It was through my own struggles with anxiety that my mental health also started to decline. As time progressed, I began to feel very down. I was constantly irritable, unable to think clearly, had little mental energy and struggled to find any interest or motivation in anything. Even simple tasks like tidying the house or cooking a meal seemed like an enormous effort.
Symptoms and behaviours of poor mental health
- Lack of enthusiasm for life
- Constantly snappy and irritable
- Unable to concentrate or remember things
- Slow and laboured thinking
- Strong tendency to ruminate
- Feeling overwhelmed by everything
- Lack of sex drive
- Constantly tired, mentally and physically
- Lack of any positive emotions
- Paranoia about what others think of you
- Unable to properly connect or relate to others
- Cancelling on people, finding it hard to socialise
- Excessive eating or drinking to suppress how you feel
- Not taking care of personal hygiene
- Feeling the need to isolate yourself
Initially, I thought anxiety was to blame for all these new symptoms I was encountering, and so again, I set out to defeat them. It took me a long time to realise that anxiety wasn’t to blame here and that how I was feeling was due to my failing mental health. The reason my mental health was failing had nothing to do with anxiety; it was all to do with my ongoing battle with anxiety. It was all the fighting, overthinking, worrying and attempts to figure it all out that was to blame for my current state.
Because of all these new symptoms, I had created, I then worried, ruminated and fought even harder, which resulted in my mental health declining even further. Is it any wonder my mental health began to fail when my brain was given so many tasks to do?
Due to my lack of understanding, I was once again in a vicious cycle of my own making,
The effects that worry and overthinking have on your mental health
I had no idea that the brain was just like a limb and that if you overdid things mentally, then you would suffer. I had educated myself enough at the time to look after myself in other areas by eating well and taking up exercise, but I had done nothing at all to look after my mental health. My brain was still being used to worry, fight and figure things out on a daily basis, and this is why nothing was changing.
Even when I had figured all this out and due to the fact it had crept up on me slowly, I did not realise how poor my mental health had become. Eventually, I think it just hit a threshold and instead of feeling a little bit off and irritable, I was now feeling quite a lot of psychological pain as well as my brain no longer functioning properly.
Not only did it affect me emotionally and psychologically, but it also began to affect my social life. I no longer found joy in anything I did and barely had enough energy for myself, never mind anyone else. I would constantly cancel on people and make excuses not to go out and socialise, which only gave me something else to worry about as I now feared I would lose those around me.
Learning to open up about your anxiety and how you feel
It was at this point I knew I needed to open up more to people about how I felt, as keeping quiet was just creating more problems. The very act of constantly trying to come across as OK being the major one.
For a man, opening up was not easy as there was a lot of ignorance around mental health at the time. But I thought if people want to judge me, then that is their problem, not mine. My priority now has to be to myself, and if opening up helps me, then this is what I need to do.
I then started to explain how I felt to those closest to me and said: “The reason I have cancelled a lot recently has nothing to do with me not wanting to attend, I did. It is just that my brain found simple tasks difficult and the reason I was quiet at times is that I didn’t always have enough mental energy for a conversation”.
I also said, “I don’t want or need you to treat me any differently. All I need is your understanding and non-judgement”.
Overall people were very understanding and a couple of people explained to me how they had struggled in the past, and so I found that talking about how I felt allowed others to do so too.
Once I became more open to others about my feelings, it took an immense burden off me. I could now finally be how I wanted to instead of trying to put on an act and pretend that everything was OK. Before this, I was always trying to portray how I thought I should be and not how I was currently feeling and trust me, trying to keep up any kind of act takes tremendous mental energy to execute and why I felt even worse in social situations.
I guess I also didn’t want to admit to myself how I felt and keeping up an act was a sense of denial. A big turning point for me was eventually accepting myself as I was and having other people accept me too.
The biggest thing I learnt was that it wasn’t socialising that was so exhausting, it was trying to keep up a pretence that was. I am not saying I always wanted to socialise, but once I dropped all the acts, I found it so much easier. I no longer dreaded social events like I once did as there was no longer any pressure to play a role; I could now be how I wanted to be and only give what I had.
Learning to look after yourself mentally and physically
Apart from the social aspect of things and opening up, I also learnt to be much kinder to myself. Instead of reacting with fear and frustration, I learned to accept how I was feeling with loving acceptance. It made no sense to fight, worry or figure out anymore, as all this required more mental effort and the very reason for me not only getting to this point in the first place but also staying in the cycle.
I finally had to accept that I wasn’t the happy, confident person I was before, not just to myself but to others. It did not mean I couldn’t be again, but I wasn’t that person in the present moment and instead of fighting and getting frustrated with this fact, I needed to learn to be patient and allow my brain to repair itself at its own pace.
I now concluded that there were four significant points to recovery, and these were to practice self-care, fully accept myself as I was, live my life and more than anything, be patient. This also had to be a lifetime commitment as, initially, I began to look after myself but then as soon as I started to feel better, I would start trying to do too much, feel bad again and the whole battle with myself would start all over again.
Once again, I had fallen back into the habit of pushing my brain beyond what it was designed to do, and anything you overuse will result in the same outcome. You can’t push anything beyond its limits and expect it not to break down.
This is why it saddens me when I hear people say “I have been battling with my mental health” and why I always advise them not to. I encourage them to seek help, educate themselves, talk with someone and make changes to improve their overall well-being.
I advise them to do all of these things but then explain to them that the last thing you want to do is start battling with your mental health, as battling requires more effort, more introspection and more thinking. All this does is use up immense brainpower and results in more suffering.
This is why trying to worry and think your way better has the complete opposite effect; it wears out that weak and weary brain further. You wouldn’t go for a run on a broken leg, so why keep pounding the brain, when the pain is telling you how broken it is feeling at the moment? In its current state, it needs looking after, not thrashing; it doesn’t want any more tasks or worries put on it.
Don’t be afraid to seek help for how you are feeling
For me, talking about how you feel is one of the most important aspects when it comes to improving your mental well-being. Apart from opening up to those around me, I saw a lovely lady who helped me progress just by listening to me. I had kept so much to myself and hadn’t spoken to anyone about how I felt for years, and once I opened up, I didn’t want to stop.
I wasn’t really looking for advice from this woman as I was happy with what I had seen and the improvements I was making, but it was just nice to have someone who would listen to me without judgement.
Learning to listen to my mind and body
Although I started opening up and socialising more, there were times when my brain just didn’t have the energy to be around others and I needed to be alone. During these times, I knew that it just wanted rest. I learnt to listen to the message my suffering was trying to communicate to me instead of pushing on regardless.
When I needed rest, I needed rest, but this was not an excuse to shun the outside world. I knew the importance of living my life and socialising too and that it was all about getting the balance right. Even if I felt too drained for company, I could always go out on my bike or take a walk on my own.
Things that improved my mental health
- Being in the outdoors
- Turning my attention outwards instead of inwards
- Cutting down on stress and worry
- Simplifying my life
- No longer battling with myself
- Reading up on Buddhist teachings and meditation
- Talking about how I felt
- Resting when I needed to
- Socialising again
- Looking after myself physically
- Cutting down on alcohol
- Making positive changes to my life and surrounding myself with the right people
- Allowing myself to feel how I did without judgment
- Being very patient and giving myself the time and space I needed
- Dropping all fake personas and masks
It took me a long time to realise that my mental health was even more important than my physical health. It also made sense to me how I got to the point I did and what was keeping me in the cycle. Again I was the cause of my own suffering; I just didn’t see it at the time.
I can’t even explain the difference it made to my mental health when I just fully allowed myself to feel how I did. It cut out 90% of the mental battles I was having at the time and gave my brain the mental break it so craved while giving it the valuable time and space it needed to heal.
As I followed this path and made the changes I did, my mental health improved dramatically. I had to be patient and there were some tough days along the way, but I finally found the mental peace I was looking for. To this day, my physical and mental health is my number one priority and all the lessons I learnt along the way have allowed me never to put myself in that place again.
If you would like to read my personal story of how I overcame anxiety then you will find this and much more in my best selling book ‘At last a life’. The book has sold over 100,000 copies and is recommended by many therapists and is now on prescription at many doctor’s surgeries.
- How being too Self-Absorbed can affect your health - 21st February 2024
- The importance of self-care for good mental health - 21st April 2023
- Why does my mind go blank when talking with others? - 7th March 2022
Hi Paul
Thanks. I massively struggle with being kind to myself even when things are going well. if things start to go well, I can find myself going back to reading more stuff about anxiety and filling my mind even more to the point where I wake up the next day with my head crammed full of anxiety themed things once again.
Its almost as if I have a self destruct button that I hit repeatedly.
”I am doing well, let’s find out more about this!’, ”I have spare time so lets read up about it even more!” ,” Things are good but let’s get it even better!”
Any help massively appreciated.
I’ve commented before about how you saved my life. But can we now talk about setbacks once again? I promise I understand your books and I’ve been recovered for over 2 years but this week I had something set off the anxiety and here I am with plaguing stomach aches (this is my worst symptom. I’m in so much physical pain it’s hard to just keep going) and other symptoms I had before. It’s been 2 years so the onset of anxiety is surprising and has definitely thrown me off. Trying to remember your words. Ive been doing my life as usual. Went to a family function, had pool time, and talked with everyone. Today I woke up and did laundry. But as I type this I realize I’m missing one key part of recovery and that’s the acceptance of the anxiety and physical symptoms that come along. I would love for any insight and encouragement
hello, Nicole, I am exactly like that I have been good for about 10 months then all of a sudden my eyesight started to go blurry and I have lost my appetite again and feel nausea. I set off a feeling of panic as these were the first symptoms that started all of this 2.5 years ago. I went into meltdown crying etc. it is so hard to make yourself just accept this anxiety. I tell myself its just a setback and I will be ok but then you second guess it.!! How are you feeling now?
,
First I need to say thank you for your book, it helped me tremendously! I have suffered from anxiety and panic attacks for years, some of it caused by things I had to go through, hectic baby blues after the birth of my daughter, a traumatic experience where my father fought for his life and lost his leg, started a partnership that didn’t work out, because of all the stress and trauma I’ve experienced and the partnership that didn’t work completely floored me, that was about 5 years ago, I have experienced my first panic attack, I couldn’t eat, sleep, think straight, I was constantly analyzing how I was feeling, why I was feeling like I felt, trying to look for a cure, the doctor prescribed antidepressants was on it for a year, wanted to go off and the psychiatrist recommended I stayed on.
