Have you ever felt the grip of anxiety loosen with a simple shift of focus? That's precisely what we're unpacking today. Join us as we weave through personal revelations and practical tactics to transform anxious energy into a tool for reflection and problem-solving. We start with the intimate act of journaling our fears, dissecting the anatomy of worry to lead us into a more serene state of mind. By confronting the sources of our stress head-on, we uncover how to effectively address the roots of our anxiety, instead of fruitlessly trying to ignore them.
In the quest for presence and joy amid life’s chaos, we turn to the lighter side of things – humor and mindfulness. Writing down thoughts for clarity, breathing deeply, and meditating are just a few of the simple, yet profound practices we discuss. We'll explore how these techniques can tether us to the present, allowing us to relish the reality of the now and find contentment in the day-to-day. No need for a guest in this deeply personal and universally pertinent conversation; instead, it's all about you and how you can apply these strategies to navigate towards a calmer, more joyous existence.
Have you ever felt the grip of anxiety loosen with a simple shift of focus? That's precisely what we're unpacking today. Join us as we weave through personal revelations and practical tactics to transform anxious energy into a tool for reflection and problem-solving. We start with the intimate act of journaling our fears, dissecting the anatomy of worry to lead us into a more serene state of mind. By confronting the sources of our stress head-on, we uncover how to effectively address the roots of our anxiety, instead of fruitlessly trying to ignore them.
In the quest for presence and joy amid life’s chaos, we turn to the lighter side of things – humor and mindfulness. Writing down thoughts for clarity, breathing deeply, and meditating are just a few of the simple, yet profound practices we discuss. We'll explore how these techniques can tether us to the present, allowing us to relish the reality of the now and find contentment in the day-to-day. No need for a guest in this deeply personal and universally pertinent conversation; instead, it's all about you and how you can apply these strategies to navigate towards a calmer, more joyous existence.
This week, we're going to be talking about why focusing instead of worrying can help you. Yeah, it can actually help a lot with anxiety. It can help with anxiety and it can also help you live more in the present moment, and that's what we all hope for. I think that is really. That is the only true moment. So listen to this episode, this week's episode of Get Real with the English Sisters. Please do take a few minutes to subscribe and follow us on YouTube, too, where you can actually see the video version, and it's all about focus. I mean, I think, when I have anxiety and I've got like so many things to do, one thing that can really help is if I write them all down, like if I journal, really, yeah, if I write down all the things that are worrying me, and then I'll say, well, what's the worst thing that can happen if I don't do it, and when can I do these things? When can I address these things? Yeah, sometimes just putting things down, I do it like I actually write it on my phone, but, yes, the same thing on notes. Yeah, writing it, write it down and then focus on it. So you're actually focusing on it, so actually focus.
Speaker 1:
What about focusing on your anxiety is a bit. You know you can actually help you. If you focus on the anxiety, will you focus on what's giving you the anxiety? Right yeah, seems difficult, doesn't it? It does when your mind is like racing. Yes, yes, because you would think I don't really want to focus on what's giving me the anxiety. I want to get away from it. So I think what you have to do is accept the fact that you are having anxiety over it, over whatever it is that you've got to do. You accept that and then you allow your brain, one part of your brain, to focus on that, while you keep the rest of your brain focused on other activities. So distraction, basically. You like you know you work, not worrying through it. What you do is you write it down.
Speaker 1:
So say like, if you've got, say if you're frightened of the dentist and you've got a dentist appointment tomorrow, right, yeah. So you write it down and you say I'm frightened of the dentist. What's the worst thing that can happen when I go to the dentist? Okay, he's going to give me a feeling and I'm really scared. How can you deal with it? You can tell the dentist that you're frightened. Write it down. You can also ask the dentist for some anesthetic. Write it down, hopefully. And then what's the worst outcome that can happen? The worst outcome, maybe, is I won't go to the dentist appointment or I'll run away. So you write that down. Write that down, right, yeah. And then you say, and what's the best outcome? The best outcome is that I tell my dentist, he's a friendly dentist and he helps me, he gives me anesthetic and he fixes my tooth. That hurts, yes, so, so. And then you look at that best outcome and you, you, you, you sit with it for a few minutes. The best thing is that he fixes my tooth and I come away With a, with a smile, yeah, and no more pain. And then that. And then you take a deep breath and then you instantly feel a lot calmer and then you can focus on today, what, what do I have to do today? Today, I have to get to this yeah, yeah, right, yeah. So it's.
