What is anxiety?

Anxiety comes from the anxious worry about the unknown. What if this is going to happen? What if it all goes wrong? What if I am going to fail? What if they don’t like me?

It’s a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease about something with an uncertain outcome.
I think it’s easy to say that we have all felt a level anxiety at some point in our lives. Especially if you happen to live in the Christchurch area. Anxiety has become a part of life and all too real for people due to living with the unpredictable earthquakes. There is always that feeling of uncertainty of “is there going to be another quake” (this can be heightened by even a truck going by). That ongoing lingering anxious feeling can eat away at you and take a toll on your health and well-being.

Common symptoms of anxiety are:

• Panic feeling – Panic attacks
• Churning stomach
• Problems sleeping
• Feeling nervous
• Short shallow breathing
• Sweating or being flushed
• Difficulties focusing and concentrating
• Feeling edgy, irritable or fidgeting
• Feeling drained in energy leading to exhaustion
• Not wanting to leave the house
• Giving up before you even start.
• Making excuses for not trying.
• And so on…. Any of these sound familiar?

To be clear, it’s completely normal to feel some levels of anxiety. Commonly; anxiety comes from having to step out of our comfort zone, doing something that is not usually considered “safe”. This is the area where we get to grow and develop as people.

Anxiety becomes a problem when it really starts impacting badly and having a negative effect on your life.
Think of anxiety as a place, its ok to visit there, but you don’t want to live and stay there every day.
Even though tackling these nervous feelings might sound daunting at first, this is where having a good plan and in place becomes beneficial. I can guarantee that the pain of fronting up and dealing with these anxious feelings is nothing compared to the pain living with anxiety eating away at you.

Treatment for anxiety:

We would work together to get to the real source of your anxiety, find out what’s causing these feelings and how to understand it by breaking down the whole anxiety process. 

We will look to make a decision to work with the anxiety and put strategies and practical tools in in place to help you overcome the anxiety.
Some of these strategies include, rolling with the anxiety, focussing on what you can control and developing a plan with practical tools to help manage your anxiety in day-to-day living.

Tired of living with that nervous anxious feeling? Take the first step to make the change in your life now.