I’ve started my new own company and I’m really blessed, I am a graphic designer and usually need to work with tight deadlines. Even though I was on the medication I still experienced anxiety attacks so after I’ve read both Your books, I’ve decided in February I’m going to wean myself of the medication and heal this thing without meds. Goodness it has been a really up and down affair, but I went from having constant anxiety to having a “setback” now and then, some very bad and some mild, it is when I have the mild ones that I can accept how I feel, it’s been 27 days since my last setback and I am busy experiencing another one, this time it hit me hard to the core, where I felt just like I did the first time, lost of appetite, nausea, raising thoughts like” perhaps you shouldn’t have gone of the meds” it was even harder when I tried to talk to my hubby, it felt like he is so tired off this crap” I felt despair as if I’ve let my husband and beautiful daughter down” I don’t want to loose them beaches of something I don’t have control over. It is days like these when I feel dreadful, I so badly want to hold on to the good days and control the bad ones, manipulate myself out of how I’m feeling! Urggggg will this ever get better?
It helps to read others testimonies and setbacks! For anyone out there who is going through the ups and downs! I feel your pain, just stay strong, we will one day wake up and know that it was all worth it!
Paul thank you for bringing some light to my dark days! You’re books was a blessing to me! I am telling everyone I know who is struggling about it!
When things are going well, it is when I adopt a ‘So What?” approach, but after a few days I always end up going back to reading, getting knowledge, finding stuff out etc and then I go tumbling back to square one. It’s also as if I get bored when things are going well and I need to fill it by filling myself with more knowledge.
It’s when I’m in a heightened state of anxiety and it feels wrong to do nothing about it. So I search for stuff to help me cope with it/stop it.
It’s only when my anxiety drops that I realise/remember it’s the wrong way to do things and the reason I end up the way I do and in this constant cycle.
I can so relate to this. I go Google mad then when anxiety passes, I realise that’s not the right way!
Paul, you are an inspiration. I credit your words with being the only thing that helped me out of dark despair. ‘At last a life’ and your blog were the turning point in my life after spending ££ on quick-fix self-help ‘solutions’.
I have let go of a lot of my suffering and feel such a change. Habits are hard to break and with my perfectionist nature I often slip back into trying to control my anxiety but your words make so much sense and I can now rationally recognize when I’m now slipping back into unhelpful habits and thought patterns.
Sharing your journey has been invaluable.
Awesome Paul thank you so much!
Thank you, RD for your words and I am glad the book and blog helped you. The truth is there is no quick fix, healing takes time and comes through understanding and not through techniques, as all techniques are a form of control and suppression. The quick fix sells as it’s what people want to hear and so is mainly peddled by people who wish to line their own pockets. I fell for it too many years ago.
My pleasure Kelly and thanks for taking the time to comment.
I haven’t been on this website for a couple of years so should remember to be proud of myself!! I have felt bad for a month and feel that I want to offload and carry on living my life because that is all is needed. I have a job at a school that I love and when we went back in September I moved up to a different class with different members of staff. I started to become anxious as I loved the class last year. I never worried about how I felt I was just getting on with my life.
From the worry I had and the constant negative thought that I’m never going to love my job as I did I started having trouble sleeping and then became more anxious trying to get rid of the thought. Then I got upset as I don’t feel happy and relaxed. Then I felt sad that I’m too preoccupied with my anxiety to enjoy things with my family and friends. I keep crying which I’m guessing is my release. I do know though that once I get my sleep routine back and the thoughts stop I won’t even think about it again. I just feel very tired. I suppose I have written this to give advice to myself and everyone else that it is hard and you won’t suddenly feel great but we are definitely doing this to ourselves.
Brilliant as always
Thank you Paul! I am going to save this post and read it when I am struggling to find the balance and have more patience with myself. Every word you speak is so true and encouraging…just like your book. Thanks again. Xx
Brilliant. This is exactly what I needed at this moment in time. Thank you Paul x
Paul, my goodness, I didn’t know what was wrong, with me.
I’ll have to re-read but think you have helped.
Thank you
There seems to be a shift in how people perceive mental illness and I hope it continues to become the norm that people are honest about how they feel and receive no judgement. This way it is no longer a battle and u have nothing to hide and should ensure better mental health across the board. Thank u Paul for your wonderful words spoken from experience. They help soothe the mind 😁
Paul- your books have been invaluable- been in anxiety loop for 3 plus years- things have improved greatly thanks to your wisdom and insights from your own experience. I have an added element I’m working through which is weaning off a benzo that I have been on since this all happened- so I’m not sure where I stand actually as medicine is still in my system- patience with self is key that I need to remember – it has not been easy as detox symptoms are added to the mix…your article speaks truths to the mind and gives understanding of what’s happening- that gives some comfort…I do go back and recreate info in your books because it helps me to remember and feels like a needed conversation with you.. so glad I found you after all this time…need to still give myself time. I know I need to allow but get caught up in what is detox symptoms vs anxiety loop, thank you so much, Paul. I will continue to follow- the work you have done for others is greatly respected and needed in the mental health field! Xx
Such an inspiring post. Thank you for all the words of wisdom you share x
Hi Paul or others who have recovered.
Really appreciated this post. I wanted to ask about some specifics…
I have been suffering from anxiety for 9 years. I actually found pauls book after a year or so and made some improvements based off it and did improve a fair bit but it never left me. But slowly over time anxiety has taken over my life again and I have become very disillusioned with life. I am a seeing a therapist and trying to live healthier. But I had a huge panic recently though that has sent me spiralling down into intrusive thoughts and bleak thinking. Over the past few years or so I have become obsessed with my fear of the future, namely how I will cope and find joy or happiness. I’m almost 36 and feel so trapped, despite having good friends and understanding parents etc. Feel so down at the moment and can’t seem to see how will feel fulfilled in the future or be able to hold down a girlfriend, good job etc and not be constantly troubled and unmotivated. I completely stopped dating a couple of years ago and stopped drinking alcohol for fear of panic attacks (was never reliant on alcohol) or the consequences. I know this avoidance is not part of the method but just found it too hard.
Thing is in 9 years my anxiety never left me, despite it being much less severe at times. I am very high functioning and still see friends, exercise, do things etc and try and live life but I am just always troubled by the fact I don’t seem to enjoy much anymore or find joy or get enthusiastic about anything. I am completely unable to live in the moment anymore or forget my anxiety. I feel like the anxiety has completely crushed my spirit and cannot picture a bright future for myself even when I try. I do try and to allow negative thoughts and feelings but every day it just seems like a huge struggle despite me trying not to fight thoughts and sensations and just ‘allow’. It feels like the content of these thoughts holds genuine weight as have not felt happy in a v long time.
If anyone can offer any pointers on how I can move past this negative future thinking be hugely grateful.
HI Nick, I read Pauls first book and it was very helpful with important points that contributed to my recovery. However, I did need more help and research. As a long-time sufferer for many years and a story similar to Pauls, I realised a few things. There are two general categories regarding anxiety. Harmless and Genuine. When it comes to Genuine, that is a grey area and can be specific to the individual. In my particular case, I had to process a lot of my inner disturbance instead of suppressing it or just continuing to feel it. I had inner conflicts. I had to talk to someone. I needed a lot of time for myself. Especially with problems in life I needed to address them in an organized way even if it meant writing them down. You should acknowledge genuine issues if they continue to persist.
If you have genuine inner disturbance there is no harm in considering what it is communicating to you so you can process it and hopefully have it out of your mind. Or at least feel confident you are doing something about it.
It is also however important to realize that it is good to have a healthy perspective/attitude on things because that lets you see the reality of things and helps to be constructive. It can be a huge weight off your shoulders when you see things differently.
In the case of harmless anxiety, for example, OCD or general harmless anxiety thought bombardments, you’ll notice your emotions are being triggered and you are being deprived of time to think in a healthy way. If you think less emotionally you’ll realize you don’t need to fall for those traps. When I would give time to these thoughts and let them be there, after a while I didn’t care that much and the emotional hold on me would die off. Two types of thinking, emotional and intellectual.
I hope that helps
Hi Paul would love some advice or a blog on teenage anxiety. as a parent how could I help without being too intrusive. Thanks
Can anybody recommend a good therapist in Orlando, Florida?
I have been struggling with anxiety for 12 years. Started when I was around 25 and graduated grad school to get my first job. Filled with disturbing thoughts which caused panic, fear, depersonalization, no sleep, etc. for a few years. I don’t have panic attacks. Instead, my fear/feelings are constant throughout the day and mostly psychological from an overtired mind, light-headed, distracted, ruminating about symptoms, overwhelmed, tough to concentrate, scared).
After reading Paul’s book I have hit pockets of feeling better, sometimes for an extended period of time like months or even years. Inevitably, the symptoms start to creep back and before long I find myself caught up in another setback. I understand everything Paul is saying and agree that it’s the way to set yourself free, however, I often struggle with applying those principles. I know it is now the fear of fear and the constant attempts to solve a problem that is unsolvable which is keeping me in the cycle but I am struggling to accept the truth and just allow it to be. I realize my original fear of the disturbing thoughts has gone but I can’t move on from the secondary fear that has been created.
Nick explains a lot of my symptoms/feelings. I am high functioning, have a great family and kids, have a great job and amazing friends. I am person who truly loves life. I continue to exercise and participate in all activities without hesitation. In fact, only a few of my close friends and family members are even aware of my struggles. Nobody else would ever know. Anxiety hasn’t caused me to miss out of anything but it makes everything much more difficult and I grow increasingly frustrated.
Again, I had a period of nearly 2 years where this wasn’t even bothering me. I know I did not do anything substantial other than to accept. However, over the past couple of years, I am struggling to do so. It feels like I am going to continue to feel crappy no matter what I do. I don’t want to deal with this anymore which I know is not the correct mindset. I think I have created a subconscious fear because I continually wake up in the middle of the night after having a nightmare that I am stuck in the state and it will never go away.
Any advice would be appreciated.
Hi all,
Before even drafting this; I know it is reassurance seeking.
I am dealing with persistent distressing & upsetting thoughts in relation to my relationship & fiancé.
This man is my rock & best friend. I love him with all my heart & we are getting married in the next 12 months.
We are also building our own home.
Additionally, I am in a very high-pressure job where I feel like I’m always “on” & never switch off.
The thoughts come with such force and there’s no getting away from them:
Are you sure you should be marrying him?
Don’t go ahead with the wedding?
Is he definitely the right person for you?
Do you definitely love him?
All these thoughts are disturbing & extremely distressing to the point where I’m finding it hard to “see the wood from the trees”
I am dwelling and obsessing and I don’t know how to move forward.