Speaker 1:
It's a bit ironic really, isn't it? Because you have to kind of focus on your anxiety, figure it out, sort of jumble it all out yeah, like all little pieces, it's all in there and sort of write down the points that are making you anxious or nervous. Same thing and then try and work through them, because you would think. You would think, yeah, I'll push it to the back of my mind. Yeah, but that doesn't work because it's not at the back of your mind. No, it's not really. It's a fond of your mind and it's making your heart race and you're getting really anxious and nervous over it. So that doesn't work. No, it doesn't, no, no, but you would want to do that, instinctively, I think. What? Put it back in your mind? Yeah, just put it away and get on with something else.
Speaker 1:
But you can't because it's there all the time and it's making you anxious. People do put things away for years. Yeah, that's why they're anxious for years. But they're making them anxious and they hide them. That's why it gets into chronic illnesses chronic back pain, chronic, this chronic, that.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, a lot of the times it can be due to some psychological factors, some form of anxiety that's keeping you tense. Unfortunately, yeah, anxiety, they say. How can anxiety give you, say, chronic backache? It's because when you're anxious, your whole body is tense. That's right. It's not just your heart that might be beating faster, or your. You know the cortisol and all the hormones, it's also your posture. You know, without you being aware of it, is tense, your breathing and your muscles tense up, and that's why you can get sort of all body kind of body pain, joint pain, if you do a test, if you just clench your fist and then release it and then allow that relaxation to go right up your arm, if you're not driving, and notice how much tension you've actually already held in that arm before and how relaxed it now feels. Yeah, that is so true. We're actually doing this now. So even if you're holding tension, aren't we? Because there's so much going on that it's just inevitable, I think Now. So I think the way to contradict this tension that we all have is to take minutes and time throughout your day to actually release the tension. You'll notice you've already have tension in your jaw yeah, definitely, you know, at the top of your forehead, in your, you know, in your knees, everywhere really. And if you allow yourself to just go into the mindful moment on it and say, right, I'm going to focus on it now, and then allow yourself to to gently release it and write down what you have to do and get things done if they're getting you tense. Yeah, you're right about writing down, it seems for now.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I admitted to my husband that a few things were making me tense and he started laughing the cute way. Yeah, because they were minor things. You've always been like why do these little silly things make me tense? Yeah, yeah, it could be just like bureaucracy. Yeah, like little bureaucratic things.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, like doing little stupilling in forms, doing these silly little things that you would think, come on, I'm grown up. For goodness sake, I should be able to do this. I've got to get this done. Yeah, and you do it, but it still might give you anxiety. Yeah, like phoning the gas people or something. I just don't like doing these things. But they're just stupid things that you would think, yeah, but they're not that stupid. They can get you nervous, things like that they can. But like someone that was another person would just say what's the problem, pick up the phone and phone them, order it. Ah, because you have to order gas. Oh right, it's not a big deal, you have to order the gas, it's an easy thing to do. It does seem like an easy thing to do. And, yeah, I start thinking what day should it come? I'm not here. Blah, blah, blah. When are we here? Yeah, I want to study tomorrow.
Speaker 1:
All these little silly things. Yeah, you tend to put off things like that. You do silly things. Yeah, they really are silly, but that is nothing silly when it comes to how it makes you feel. No, so if I, if I write it down, I'm going to phone the gas. That's, in the end, what I did do. I said I'm going to phone the gas at the end of the month. So in the you know they come the next week.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, but it's just sometimes it can be things that you might think are like silly or banal or like irrelevant that actually are causing you anxiety. So just, you know, check these things off the list and do them because it'll make you feel better afterwards, even if you just write it down, you say I'm gonna do it on Wednesday or Thursday or now, you'll just see, put it in your calendar. I think, yeah, and actually, how many people actually have things that? I mean because I'm aware of these things that cause anxiety. So you know, I talk about it and I verbalize it to myself and to whoever's there. So when it's relevant and it takes it, the takes the pressure off, it may be feel good when I tell my husband, because he said that's silly. Yeah, no, he didn't say that's silly. He said you've always been like that, but it's not problem darling, you know, it's just. It's just to have some like It'll be a problem if it was broken, the gas or something, but even then, no, that's what I mean. Even then, if it is broken, I mean you have to deal with it, even if I couldn't, if I said, look, I really don't want to do this, can you do it, he would have done it. Yeah, so it's not.
