“Expectation is the Mother of All Frustration”

One of the hardest things about managing extreme anxiety is not being able to see progress. As humans we want to see progress quickly, but even more so, we just want to see progress. If you have anxious thoughts 1,000 times per day and now you have them 800 times per day, can you really see the difference?

Think about breathing tools for a moment. (Breathe in for the count of 4, hold for 7, breathe out for 8. Or breathe in calm, breathe out stress. Or put your hands behind your head, lean back and take some deep breaths. Or count to 5 as you breathe). What do you expect these breathing tools to do? Most believe they will "calm me down". What does it mean to be calmer? Maybe the heartrate will slow down, the shaking will stop and the racing thoughts will slow down. When that doesn't happen, people get frustrated and say breathing tools don't work.

Here's the thing. Breathing tools work 100% of the time. Our expectation of them calming us down immediately is wrong. When we expect something that doesn't happen, we often get frustrated, like Mr. Banderas says in that quote.

So how do breathing tools work 100% of the time? When we’re breathing calmly, the breathe is telling the survival brain I'm safe, don't send me anymore adrenaline. I don't need it. Our breath always signals to the brain raise the alarm or turn the alarm off. Breathing tools work 100% of the time. Adrenaline is a chemical and the only thing that makes it reabsorb into the body is time away from the perceived danger.

Depending on how anxious you are, breathing tools will calm you down because there's not a lot of adrenaline in the body, or it won't because there's more adrenaline in the body, or it'll make it worse because there's a ton of adrenaline in your body.

Have you ever tried slowing your breath after running hard? It is very hard. You need to give your body time to settle. Managing anxiety through breathing is similar. Too much anxiety means trying to breathe slowly won't work and may make you feel worse.

As you’re working on managing anxiety, don’t give up on the breathing tools. There are a ton of breathing techniques. Keep using them, trying different ones and determine which you like best in which situations. Any breathing technique you are using is working even though you may not see the difference quickly.

There are many other tools to manage anxiety. Breathing is just one. The thing is we have to retrain the brain that right here, right now, I am not in danger. We need to shut the alarm system off frequently throughout the day. If you have anxious thoughts 1000 times per day, but only practice the tools 3 times per day, it will take a lot longer to get that anxiety under control than if you practice 10, 30, or 100 times per day!

It sounds overwhelming, yes. But isn’t your anxiety overwhelming also? 5 years from now you will not be the same person you are today with your anxiety. It will either be worse (because you’re not managing it and the survival brain is perceiving even MORE danger over these five years) or it will be better because you let go of expectation and just started using the tools frequently.

Imagine what life would be like with 10% less anxiety. 30%. 60%. 80%. We cannot and should not try to get rid of anxiety completely, but if 90% or more of your day was without anxious thoughts, how free will that feel? How much energy would you have? How much clarity? What would you be doing differently? Who would you see? Where would you go? What would you do? Who would be with you?

Are you ready to begin the journey? Schedule your clarity call with me! If you still need to a bit more time, take a look around my site.