He makes me very happy & he generally makes me smile every day. We are together for ten years.
I feel like I need some form of certainty or reassurance that this is just anxiety.
It’s occupying my mind when I’m trying to sleep & it’s impacting my work in an already very stressful job.
It’s also important to note that I’ve had other forms of distressing thoughts relating to schizophrenia and fear of depression and also a fear of harming others.
I feel completely shook to my core & a shell of myself. I don’t want these thoughts & I just need to know they’re not real.
Can anyone provide light on this?
I would love to tell my story if I can I have suffered from every aspect of anxiety since the age of nineteen and even before that I can remember as child and having difficulty sleeping and just not felling well in my mind it was so terrible but at nineteen I got pregnant and then it begins nights of not sleeping depression depersonalisation until I had my first breakdown went to the hospital and they just gave me sleeping pills and told me I was just overly exhausted and from then on until ten years and 2 more Breakdowns later I was convinced I was out of my mind keeping it a secret walking around like a robot there was no aspect of anxiety that I did not face I felt so helpless until one day I happened to stumble Upon Paul’s site and I can safely say it changed my life letting me see that letting go of the anxiety and just letting it be I struggled in the beginning but just kept pushing forward and not looking for answers anymore and letting my thoughts come and go with out letting them control me and little by little it got better. Until now 3 years and I fell brilliant I just want to help someone how is struggling by letting them no you can get there and to thank Paul you have no idea how much you have helped me forever x
Hi Mandy this is good to hear. I have been starting Paul’s method for about a month now; I am hoping I can be like you as my end goal, I am just impatient!! One thing I find people don’t mention is all the weird sensations anxiety has, all the normal ones are mentioned, did you suffer from strange ones?
I need some help, I just need advice…
I have been going through this for a really long time, like a lot of people here, and this situation with anxiety has obviously caused a lot of issues in my life and general unhappiness. I never used to really struggle with exams, but now I have been struggling the past 3 years and really to struggle to study with the anxiety present. Of course, this coupled with the anxiety being in the exams– leads to not good results and more negativity.
I have been round and round with anxiety, I have been able to let go in the past and release, but I still struggle with this. I think what I am understanding (again bc I have understood it in the past) is that I need to be ok with the anxiety being there for as long as it wants to be, and just carry on functioning alongside it, I know this has been repeated a million times, but I find that a lot of the time I think I am ‘ accepting’ when really I just am doing something to try and make it go away.
So I think at this moment, I have the right understanding again, but I suppose because this can be lonely and isolating I want to kinda make sure and get some encouragement that this is correct.
It’s kinda like being ok if it never leaves because you know you can do everything even whilst it’s there, rather than thinking it needs to leave because it is ruining your life.
Thanks, x
”It’s kinda like being ok if it never leaves because you know you can do everything even whilst it’s there, rather than thinking it needs to leave because it is ruining your life.”
Yes.
Even though I may understand it logically still struggle to do it,…
I have an exam in 2 days and I am so nervous about it, my nerves always get in the way and stop me studying and also during the exam, I get so nervous, I struggle.
Really working on letting go of control, but not doing a good job at it. 🙁
Hi Paul and everyone,
First, I want to say that this is my first time EVER in posting on this blog. I just found Paul’s book this month and it’s really helped me, as well as Claire Weekes’ material. I’m pretty early on in my recovery, but I feel like I’ve taken some strides in just these few weeks. When I had an anxiety attack in April, I had no idea what was happening to me and made everything worse by over-thinking, fearing and I was getting all the wrong advice. Now I feel like I’ve finally found the right path. I just have to stay on it.
I just have two quick thoughts/questions.
1) Sometimes I kind of feel like I’m an idiot for not ‘getting’ it. Like, I get it, you shouldn’t worry, you should embrace all the symptoms, stop fighting and struggling and let be. I get that, but it’s just so hard to do sometimes. Like, I’ll have it down and then suddenly I’ll be back doing the same old worrying, struggling. So I feel stupid. Paul, you make it sound so simple so I end up feeling like a failure if I can’t get it right away, or if I lose it. But I know it’s just part of the process. Both you and Claire make sure to say that it’s easier said than done. It just really annoys me when I have to remind myself of what I ALREADY know. I guess old habits are hard to break.
2) Question. My biggest symptom I think is with obsessions. I will get a thought in my head and it won’t go away. Then I start wondering how do I deal with this? And I know that I should stop caring, but then, I start thinking, wait, if I stop thinking about it, am I avoiding it? Isn’t avoiding bad? For example. I recently got a weird thought when I saw the paint pattern on the tiles over the sink in my kitchen. I imagined one of the paint spots changed colors. Then I got really scared like ‘what if I can’t stop seeing thinking this thought whenever I look at the tiles’? Now, of course, because I added the fear, I see it everytime I look at the wall. I’ve lived in this house for over ten years and never thought of it before. Now everytime I wash dishes and so on I face this conundrum:
On one hand, when I just shrug my shoulders and go about my business, I get this anxiety build-up that says, “look at the wall! you’ve got to look at it to test and see if it’s still there! If you don’t look at the wall, you’re avoiding it, and avoiding is bad – Paul said so!” But then if I look at the wall and think the thought, a bunch of anxiety comes in. I started to think, well I could just pass through this anxiety, so maybe it’s good practice if I stare at the wall and let the anxiety pass through me, like flooding. But then I started to think, if I get caught up in staring at the wall, they aren’t I just giving this thought way too much respect? Staring at a wall is not something I’d normally do, so why do it?
Now I’m thinking that staring at the wall doesn’t really matter as long as I don’t worry about staring. Just like my arms shaking due to anxiety, it can’t hurt me. If I stare at the wall, as long as I don’t really care or worry about staring, then it won’t matter. I just don’t know what’s the better option. If I just go about my business while refusing to look at the wall, am I avoiding? If I let myself stare at the wall, am I giving credence to my anxiety (telling me to look) and giving the thought power?
Any help you can give me would be really helpful!
Thanks, Paul
Love love love this
Just what I needed to read today. Have been a GAD sufferer for 10 years, it comes and goes. But this weekend has been bad and I know it’s becabuse I’m stressed at work. Reading this post has bought it all into perspective for me, thank you for calming my racing mind Paul 💐
Alz & Romy,
Two weeks ago, I was coming back from a long holiday. Due to time differences, I was awake for more than 35 hours straight. On top of that, I had to come back to regular life and had to deal with the fact that a fantastic journey had ended. Surely, I felt anxious. Of course, I hated every minute of it. I had a racing mind riddled with obsessive thoughts (I don’t love my wife, I see things that aren’t there).
One week later, I experienced one of the most peaceful and lovely weekends with my wife. I felt calm, at ease and happy.
What did I DO to get from this terrible point A to point B? The answer is nothing. I just did my best not to panic about my panic and to be as calm as possible amidst the storm. This is what it is all about. Nothing more. It is – truly – accepting your current state of mind.
Romy, you are not stupid. Not at all. The message Paul and many others are giving is simple, but harder to ‘do’. Especially to do it continuously, because that’s what it takes. Acceptance is an attitude. It’s behaviour that you need to acquire and it takes time to ‘master’ it. You can’t accept just once. Accept time and time again.
You will fail as we all do. But know that every second is a new opportunity to accept once more. That is why I am 100% certain that acceptance is possible for everyone. Maybe it might take some extra help from a loved one, psychologist or even medication. But it is possible. After five years, I can safely say I have recovered even if I’m still experiencing anxiety from time to time.
Belgian
Belgian is correct, surrendering, allowing, accepting is not always easy to put into practice as the instinct is to fight and struggle with what we don’t want, the mind almost screams at us to do something about it.
My own surrender came through the utter exhaustion of trying to change my experience and just finally giving up and also knowledge. When I started to truly understand my suffering and that I was just recreating it, little by little my resistance fell away. With understanding comes less fear and when you fear something less then you let go of the fight with it, it no longer holds your focus the same.
It could be sneaky at times because initially I would use allowing as a concept to try and change my state, I might also start obsessing about needing to allow, the mind can soon pull you back into trying to change your experience.
Eventually, it does become an attitude, a way of life, when I first let go I would say I suffered more than ever as everything I had been suppressing, avoiding, struggling with came up to the surface. But it was like a river that was no longer blocked and was now free to flow out to sea unhindered. It was a relief to no longer fight, struggle. It also made sense that everything left alone in the universe finds its own balance but while it does then there is a period of discomfort.
It is never about reaching some perfect state, it is about having no resistance to any state, although I no longer suffer from anxiety I can still go up and down with my moods but I accept that now and there is no personal will left in me to try and change anything, I am no longer at war with my inner weather and just like the outer weather it will change when it is ready. The anxiety itself is only a very small part of your suffering, it is the whole battle with yourself that is.
Freedom comes when you finally give in and realise you were fighting a war you could never win, that the very effort to change things was the very reason you stayed in the cycle. The cycle is very obvious when you see it and it is this seeing that is the first step to finally ending it.
Hello Paul,
Paul and Belgian, thank you so much for answering me.
Paul, something in your final two paragraphs struck a chord with me because lately, I have been struggling with the idea of hope.
Initially, when I read your book and your blog, it was a big relief to know those negative feelings – of anxiety, despair and sadness etc. actually just needs to be felt – it is energy that needs to be released. I get triggered when I see certain patterns and sights, like when I walk outside and see cracks and holes on the ground and other irregular patterns. Heck, even just typing that sentence, I felt a rush of panic, pins and needles in my arms at the thought. It was somewhat of a relief when you said that the reason why we keep getting triggered is that there’s still that anxious energy inside of us. I know you’ve mentioned that you actually started to look forward to feeling this anxiety without resistance because it meant that it was leaving your system like it wanted to. That the anxiety wants to be out of us as much as we want it to be out of us (and symptoms like intrusive thoughts like the one I described above, shakiness, panic etc was pretty much anxiety releasing itself). It was for the first time an explanation that made sense to me. For a while, I started to actually feel comfortable feeling uncomfortable. For once, I was in the right place. I felt hope that I can finally be rid of these feelings.
But then, I started to read some of the success stories in one of your books and what I saw was a constant refrain that eventually they stopped caring whether or not they felt better anymore. They gave up hope of recovery and just lived their lives and that’s when they started to recovery.
I was thrown into confusion. On one hand, your discussion of yourself makes it seem like you WANTED to recover. You wanted the anxiety out of you for good and wanted to be free. You didn’t give up hope and so found the answer of allowing. You were glad that you could finally feel these feelings of anxiety without hindrance because after all, it was just energy escaping you. And the more energy that escapes you, the more that anxious energy leaves you. Once the anxious energy is out of your body there won’t be anything left to trigger. To me that seems to be a statement of wanting to be free.
