxiety disorder
4. Do not drink alcohol
Alcohol does not help to relax and reduce manifestations of anxiety and worries. At most, it can cause additional stress and deepen anxiety. Alcohol also disrupts sleep patterns, and quality sleep is a good way to control anxiety.
5. Do not use caffeine
It is better to forget about morning coffee or energy drinks during this period. War is a serious strain on the psyche, so you should not excite it even more, it can have a negative impact on your well-being.
6. Pet your pet
A cat and a dog, a parrot, a canary, a hamster or a rat — it doesn’t matter who lives in your home. This family member will never judge you. In addition, studies have shown that interaction between humans and animals reduces anxiety and the level of the stress hormone cortisol.
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7. Do needlework
Knitting, embroidery, beadwork — all this will allow you to relax and keep your hands busy. Needlework relaxes and allows you to think less about what is happening around you.
The preferred class time is one to two hours a day if possible.
Read also: 13 remedies for anxiety
8. Use your senses to center yourself
We usually worry about things that haven’t happened yet. This famous “what if…” wreaks havoc on our psyche. Excessive focus on a bleak imaginary future only deepens anxiety, so experts recommend using all your senses at such moments.
Focus on what is happening right now around you, thanks to what your five senses feel.
9. Keep your hands busy
Squeeze an anti-stress ball, play with a bouncer and other special toys to relieve stress. This gives the nervous energy a space to escape. By the way, even clicking a pen or washing dishes is suitable here.
10. Take a meditation break
The power of meditation is what is needed in anxious moments. Meditation will allow you to focus on slowing down your breathing and relaxing your muscles, and will relieve anxiety.
Practice meditation every day: first five minutes a day, and then ten, fifteen, twenty.
Read also: Action plan: how to gather and start working
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11. Put anxiety in the text
If a thought worries you, write it down in a kind of diary. It can even be a note on the phone. Set a reminder for yourself in a day and don’t return to that thought again until the alarm goes off. Will you get over it in a day?
12. Get out of an anxious environment
No, it wasn’t a call to get out of the bomb shelter during an air raid.
If you feel anxious, you can go outside — go out and walk for 10 minutes. If you cannot go outside, go to another room. If you are in a bomb shelter, close your ears and eyes and imagine that you are somewhere else.
13. Relax your muscles
Muscle relaxation is a technique needed to lower heart rate and lower blood pressure.
Starting from the toes and ending with the head or vice versa, tense each muscle group of the body in turn, and then relax those muscles. That’s how it works.
14. Charge
Exercise is a great way to relieve stress. Do not give up morning exercise if possible, it will help you relax and reduce the number of negative thoughts.
Read also: How to overcome fear of the unknown and anxiety about the future