Speaker 1:
It's, I think, when you tell people about your anxiety and what's making you anxious and you tell yourself and you become aware of it. That's when. That's when all the healing starts, because that's when you can, you can move on and you know and and address it. What about when it's not just one thing like and you've got lots of things like your your pipe might have broken and this might have happened. You have to write it down and you have to say, okay, this is making me anxious, this is making me anxious. How do I deal with it? What's the worst thing that happens if I can't deal with it? I have to be without water for two weeks, whatever.
Speaker 1:
But you know, yeah, right, but in the end, you're going to feel less anxious and you'll probably you'll put things into perspective, because anxiety is also fear. That's gone out of perspective. Yeah, it's gone out of focus, hasn't it? Yeah, because we used to have to have fear to put, and fear has, like, kept us safe, keep us safe, definitely Stopped us being run over by cars. It's this instant fear, but when it's something that's ongoing, it's not, it's not healthy, it's not keeping us safe at all, it's doing quite the contrary. Yeah, yeah, it's actually. It's keeping us on a state of alert high adrenaline, high cortisol, not being able to sleep, probably at night.
Speaker 1:
So you reckon, just by simply writing things down, that could be, you know, and focusing on the actual anxiety, yeah, and telling people as well, and how, if you can tell someone otherwise, just tell yourself, because how many people are anxious? They might be grieving and they don't know. I feel so anxious, I feel so anxious and they don't know why, and they are actually grieving. If they wrote it down, I feel anxious, why am I feeling anxious? And they say, oh, actually, you know, I'm actually grieving at the moment. Could that be it? And then they could look into themselves. Yes, that's it, you know, sometimes it's not so obvious. No right, it's not a broken pipe and it's not the gas man you have to call away or a surgery.
Speaker 1:
It might be that you're grieving someone or something, or that you've had, you're grieving, you know, a loss, or even if something personal, like you know, like yourself, well, you might be grieving, like, for instance, if you can't have a child, oh, definitely, you might be grieving that you can't have a child, that the doctors have told you can't have children, absolutely, you know something like that. Or that you might be grieving that you're not as fit and healthy as you were 10 years ago. Right, yeah, and not you know. The fact that you're grieving this, it means you're not accepting it. When you don't accept something, you don't take the time to accept it, you can't get over it. No, you're right, that is so true. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:
So writing it down, thinking about it and trying to figure it out, sort of untangling it a little bit, yeah, and thinking of what the worst outcome is and what the best outcome is. And, yeah, I suppose, seeing it with a bit of pinch of humour as well. You know, humour always helps, humour really does help. And it's probably a secret isn't it to try and keep anxiety at bay and focus on it? Yes, and obviously there's all the mindful techniques you can do and the hip-nose and everything, but to stay in the present moment. To stay in the present moment and focus on today, and that really helps.
Speaker 1:
You take a deep breath, you focus on the now, you focus on what's outside your window, you take a few minutes to meditate. Someone I don't know who was saying it, but someone was saying that the best way to really relax is like, if you're on a train, put your phone away and look out the window. Yeah, simple as that, and actually don't do anything. Or just when you're at work, just put your phone away, look out the window for a few minutes and just observe. Just observe, yeah, whatever it is that's there, the passes by the nature, the trees, whatever it is.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, because that does bring you back into the moment. That's life that's going outside, that's happening outside of the window and it's going on right now. So it's present right now. The person walking by is happening right now. So it brings you back into what's happening right now. Because the passes, the passing, doesn't exist, yeah, and the future? The future doesn't exist, but we do know that somebody's walking by right now. 30 days exist. Yeah, that today and what we're doing right now does exist and the joy that we can get from today exists Absolutely. Okay, let us know what you think. If you think, try it, write it down what's the worst thing that can happen? Yeah, what's the best outcome, and then I'm sure you'll feel a lot more relaxed and happy. Absolutely, lots of love and smiles from the English sisters. Bye, bye, 가볍기를.