But then suddenly, all this talk of ‘no longer caring whether we recover or not’ makes me feel like I’m wrong for wanting to be free. I know people can never live without anxious feelings – it’s part of our system for a reason. But what is wrong with wanting to be free? What is wrong with wanting to free of this constant hell? I was able to allow the anxious and terrible feelings in part because I knew it was just junk leaving my system – as you said, we’re healing. We’re detoxing. But now I feel like, I’m not even supposed to want to be healed. I get that I’m supposed to live my life anyway, but what is wrong with living my life while feeling good about these anxious feelings leaving my system unhindered (and therefore having hope that it will one day be gone and I will be free without needing to take a litany of medications to get through the day)?
Reading your last couple of paragraphs makes me think that not caring about recovering is not necessarily the same as not having hope, but just not trying to actively seek recovery. Am I getting this right?
Please help me as I am slightly confused. I don’t want to use this site as a crutch as I know you say that it’s counterproductive and besides, my brain is telling me that it is sick of this dang subject already lol. But I just wanted to figure this out. Am I allowed to hope to be one day free? I’ve already had a moment of giving up while I was upstairs in the bathroom, just sick of it all and wanting to just let myself feel what I feel in any given moment. But then, I feel like I’m doing things “wrong” when I let myself have hope that I’ll be free one day. I feel like I’m doing things “wrong” when I look at my mother and see her enjoying a movie on her laptop and wondering why I can’t be free like her (this is close to “lamenting” and I’m not supposed to lament or feel self-pity, right?). I just feel like there are so many shoulds – I shouldn’t hope, I shouldn’t feel moments of self-pity, I shouldn’t fearfully react to thoughts/sites that aren’t fearful, I shouldn’t be allowing my mind to race around and around in circles like this. It goes on.
The one thing I know clearly is that this will take time, so I’m trying not to be hard on myself if I don’t get this right away. Like Belgian said, every second is a new opportunity. A dangerously hopeful statement, but I don’t think that hope is such a bad thing.
I’m sorry for this long email, but I thought because I don’t want to keep coming here and asking questions, I want to get this all out there now. Any help from Paul, Belgian or anyone else who has come out the other side would be so helpful. Thank you.
Oh and one other thing (I hate that I keep bothering you with questions but I hope this is the last one). It’s just another thing that felt contradictory to me and I wasn’t sure how to parse it out.
It’s about constant thinking.
On one hand, you’ve said that the constant thinking about yourself is what kept you in the cycle. On the other hand, you’ve said that you can’t suppress your thinking and just let it run its course. I worry that when I’m constantly thinking about how I feel I’m just adding worry and stress to my mind. On the other hand, aren’t I supposed to just allow these thoughts even if they are thoughts about how I feel? I’m worried that if I let my mind race on and on about how I feel I’m just adding more stress on my mind and nerves. Isn’t this counterproductive?
Of course, I can’t stop my thoughts anyway, I can only let them be there. But if they’re always there then how do I recover from anxiety? I’m not supposed to try to STOP these thoughts, but the thoughts keep coming even as I try to do other things and live my life. Belgian had said that he had constant negative thoughts after coming back from a vacation and just tried not to panic. The problem is even if I try not to panic and just relax behind my thoughts I don’t know if the thoughts themselves (thoughts about anxiety and how I am feeling) are harming me and keeping me in the cycle even if I relax behind them and let them race.
I’m just constantly wondering if I’m doing things wrong. I can’t tell the difference between relaxing behind negative thinking and not-relaxing, because the negative thinking about my situation is still there, my sadness over my situation is still there (I can’t stop that emotion). If I have a thought “I wish things were different” I suddenly think, “oh no, I’m not supposed to wish things are different! That just means I’m not accepting!” If I have the thought, “I wish I wasn’t feeling this way” and then feel a pang of sadness or panic, I once again feel like I’m doing things wrong because I’m not supposed to feel sad over my situation, I’m supposed to be living alongside my anxiety and not caring whether it’s here or not. Very clearly I’m not there yet.
The truth is I wish I was better. I want to recover. I want to feel hope. I’ve been living a stressful life for many years, but my D-day came mid-April when I had a panic attack. I found out about this whole acceptance thing and Paul’s work (and Claire Weekes’) this month, and I actually had some good few days over the past couple of months but now I’m back to just… I want to have hope. The whole “I don’t care if I’ll recover or not” just makes me feel like I’m committing myself to a lifetime of being in the cycle. I’m scared that every wrong move or thought I have will make me one of the ones that Paul says “stays stuck in the cycle forever.” I just want to be one of the ones that find recovery, one of the success stories. Sigh. If you can tell I’m having a bad day.
Ronny, of course, you want to recover and of course, I did also and everyone else who suffers
The point is it is the desperately wanting to recover that causes the striving/fighting/resisting. I just gave up this whole battle with myself and then the healing took care of itself, it is this battle to be better that keeps us stuck in a cycle. I was just done with fighting any longer, I saw clearly I was creating all my own suffering and keeping myself in a loop of suffering. There is no right or wrong way to do anything but to just give up this battle you are having with yourself.
No longer caring means you give up the battle to feel any different than you do, you surrender to it, you’re not at war with it anymore. You may not like it but you have given it permission and the freedom to be there. You are no longer fighting, suppressing, resisting, all the actions that cause you to suffer.
You TRYING to make sure you do this right says to me you are still looking for a way to feel different than you do and so are still striving, fighting or suppressing. This is not about trying to find an escape or executing a technique to feel better, it is not about trying to manipulate yourself in any way, it is just surrendering to how you feel in that moment, good or bad.
This attitude won’t come overnight, it can take time but just practice letting go
We think if we allow something then it will take us over, that it will grow when in truth the opposite is true. Think of it like wasting continuous energy trying to hold a bolder on a hill and then one day just letting it go and feeling the relief of no longer having to push against it, that’s surrendering.
You can wish things were different if you want as long in that moment you allow yourself to feel how you do. As long as that wishing doesn’t start you battling against how you feel, trying to change your current experience through a fear of allowing it then that’s fine. So if you are feeling really down and sad, then allow that sadness fully (at that moment there is nothing you can do to change it) just your mood to change naturally. If your mind is spewing out negative thoughts, then allow it to do so, don’t get into a battle with it to stop them, they will cease when they are ready. If you feel anxious then allow that anxious energy to be present, don’t spend your time trying to control or suppress it. It does not matter what emotion or symptom I mention the answer is always the same just let go and full surrender to how you feel.
When you cut your finger or break your leg, you don’t battle with it, you just leave it alone and the body heals it, the body has an immense healing system if allowed to do its job. The broken leg would not heal if you kept hitting it with a hammer each day and the cut wouldn’t heal if you kept picking at it, it is the same principle for any physical or psychological suffering.
Your body and mind know how to heal, they just need to be left alone to do so. This is what Belgian meant when he said he did nothing and the mind and body healed itself, his mood changed naturally without him having to do anything, if he had fought how he felt that day then he would have spent far longer suffering and to a higher degree. This is what his approach had been previously and nothing was changing, it was the same for me, healing never took place when I spent all my day battling with myself, my thoughts and emotions, in fact, I just got worse.
It is not the anxiety or the thoughts that cause the majority of your suffering, it is the battle with it that does. Allow yourself time to see this, for it to really sink in. The reason I write so much is for people to see this for themselves, the understanding starts to sink in, explaining symptoms and the reason they are there eases a lot of fear and it is much easier to allow something when you understand it and fear it less. When you see it then the resistance and fight starts to fall away automatically, it makes no sense to carry on battling with yourself, you see how much suffering you are creating for yourself.
Paul
Thank you, Paul.
I think my problem was that I was still trying to control things, trying to find a way out. I wanted my life back sooner rather than later.
The truth is I don’t know how long recovery will take, but while I won’t give up hope that recovery is possible, my new goal is to learn how to accept whatever experiences I’m experiencing at the moment without telling myself I’m doing anything wrong or feeling the pull to change it. Experience is an experience. Even the experience of thinking, “oh my god I’m doing it wrong!” or “oh no if I keep obsessing about this, it’ll never go away!” or “oh no I’m identifying with a thought I’m not supposed to do that!” is just an experience. I used to catch myself and go, “oh no wait, I can’t think that because if I do that means I’m not allowing! I have to allow!” Now my goal is to just see every thought and feeling like an experience, including those ones, and letting it be exactly what it is.
You say that we shouldn’t identify with our thoughts. But hey, if I have an anxious thought and a bunch of anxiety explodes out of me at that moment, well, it is what it is. Maybe that means I identified with it because I had the anxious reaction to a thought, which is nothing more than energy. I used to think, well if I truly didn’t identify with this thought then I wouldn’t even have an anxious reaction. But whatever, I had an anxious thought and a fearful reaction. I can’t change that fact. I’m not going to bother anymore trying to think about whether this is the ‘wrong way’ to think or react or feel. If this is the experience that I’m having, then I’m just going to have it without trying to change anything about it. And I’m going to go on with my day. Maybe that’s what it means to truly not identify with your thoughts: no longer trying to do anything about it (the thought or the emotional experience surrounding the thought). It’s all fair game.
Because honestly, trying to get everything right is so exhausting and I realize now that I wasn’t doing myself any favours. It’s easier said than done. I’m typing all of this but I know I’ll probably fall back into old habits. But I’m just going to keep doing myself and be patient until this becomes my new default behaviour. In the meantime I still have a life to live, work to complete (unfortunately this work is academic which means it’ll take more mental energy – I don’t want to tire my brain out but I kind of have to complete this work – I guess it’s fine as long as I don’t deny whatever experience I have while working and thinking).
Thank you, Paul, for taking the time to answer my questions and respond to my posts. I’m never going to give up hope and I will continue to be kind to myself as I slowly get used to allowing my experiences.
I think Romny is making the point I made on your last blog entry Paul. When I read that people have recovered by allowing / accepting / stopping suppressing / giving up etc, it is hard not to also do this with an end goal of recovering. This then defaults to me doing all these things while checking how my anxiety is and if I’m doing them right.
I answered his concern Jamie in my above post and covered everything he mentioned.
You can have it as an end goal if you wish, no one is saying don’t do that, it is everyone’s end goal to recover. The subtle difference is not turning these things into a technique. Saying ‘Right, I need to allow to get rid of my anxiety and then spending all day trying to allow’ and then getting frustrated when it won’t go away but this is not allowing, this is back to trying to get rid of something. This is why it can be hard to grasp as it can be so subtle.
