This post seems like it’s too good to be true. Most of us feel like anxiety will be around forever. And for some, this is not far from the truth.
I don’t know when my anxieties started but I know that they have been around for quite a while. Anyone living in fear of simple little things in life knows what this is like. Fear. Shortness of breath. Excessive worrying. Inability to do the things you love because something is holding you back. All of these things threatened me. My anxiousness peaked a few years back in grad school when a friend of mine commented on my short breathing patterns and thought I needed to take a break and slow down. It was only then that I began to seek professional help.
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So why 2014? I didn’t actually plan for this to happen. I didn’t set out on a mission to eliminate my anxiety– in fact in the beginning of this year I likely thought I would never be able to get rid of it. It was just a part of my life. To be fair, I still have small bouts of it from time to time, which I think is normal. These little bouts no longer control my life. I also never took medications for my symptoms, so perhaps mine were not so severe. But that doesn’t mean that my anxiety wasn’t taking control of my life. In many ways it was.
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When I began to work with a professional this year the biggest thing I learned was that my anxiety was trying to tell me something. And that was the key for me to really understand it. It was like a blessing in disguise, telling me that something was wrong.
And after starting to dig deeper into my issues, this is what I learned:
– my worst anxieties happened after I would say yes to something that I really wanted to say no to, allowing the “follow through” to mildly terrify me
– if I was in a state of fear and didn’t want to move, the best thing I could do for myself was, in fact, to move, to do something
– I had a lot of clutter in my mind, of past relationships, of things that just weren’t working out for me anymore; and I chose to hold onto this clutter because I didn’t want to let go of my past and the identities that I had constructed for myself
– I was deeply tied to making my parents happy and fulfilling their dreams, even if they weren’t my own
– I was deeply tied to unrealistic financial and other goals of being “better” and “moving up the latter”, two things that I didn’t actually value deep down, but that I thought were expected of me.
Woah, that is a long list! But if you look really closely at this it all spells one thing: I was trying so hard to be someone that I wasn’t to please everyone around me. And once I let go of so many of these things and started to focus on things that really mattered to me, the anxieties led up. No joke. Getting rid of my anxiety was a by product of letting go. It has been an incredible feeling! I started saying no, thank you, to things that I wasn’t really into doing. I put a pause on the idea of climbing up the career latter because I actually really love my career right now. I began to practice more difficult yoga poses and got over the fear of falling on my face (and yes, I have fallen more times than I have succeeded). And I’ve begun to realize that everything will be ok. If I don’t make that big paycheck, if I say no to a friend, if I don’t buy a house right now or even ever, it will be ok. It will be OK because I will be at peace with the decision knowing that it was mine to make. It will be OK because the turbulence of doing things for others at my expense is greater than the praise that I might get for being everything to everyone. This year, I’ve started putting myself and my priorities first, and that has been the greatest gift that I could have ever received.
I hope that this can give someone at least some sort of inspiration that they CAN do it. Find out what is really bothering you and how you can make small changes to take control over your decisions. Everyone is different, everyone has different reasons of being afraid, but we all experience the same negative effects of that fear. In the end this is your health, your happiness and your life. Even if you start with small changes, or make that first appointment with a specialist, you are already making a difference and being proactive in your struggle. I am so glad that I did.
Stay Present,
xo Sara Lou
saralouyoga.wordpress.com 