I just gave up trying to control or get rid of anything, I just fell right into how I felt and in time recovery then came to me but I understood the process and the science behind it, it made no sense to try and get rid of anything anymore, to fight with myself. I also had to put myself in situations that triggered my anxious energy and to reprogram my brain that things I had previously avoided were safe, it is an active process and it takes time.
Previously the more I tried to recover the more lost I got, recovery doesn’t have to be an end goal for it to happen. I get many people emailing me weeks down the line excited that they have now ‘got it’ that it has really clicked with them. I get emails daily about how the books have changed someone’s life and they are now back to their old self living their life. They aren’t special or different, they just finally understood the message and put it into practice and were patient.
It is obvious from your message that you are looking for a technique, if you were truly allowing then you would not care if your anxiety was there or not, you would just be allowing of it while getting on with your day. Again there is nothing to get right, you are treating it as a technique, something to master. It is when you stop trying to do things right that you have finally surrendered, as you are not trying to do anything, this is what surrendering is.
Allowing yourself to feel like you do is difficult, allowing the thoughts to race, the anxiety to be present, the heart to race when every instinct says fight, get rid, manage it and this is why it can take a while for that attitude to be stable, it is nearly impossible to adopt this attitude overnight.
If you keep trying to get rid of something then all you will do is strengthen it, what you resist persists as they say. I can’t put my understanding into someone else in an instant, I can only point them to it, some people get the concept straight away and some take longer. I remember Nolan first coming here and he had no idea what I meant and then it eventually clicked with him, he just gave up trying to feel better, he just gave in to how he felt and recovery came to him. He now passes on some great advice to others.
I remember a woman saying to me once ‘This isn’t working, I have been trying what you said and its not getting rid of my anxiety’ I said ‘I never told you to try and get rid of anxiety, I told you to stop trying to get rid of anxiety’ in an instant a light bulb went off in her head and she said ‘I don’t know why it hit me so hard when you said that but I finally got what you meant and I instantly gave up my whole battle with trying to get rid of it, I clearly saw what I had been doing wrong’ This lady is still in touch now from time to time and is anxiety free and living her life fine.
Anyway, I will have to leave it there, feel free to go through other posts and see if the message sinks in.
Thanks for taking the time to reply again Paul
…..and I fully appreciate you had addressed Romny’s points. I just meant that Romny seemed to have the same misunderstanding as me. Thanks again.
Paul,
What do I do about judgements of self or self-esteem? Like comparing myself to others or feeling inferior? Sometimes I feel okay but these thoughts get to me. I am trying to see how I can fit acceptance with these thoughts. Like do I just ignore them? I’m scared if I don’t battle them then I will believe them. And sometimes i do feel like I’m believing them and chewing it over in my mind
Romy,
You wrote the following: “Maybe that’s what it means to truly not identify with your thoughts: no longer trying to do anything about it (the thought or the emotional experience surrounding the thought). It’s all fair game.” This is exactly the point!
I’ll try to explain a couple of concepts that help me to understand better what is happening. First, I’ll talk about how I used to look at thoughts and how I now look at them. Second, I’ll try to show you there is a difference between ‘first’ and ‘secondary’ panic and that difference is important.
Let’s look at thoughts first. I used to believe that what I thought must be real. How can they not be real? They all create so much turmoil in my life, right? I also used them as a protective shield against the hard reality that most things in our life are not under our own control. They became not only real but in a way also magical. ‘I have to think I have cancer because if I don’t, I will certainly have it’.
A first shift came when I learned this simple truth: Thoughts are never real. They are manifestations of the activity in our brain. Identification happens when you start to panic and notice some or a couple of these scare thoughts and begin to struggle with them. Someone with a panic disorder takes these thoughts and turns them into a seemingly never-ending horror story.
Fun fact: it is estimated we have somewhere between 60 000 and 80 000 thoughts each day. All of these thoughts influence your mood and behaviour. The same mood which influences also your thought patterns. In other words, an anxious thought is designed to make you anxious and an anxious ‘body/mind’ is likely to come up with more anxious thoughts. So basically your thoughts influence your mood and your mood influence your thoughts. As a consequence they can’t be ‘real’, they can’t be fact. The ‘real person’ is the person who is able to question them. That is what Descartes meant when he said: I think, therefore I am.
Now, let’s talk about the difference between first and second panic. The first panic is your initial response to a thought. Your body reacting very quickly to a threat identified by the mind. In healthy situations, you will say “I had a scare”. For example, when someone scared you with a mask but you almost immediately realize it is your stupid brother. Of course, you’d feel the adrenaline for a couple of moments. But you will quickly shrug it off and forget about it.
The second panic arises when you don’t shrug it off. It happens when you panic about the panic. When you start getting into a fight with the thoughts and sensations you experience after this first fear. By doing so you create more fear and stress and therefore are fueling the exact same mechanism that made you panic in the first place.
An example to illustrate. I have a headache. It hurts. The thought comes: “what if I had a tumour”. Almost involuntary, a slight feeling of fear passes through my body. I am now faced with two options. Accepting and not doing anything or trying to fight/escape those feelings and thoughts. If I chose to fight, I decided to add stress and start the secondary panic process.
I can’t tell you how liberating it is to understand that I don’t HAVE to take that second route, that I can make the right choice at any time. The more you make this choice not to interact, not to react but to accept and let go, the more you notice it becomes a habit.
Even if you don’t understand all of the above you can still accept. Acceptance is not reacting, not doing anything with the state you are in. Sometimes this might seem hard and you might need some help with it. That is fine and please look for it if you do. I wish you all the luck and leave you with something Claire Weekes said that stuck with me: “Recovery always lies on the other side of panic”
Thank you Belgian! This was really insightful and helpful! I’ll keep this in mind moving forward!
Paul, I hope moving forward can you make a blog post about what meditation practices helped you in your process of recovery and beyond since you talked about it being an important part of your life. Or at least maybe how often you meditate. I have learned about Mark Williams’ mindfulness meditation and it’s been helping me with the practice of noticing and accepting whatever energies are present in my mind and body. I’m sure a resource guide of what meditation you find helpful, or what Buddhist teachings were poignant with you might be a good resource for others!
Paul Ive commented before about how you saved my life. But can we now talk about setbacks once again? I promise I understand your books and Ive been recovered for over 2 years but this week I had something set off the anxiety and here I am with plaguing stomach aches (this is my worst symptom. I’m in so much physical pain it’s hard to just keep going) and other symptoms I had before. It’s been 2 years so the onset of anxiety is surprising and has definitely thrown me off. Trying to remember your words. Ive been doing my life as usual. Went to a family function, had pool time, and talked with everyone. Today I woke up and did laundry. But as I type this I realize I’m missing one key part of recovery and that’s the acceptance of the anxiety and physical symptoms that come along. I’m struggling again with letting my brain rest and trying to fix it quickly. I know better but seems I’m stuck. I would love for any insight and encouragement
Hey guys,
Um, so after a really bad day, I’m back again. Sigh.
I’m not going to ask any questions pertaining to my day because I think I did fairly well in not struggling. It was overwhelming depression, but I let it be there. It is starting to lift ever so slightly. Was in a six-hour car ride with my mom where I tried to engage in discussion with her. Felt moments of extreme sadness, but tried to allow it. I know what I need to do. It’s hard. HARD to do it. But I’m getting through it one day, one step at a time. And I know God will give me strength with this one.
My one question pertains to the usage of this blog. I know we shouldn’t be using this place as a crutch, but I really do need people to talk to about this thing, people who are going or have gone through what I’m going through. I find it incredibly helpful to reach out to people who are really engaged in the process, to know that I’m not alone if I have a setback (I believe I just had my first MAJOR setback after feeling great for a few days). I don’t think I’m looking for a way for it all to be better. But in these early stages, it’s hard to just shrug and get on with things as Paul suggested.
I AM still doing things. I’ve signed up for a book club with some of my friends, watching dance competitions, yoga classes and so on. I’ve got a whole book I’ve been planning to write and though my anxiety almost made me give up, I’m going to go back to outlining and writing. So I haven’t given up on life. It’s just….this is the only place where I find there are some really useful commenters that give me a little spirit-uplift when I need it. A little bit of hope that I can come through. Is this wrong?
Do I need to completely disconnect from this site and comment section in order to get better, even in these early stages?
Romy
What is wrong with having a really bad day after having a few good days? Again this is not allowing, this is wanting to only have good days, maybe thinking that’s how it should be now.
I had a whole range of days in recovery, some really intense downers, some real days of peace and those in-between, these fluctuated for months like this before I started to feel real stability and peace.
Again people tend to only allow when these days are good, which of course is easy, why would we reject or fight a good feeling? Most people measure progress on how they feel but this is WRONG. Your progress is measured on how allowing you are of how you feel and not if you’re feeling great or not.
Don’t label a few bad days as a setback, they aren’t, you are going through a process of healing and all sorts of days will arrive as your emotional space clears out and your mind heals. It is the allowing that allows this process to take place, it is not a free ticket to it all being over instantly, don’t use my words as a technique to try and feel good all the time otherwise you will be full of disappointment when you have the inevitable bad day, one that will in many cases have you looking to suppress or escape it once again.
Use this blog how you wish, just realise that this has to come from you, no one can magic the bad days away, at some point you have to face all this stuff and allow its presence within you to be free of it, the anxiety, the sadness, the irritability and anything else you have been rejecting and suppressing. We eventually realise that we have to stand alone and go through this ourselves and not keep looking for someone or something to take it away, to stop us having to face it and go through it.
Paul
Thank you, Paul. I’ll keep all this at heart. For the record, although I did have thoughts yesterday about how much I really didn’t want to be going through this, or how I hated this, I don’t think I tried to stop the sadness at all. I knew I couldn’t. That’s why it was so intense. When I’m feeling intense sadness, it’s next to impossible to not think intensely sad thoughts, right? Since our thoughts reflect our moods and vice versa. It feels like a Herculean task not to expect myself to think sad thoughts or feel a loss of hope even if I commit to not changing my state and just letting it be there. I don’t want to force myself to think happy thoughts because I know that’s impossible. If my thoughts are depressing, I let them be as depressing as they want but just try to remind myself during brief moments where I can that this is all just part of the process.
As for the blog, you’re right that I need to stand alone. So I’m watching myself closely on that. I don’t want some magic words to make it all better, however, it is nice to have advice on how to handle situations from people who get it – or even just to talk to someone. But I know none of this will provide comfort and I shouldn’t look for it too. Thank you again and I hope I’m not annoying you. I know I’ll get this.
Quick Question:
I’m currently in the middle of a big academic project, dissertation, and I’ve been trying to take things very very slow. It is so difficult to complete mental work when you’re mentally exhausted. I’m wondering if I should just have the courage to tell my advisors what I’m going through and to ask for either an extension or a pause? I don’t want to run away from my life or avoiding doing the normal stuff in it. But I can’t see how I can put together a project of this magnitude (or of the magnitude of say a novel for example) on a tight deadline while dealing with an anxiety disorder. Pushing myself too far on these deadlines and taking on too much work is the big reason why I broke down in the first place.
To know you couldn’t stop it is a good start and you seemed to be allowing of it so that’s a good thing. Fighting against it just creates more resistance and so more suffering, also when you try to suppress it then you don’t allow this energy to leave your inner space.
I saw these intense periods as a good thing, I wanted this stuff gone so I almost welcomed them. I did not enjoy them particularly but I knew these releases were where I was going to make the most progress as long as I stayed open to them. It is difficult as the instinct is to distract yourself from any negative emotion, to run away from it or fight it but all this is counterproductive as we then just keep suppressing and recreating what we want to be free of.
It is very important to understand that these negative/emotional surges are your bodies way of trying to release these emotions from your inner space. But it can only do so by you staying open to it, if you try to shut it down, distract yourself or fight it then the emotional energies are not released and so you stay stuck.
The truth is you can spend a lifetime trying to find ways to suppress or defeat these surges and get nowhere or spent a short period finally allowing yourself to feel them. Is this the former not what everyone does when they jump from one treatment to another, one book to the next, one guru to the next, one retreat to another all looking for something to make it go away without having to face up to it? Does it always end up nowhere? This is what I finally figured out, nothing was working and so I just gave up, defeated and this is where all the obvious truth starting rushing in. Trying to get rid of something was never the way out, only allowing myself to feel this stuff could free it up. My understanding grew from there and I was baffled to how I had not seen this before.
Yes, it may be wise to talk to them if you feel too exhausted at the minute. If you work your exhausted brain beyond what it is capable of at the minute then it will just rebel and you will feel the suffering of pushing it too far. Just like if you ran on an injured leg. The reason you got to this place in the first place was pushing your mind and body beyond its limits so it would not be wise to push it further in its current state. When I tell people to live their life, I mean don’t allow fear/anxiety to stop you doing anything. If you are exhausted and need mental rest then this is a different matter. You can still stay occupied without having needing to use too much mental effort.
Thanks Paul.
I’m making strides to try to cut down my workload. I think this is best for me. It also felt good to tell some people about what I’m going through. It seems that it’s common in academia.
You mentioned gurus – I did consider finding a mindfulness class, a coach that can help me with guided mindfulness meditations that are all about allowing the thoughts and feelings about anxiety. I hope this is okay. You said meditation was a big help for you – how often did you meditate while you were suffering? And what kind of meditation did you do? What benefits did you feel that it had on you?
For me, it’s kinda weird. I allow my anxiety now, or at least I’m getting better at it. But I just can’t stop thinking about the fact that I have anxiety. There are moments when I’m feeling good, the thoughts will come but I can handle them and allow the anxious reactions. But when I am really down and having a hard time, my mind is just constantly on the fact that I have anxiety. I still allow the feelings to come and let the thoughts race about, but the thoughts drag me down and I end up on the internet again, filling my head with this stuff. I don’t know if that constitutes avoidance because I’m still feeling this stuff. But I guess I’m not ‘relaxing behind it.’
What do I do when these constant ruminations about my anxiety (thinking about wanting to be better, hating having anxiety, thoughts reminding me that I have anxiety) just level me? Again, I don’t fight or try to push away these thoughts. I don’t ignore them. I don’t try to make it all go away instantly because I know it won’t. I may end up on the internet, but mostly it’s just to read some words on here about allowing. But mostly I end up moping. I can’t stop monitoring my feelings and thinking about my anxiety and feeling like shit because of it.
It’s like, it’s fine to accept, but when your thoughts inevitably turn to your anxiety and how much you hate it and wish you didn’t have it, it feels counterintuitive to acceptance even if you are technically just letting these thoughts and feelings continue. The feelings intensify and so it feels like I’m going backwards. When I’m having these lamenting thoughts, I have no idea whether I am adding more stress and worry just by thinking sad thoughts and being down, or if this is all just par for the course.
I guess what I’m trying to say is:
I know that I have anxiety. I’m not trying to fight it and I’m not trying to run away from it. I know I have it. I know why I have it. I know how it works.
I just can’t stand that I have it. It just hurts so much. I just hate when I can’t think of anything else. When I can’t even feed myself because my stomach is churning and I have no appetite. I know what is happening behind these symptoms and not trying to work anything out.
I just mope and feel hopeless a lot when I’m at my low points and then I wonder if this mopping and hopeless state is in and of itself counterproductive.
Does “accepting” that I have anxiety mean that I basically have to shrug when I’m feeling hopeless and intensely sad? Paul, you said you have had these moments of being intensely low, then you should know when you’re intensely low and depressed, it’s very hard to just shrug your shoulders and say “who cares?” because your very thoughts and feelings are of the ‘there is no hope’ variety. I can’t help that but somehow I feel like this is wrong and I should be more apathetic when my mind constantly barrages me with sad thoughts about me having anxiety. That if I’ve truly accepted I shouldn’t even care, and it shouldn’t bother me, and then I shouldn’t get into these depressive modes. I know it seems stupid.
At the moment I just can’t believe that there are people who actually find themselves free from anxiety. I know you are an ex-sufferer Paul and it took you a couple of months to recover after accepting. It just feels like it takes a special type of person. I don’t know.
Is it okay that I’m constantly thinking about my anxiety? I’m not talking about coming back to this site and looking it up because I know I have to break that bad habit as it is a crutch. I am just wondering: is it okay that I am constantly, CONSTANTLY thinking about my anxiety? I’m constantly thinking, “I have anxiety and I’m so sad about it.” I am constantly focused on how I feel and feeling depressed as a result even as I try to do other things.
Hi Romy,
I don’t know if you’re still looking for answers on this, but I thought I’d chime in anyway.
I’m no neuroscientist or neurologist, but what we know is that the mind is a densely-packed, extremely complex system of nerves and neurons and synapses and neurochemicals all interacting with each other. At times, this system buzzes with energy, whether it be excitement, happiness or fear and anxiety. When you have an anxiety disorder, your mind can seem out of control. At my worst, I felt as if my mind had taken on a life of its own. It was like the famous cartoon Roadrunner up there. I didn’t want to think about my anxiety, but there was nothing I could do because there was nothing else up there at the time. It just buzzed and buzzed as my thoughts raced and raced. Trying to change it was like chasing the wind.
So yes, of course, it’s okay that you’re constantly thinking about it. It HAS to be okay, because what else can you do? That is your state of mind at the moment, and the only thing there is for you to do is to accept it and allow it to be there. By doing that, you’ll gradually take the sting out of it. I mean, the Coyote probably would have had a much quieter life had he just ignored that damn Roadrunner!
This attitude takes time, but it does get easier as you go on. I would say that about 75% of the thoughts I have are just mental noise that is largely out of my control, but it has no bearing on my life because I can just shrug at it all and let it float away. The remaining 25% is the controlled, rational thought that I actually want and feel I can use – essentially, the real me. I didn’t get here overnight. In my case, therapy and medication helped. But most of all, true acceptance of what was going on in my head got me to a more peaceful place.
Hi Michael,
Thank you so much for answering me. I do have another question – how did you take care of your body? I watched a really loud movie the other day and now I worry my body’s more sensitive than ever. Was this a no-no?
Hi Romy,
You’re just hyper-focused on your body. And your nervous system is primed to react so you’re bound to feel on edge.
You’re focusing on individual aspects of your anxiety. You’ll feel better about something and then move on to something else. The truth is that all the answers you need are there in Paul David’s books. The feelings you’re having in your body require the same response as everything else – acceptance.
Hi Paul and anyone else that can help! I’ve been suffering from mostly physical sensations of anxiety for 5 months..it started out with tingling all over now o have so many physical sensations all day every day I’m finding it impossible to get through my days…I’m constantly tingling which then turns to ear and head pressure/pain..my psychiatrist has thrown so many meds at me so now I don’t know what’s anxiety and what is med side effects! I’m only 35 and am desperate to start a family. I can’t even sit down with my husband without feeling complete panic due to all these physical sensations
..I also get burning and numbness on my face daily. I have no comfort zone so I.can seem to find any peace…no way to calm my body down?? I know you say Face your fears however mine is just about the physical sensations that bombard me all long…o have to take a sleeping tablet as my symptom are also there in bed…I’m losing hope and some days just don’t want to wake up…I was fit and healthy 5 months ago and I am so scared my life is over…I’ve been accepting how I am but it just leads to panic several times a day. Any help would be much appreciated…Deborah
Hey Deborah
Just read your post and it was like reading about myself, obviously I’m not pleased you feel this way but I’m pleased someone else feels the same as me, no one ever mentions the strange sensations anxiety gives you, all mine seem to be head related which then turns in to the spiral of all the worst case scenarios, I have good and bad days but it’s so difficult to get on with your life when these physical symptoms are there 24:7 even when you are letting them just be.
I asked this question on twitter but thought I’d ask here as well. I am currently in a situation where I’ve decided to just let myself think and feel however I do. I know negative thoughts and feelings don’t need to change (as they change themselves) and that I need to just trust in my body to be able to handle them as I go about my day.
The problem is I also know I have a sensitized body because of adrenaline and that I need to let my body rest. However, my apartment building currently has lots of construction that start way early in the morning. They have jackhammers going right in the early morning and my whole body vibrates with the decibels. I don’t know if I am actually letting my body heal by sleeping through the construction (which sometimes I have to if I have night shift and have to sleep in the morning/afternoon). What do I do in this situation? I’d like to do what I can to help my body heal.
It’s funny because I did have a bit of an epiphany the other day. I’ve been ‘labelling’ myself with “anxiety” for so long, but when I read what other people go through, it’s either not that bad or…who knows, maybe I am recovering. Fingers crossed. But I realized that it only really gets bad these days with dark thoughts because it seems that my mind keeps going through this repetitive cycle of seeing myself in a “this dreadful condition” which then brings upon a wave of sad feeling. Really, it’s my dark thoughts about my current feeling that makes everything feel hard. If my thoughts were just “hey, oh well, this isn’t a big deal my body’s just sensitized” then I don’t think the emotions would be quite as intense (except for whatever my body brings up on its own). But the thing is, you can’t stop those repetitive ‘Aaah my life is over!’ negative thoughts from coming even though I KNOW it’s not over and I KNOW my thoughts aren’t real and are meaningless (and well self-correct). I guess the only thing I can do is let them come while understanding that it’s all just the same repetitive junk, right? (the thoughts and the waves of emotion and sensations that come with it).
Thanks, HB
Hey Paul,
I am really struggling with constant tiredness.. I just dont know its all the time there- this feeling of weakness and sleepyness. 🙁
If I feel this overwhelming tiredness, It scares me. And even if I try to let it be there, I can do that.. but its still hard to be like this all the time..
What do I do about this?
Would be thankful if you could reply.
Hi all, I’ve not posted on here for a long time and sadly it’s not because I have made great improvements.
Having read some of the posts above I too have a question?
It’s about ‘Acting as if’ and ‘Acceptance’.
So if I take myself for instance, when I am low, depressed and have no interest in anything other than being totally consumed in self-pity, the anxiety is running through me and I can’t see a way out, I do what most of us probably do, I am on here searching for relief, searching for answers, trying (yes I use that word) to change how I am feeling, thinking and feeling, whether it be on this blog or listening to Claire Weekes.
My confusion is how do I approach this better?
I read that in order to get better you have to live your life regardless of how you are feeling and thinking (do nothing about it). So if I am depressed, no energy and life are empty then I should except this (however this is a large proportion of my life at present), so doing this is just making me more depressed and low and very very very tearful at every single thing I think about.
Then, on the other hand, I read you should ‘Act as if’, as this tells the mind that there is no danger and you are actually ok.and within the time the anxiety levels start to drop as you are re-training the mind, but then is this not ‘trying to feel better’?
I am going to be very honest with you all at the minute, I am so struggling with day to day living although no one other than a few close people would ever know. I get so overwhelmed at nonsensical stuff that I often have to find a safe place to release the tension through crying and self-pity. I am afraid (yes afraid, scared, worried) that I have been here before some years ago and got through it, this time it seems to be getting worse month by month and I am losing my mind!
Sorry for the negativity and worry….. but it has taken me to be honest with myself to even write this an admit how I am feeling.
I can really relate to how you’re feeling as I’ve been there myself. I’ve felt pinned to my bed by depression and anxiety. It’s awful, but the good news is you can get better and live a much better life. If I can do it, anyone can.
It’s too easy to get bogged down in the meaning of the various terms and expressions and general advice you receive. The more you try to understand it and get your head around it, the more mental energy you’ll expend. Which is only ever going to make you feel worse. Plus, you’ll be absorbed by the subject of anxiety and depression all the time as you constantly try to understand this seemingly simple message with its myriad possible interpretations and occasional contradictions.
My advice would be not to be so concerned about whether you’re doing something for the right reason. If you feel as if you’re doing something with the aim of getting better, be accepting of that. Forgive yourself for doing something for that reason. Don’t second guess your motivations, and if you find yourself filled with thoughts about how you’re doing this wrong, just let those thoughts be there. You don’t have to listen to them.
There’s no need to run before you can walk, either. My advice would be to focus on things that you want to do just because you want to do them. And then do them. And if you feel anxious, be accepting of the thoughts and feelings that arise, and continue with what you’re doing. Remind yourself that the main reason you’re doing it is that you want to.
As an example, when I was in the midst of a breakdown, I went bowling with some friends. I also went to a cheese festival with a friend. And I went on holiday to Iceland. Obviously, I wanted to get better, but the principle reason I did those things was that I knew I wanted to. I was mentally and physically drained, and I felt pretty rough, but I did it anyway.
I hope this helps. The thing to take away is to stop wrestling with definitions and meanings and to just live your life and do the things you want and need to do, regardless of how you feel.
This is really good advice and thanks for your advice to me too.
I think if I wasn’t so lonely in real life then I’d be having a much easier time at this. I’m currently alone in my apartment, alone in this city, alone at work. I so desperately want to go home to where I was living before – and I’ve been feeling this way even before the anxiety kicked in. I’m worried that if I leave that’s just ‘running away.’ But then I don’t know if I can stand being here any longer. I guess I’ll just accept how I’m feeling right now and wait for the answer to come to me.
Michael,
Thanks for the quick response………
I do feel I am the master of information on how to overcome this condition, but putting this into action is so the hardest thing. I have read before that I should do things I want to do and not do them to feel better, often though the depression wins when it tells me not to bother, you’re too tired’ too anxious, you won’t get anything from it so why bother?
One thing I do notice however is that when I am lost in something and my attention is completely off me I feel fine(ish) until I remind myself that this feeling isn’t going to last and then wham….. the overwhelming feeling of despair is back and I feel so low again. This is the circle I find myself in. What happens from there on is that I go downhill to the point of being back searching, looking and trying to fix all this. Thinking about going back on meds to help, trying relaxation tech but feeling more anxious doing them, scratching and scrapping whilst trying to be the person everyone thinks I am (and whom I want to be again).
Every free minute of the day when I am not 100% off me the feeling creeps in and off I go again, I hate to say this and even scared of writing it in case it becomes true but I don’t see recovery, I don’t have that fight that says ‘You can do this mate’.
Thanks again
I haven’t been on here for a while as I have been doing well just getting on with things but at the minute i am really struggling more with feeling confused and scared then anything. My nan died Friday and since then my anxiety has been through the roof and now I’m worrying that I’m going to have a major break down which then starts the thoughts of what if I kill myself what if I dnt cope. I’m scared of death anyway but I’m so numb at the minute aswel l scared sorry for going off my question is has anyone been through loss during recovery and did they find that they felt this way and advice would be much appreciated.
Louise berry I have exact same fear
When you hear sad news about your fear does it trigger your anxiety
How long have you been sensitized for I’m about 2 years but been making progress last 6 months xx
Hi Paul, I experienced anxiety this time last year. Was experiencing breathlessness and dizziness and worrying constantly what was happening to me. This I believe was related to overdoing things at work. This made things worse and went on for a few months. I eventually tried mindfulness and come across your book. It helped me understand what I was putting myself through by repeating the worry cycle over and over. I eventually took heed of your readings and it helped me get better. I have recently had another bout of breathlessness which can come and go throughout the day. I believe it is anxiety related as I have had my health checked. What can I do to ease this symptom? I have tried not to worry but it sometimes consumes me.Thanks, Alan
Hi Alan,
As with any symptom, the answer is to accept it and continue on. I know breathlessness can be disconcerting and bothersome, but the more you focus on it, worry about it, try to make it go away, the more it will linger. So accept that’s how you’re feeling, accept it’s uncomfortable, and then go about your day. If it’s there all day, oh well. If it goes away but then come and back, who cares.
Thanks Stephanie. I have decided to follow your advice and let whatever symptoms I have just be there and accept. I have done this in the past and my symptoms passed but I seem to have fallen into old habits of analysing and worrying about my symptoms.
Brilliant posts Paul xxx
While your sensitized does things bother you more
Like your fear if you hear someone done that thing does it make you anxious and start to thing what if I do?
Hi Natalie,
Absolutely. When you’re sensitized, all sorts of things can affect you: the news, sounds, smells, memories. So since you know that to be the case, don’t read in to your reactions very much. Accept the reactions and the thoughts and the feelings that go along with that, then simply move on. Allow yourself to feel scared while living your life.
Thank you so much, Stephanie
I’ve been like this for 2 years now but last 6 months been having good days here and there but then I see or hear something on the news and it knocks me back and seems to put my self in their shoes and terrify myself
Would you say this was normal I think I know deep down it is x
Hi,
I need help and I hate that I do. I’m feeling really desperate.
I feel so distant from everyone and feel so many negative emotions towards people who have been my friends. A voice is telling me I don’t need them, I can show them I don’t need them, but then I can’t help but feel lonely and disconnected from myself. I feel so lost.
I have my husband who loves me and is there for me and I am thankful.
However, it is coming up to 8 years now since I first got hit with this silence feeding illness and I am really losing hope. Even after discovering acceptance etc 3.5 years ago, I still am not able to apply it. I think I am trying to apply it and trying to get better and this hinders it.
I just feel like I am wasting my life, I am so stuck in my life and it makes me really really sad.
Plus the only friend I could speak about this to hasn’t been great to me lately and I don’t feel like contacting her.
I really want some help. I’m really so fed up. And I’m mad at myself because I have heard the same advice again and again.
Hi Star,
You said you’ve heard the same advice again and again, so what are you hoping to hear this time? I understand the frustration and hopelessness that anxiety/depression can bring – and talking can certainly help with that. But you know the relief is temporary. Reassurance is temporary. The power to regain your life lies with you and only you. Paul always says that he can only show people the way – they have to be the ones to choose to walk the path.
Stop letting your feelings and thoughts, no matter how strong or convincing they are, control you. Don’t expect to feel a certain way. Don’t try to make yourself better. Acceptance is the opposite of force, of struggling. It’s living your life regardless of however crappy you feel, whatever thoughts are raging in your mind. It’s having lunch with a friend even though your chest is heavy and there’s a pit in your stomach. It’s going on a date with your husband even though it all feels pointless and empty. It’s even having a cry out of frustration, but then getting back up and moving forward, one day at a time.
Every day is a new opportunity. You can either let it be defined by anxiety/depression, or you can make the most of it.
Thanks, Stephanie, I only noticed you answered me now, bc I haven’t been here for a while.
You speak the truth.
I always find that the way that Paul writes things is so clear and to the point and coming back to these words sometimes click with me. But I always lose it after a few days or so. I know I need to be ok with feeling anxiety all the time but I think that’s the issue.
Today I got some negative news about my career, I have been struggling with crippling anxiety that has been affecting my performance in exams and at work.
I am working on just allowing myself to be anxious. I realise that I am putting so much energy in hiding it and trying to come across normal and this is soooo exhausting so being aware of that and that my biggest fear is losing control of myself which wont happen, has been helpful.
But it’s hard when it feels that this whole saga with anxiety has been so costly to my life, I can’t help feeling resentment towards it.
But I know that when I can see things clearly that I can do things through anxiety even if not pleasant so the fault is not entirely on anxiety for all the things I have missed out on.
Hi guys.
Non resistance and Acceptance only comes through the practice of it. It took me a very long time to truly understand this. Trust this process and have patience with it.
It truly doesn’t matter how you feel or what thoughts arise The battle with them is the problem.
Just let it go.
Paul thank you for everything.
Hi, just out of curiousity.. Why do you think CBT is the most widely used treatment for anxiety and depression, yet the results are either minimal or short lived?
Thank you so much, Paul!
I just found your site and am really inspired, for lack of better word.
I have been struggling (and yes, I chose that word here, because struggling is precisely what I was/am doing!) with my mental health for more than 10 years now. I get bouts of low mood, no energy, crying and then the anxiety comes. Sometimes these periods would only last a few days or some weeks…but during the last three years, as my life felt like it had more demands and as I am getting older (39 now), these depressive episodes or however I should label them (question: should we really label our issues?) have become more intense and stayed longer.
I was looking for “anxiety cures” again because when I am down in the dumps with my mood, the nervous energy is what bothers me most.
The sadness or frustration etc are feelings I can deal with better. Although saying that now, I can see that the sadness/feeling no energy is what triggers the anxiety.
Because then the thoughts come “here you are again / you will never really get better / it will always come back / you cannot be 100% ok / what if you can’t get over it this time / why am I like that and why are others so ok? ” etc..
Reading all your posts, I can recognize myself in so many traits and you really describe what I am doing to myself!
Not the avoidance etc, but I can totally see how I get into these periods of mental exhaustion and then I freak out because I am a version of myself that I don’t want to be.
Self-image and self-esteem are big issues for me. I can be super confident and have a job where I need to be and I can be the centre of attention, the big storyteller, and I know how to get along with everyone. I even don’t mind small talk at all.
But the side of me that gets run down, gets sad for no apparent reason and then becomes nervous and feels like she is not up for much and can identify with people on anxiety boards is what I can’t accept fully yet.
It’s like I can only be either or…Like something is wrong with me and like I had bad luck for having the brain I have etc.
I compare myself to everyone else who SEEMS ok and like they’re going through life without thinking about their mental health too much.
I miss this unawareness. Yes, they have issues and things to be upset about but they don’t question how they feel and if they’re mentally unstable all the time!
I wish I could get back to that state!
I have read Russ Harris ACT book years ago and immediately liked all the ideas and it made a lot of sense to me. It is in some ways what you tell us as well. Stop struggling, accepting, doing everything anyway and seeing thoughts and feelings for not more than that.
I just haven’t mastered it yet or else I wouldn’t need all this support still, and I wouldn’t have kept struggling.
That’s why I am hopeful in reading all your posts but also disillusioned because I feel like I KNOW it all, I can totally grasp all of these concepts.
But I am so bad at APPLYING it.
And being goal-oriented, I always feel like I need to DO something.
So just letting be…accepting is so difficult for me.
I want to see progress and know I am on the right track. Is this even possible?
My mind is still overactive after days of feeling sad and stressed again…I would love to give it the rest and peace it needs. But it is just so hard to implement.
I guess I still want too much to get rid of it all and feel better?
So I am not quite in the accepting mode yet. Is there any other advice/hack you or anyone else on here can give to those of us that have an especially hard time of letting go?
Thanks so much
Maddy
Hello, I recently read the book and I’m working on ‘letting go’ of the struggle. I’ve been struggling for about 4-5 months now with severe physical and mental symptoms. I’m sure my fear is like many that I will not recover. It seems to pop up in my mind A LOT and puts the fear in me and causes further anxiety. If I understand correctly, I just need to feel this fear and let it be there and do my best to go about my day. I am doing my best go just live my life, I’m working and doing all the things I normally do but the anxiety is always on my mind even when I’m keeping busy. I guess I get confused if I’m truly accepting of everything or just somewhat accepting at this point. I really want to accept and I know this is what’s needed to recover, but how do you know if you’re truly accepting when your mind is constantly on your disorder?
Hi KD,
Acceptance doesn’t mean you’ll no longer experience any thoughts or symptoms. In fact, I’d say the opposite is true for many people – when they finally start allowing and accepting, symptoms and thoughts might increase because they’re not being suppressed anymore. But the point is to change your attitude and response to the symptoms and thoughts. Instead of thinking that you can’t feel a certain way or think about certain things because that will hinder your progress, allow yourself to feel and think anything. If your mind wants to think about anxiety, let it. If you find yourself having a second thought response of “oh no, I’m thinking about my anxiety again!” just remind yourself “who cares if I’m having these scary, uncomfortable thoughts” and then get back to your day. Some people get caught in thinking accepting is some type of ritual, like if I have x thought then I respond with y, and so on. But it’s more of an attitude change than anything. It’s believing that your body can feel any symptom and your mind can think any thought, and you can even be bothered and scared of those symptoms and thoughts, but ultimately you’re done trying to stop or suppress or fix any of it. It’s believing your mind and body can heal itself if you just give it the chance. You have to give your mind and body space for peace to return, even if it doesn’t come right away (and like I said, it might not).
Thank you, Stephanie, that makes sense. I guess like many I just second guess if I’m doing or ‘not doing’ the right things. I don’t feel like I’m suppressing thoughts and symptoms at this point (for the most part that is), but I do get stuck in that fear loop about my recovery a lot of the time. I know these thoughts are irrational and stir up from the state I’m in but it surely doesn’t stop them from coming 🙂 Sometimes I do get frustrated because I’m thinking about anxiety ALL the time, even when I’m doing other things. I know I just need to let my mind think about anything it wants. I get stuck in that belief that if I just keep thinking about it, things will get worse. I know now I just need to let it do whatever it wants and eventually, that should calm down as I heal. I was in a really bad place initially several months back, so I know it may be many months before I ‘heal’. I’m going to do my best to move on and give it space, thank you again and good luck to you.
Maddy -I very much understand what you are saying here. You have put it very well. I have struggled for a while and yet have varying times of being less involved or more involved with the mind. I too am goal orientated, a doer. I think the sentence that resonates most with me is that you cannot accept that part of you that gets run down etc. I too find I do not like this part of me, I perceive it as weakness, yet it’s not, it’s just what we are. I think it is possibly the need to control this ‘weak’ side that is the problem as it creates an inward fight to come out of it, instead of just waiting it out quietly and letting time pass. We have high expectations of ourselves and our bodies. Thank you for your post, it made me realise quite a bit about how I see myself too.
Stephanie, your posts are very helpful. Have you been recovering a while and how do you deal with ‘real-life’ problems whilst anxiety is high. I have had a few health problems recently, one being a small injury and find anxiety seeps into them and blurs the edges of what is real and what is anxiety, I would be grateful if anyone has any advice on this.
Hi Ejam,
It’s only natural that in a sensitized state you’ll have a stronger reaction to “real life” problems. So accept that’s what’s happening. You might be thinking “oh no, I’m freaking out about what’s going on, but if I keep freaking out then I’m gonna make my anxiety worse and my recovery longer…or maybe I’ll never recover! I need to stop freaking out!” But of course the more you try to stop your feelings and thoughts, the more confused and hopeless you feel. It would be better to just recognize that you’re stressed/anxious about what’s happening and then say “oh well, it’s not fun to feel this way, but so what, I can still carry on even though I’m really anxious.” That kind of response doesn’t stop your feelings/thoughts, but it does give you a little space from them even while they’re raging inside you. Even if you have to redirect yourself countless times (not because you HAVE to redirect yourself, but because you know it’s pointless to focus on your thoughts/feelings), again so what. Remember, it’s never your thoughts/feelings that are the problem, it’s you telling yourself you can’t/shouldn’t have them. You can’t will them to go away any more than you can will your injury to heal faster.
@Ejam:
Thank you! Good to hear you understand and can relate. We always think we’re so special and such weird cases…yet most of us are probably more alike than we think or want to be, haha.
And yes, I am too an absolute “doer”. I have this proactive attitude..always wanting to sort things out, get things done, “fix” everything – and most of all myself. Coupled with impatience…a recipe for..well, not the best for waiting things out, letting your mind and body heal in its own pace.
My therapist had me figured out from the start and she keeps telling me to “be kind to myself”, “be understanding”, “be patient” etc.
I took me basically until right now, to fully grasp it all. Yes, I knew what she meant and that I am always too hard on myself, expecting too much from myself and how I WANT to feel and how I SHOULD be.
but it always seemed kind of too easy a “solution”. And how am I kind to myself, other than taking a bath, going for a walk, spoiling myself with some nice clothes, eating well etc?
I felt like I could never really fully do it.
And now, going through a rough patch again the last one or two weeks, I kind of realize that I need to stop doing what I am doing!
As soon as I get better after my “episodes”, I am back at chasing feeling “great” again.
I am back at making plans of how I will be super sporty, eat super clean, get the most perfect body, find myself the perfect man (finally), and I have a complete list of things I need to “fix” about myself and my life.
So the pressure is on again!
I start looking on Instagram again and compare myself to 20somethings with seemingly perfect lives and I focus on everyone else who seems to have it better.
And I just keep waiting to feel carefree and energetic like I am 25 again…and if these feelings don’t come, I get sad and doubt myself and keep wondering why I am such a miserable person and what could be wrong with me.
That, in a nutshell, is what I am doing and have been doing for years.
And how on earth am I not supposed to get sad, depressed and anxious like that???
So…I feel like I REALLY get now why I need to let myself be…and why self-acceptance isn’t just a trendy buzzword, but it really is a necessity to have mental health.
Maybe there is nothing wrong with me? Maybe I don’t have a terrible chronic mental disorder, through bad luck and a wrongly wired brain…maybe I am just too effing mean to myself???
And, maybe this helps you too: my therapist also tells me that the side I like about me (the active, social, curious and unscared side) is always there. It won’t just disappear. I have this side, and I also have a vulnerable side. And they can co-exist. And the “weak” side just wants to be heard and seen. And, like you also said, not controlled or struggled with.
Sorry for the long rambling post… but as you might also know, it helps to write things off you chest. And if you get a reply or someone can relate – even better.
@Stephanie: Agree with Ejam. Your posts are super helpful. And this paragraph also struck a chord with me:
“It’s believing that your body can feel any symptom and your mind can think any thought, and you can even be bothered and scared of those symptoms and thoughts, but ultimately you’re done trying to stop or suppress or fix any of it. It’s believing your mind and body can heal itself if you just give it the chance. ”
In a way, I am looking forward to the freedom that would come with this!
I hope I can get there.
And thanks for explaining to KD of how to best deal with the meta thoughts of “oh no, I am thinking about how I am feeling again..will I ever stop thinking about being anxious etc”.
I guess we just really need to hear that, yes, over time, these thoughts will not always be there!
Hi Maddy – thanks for the reply. Your analysis of being a doer, being hard on the vulnerable side is so clearly explained and yes I really identify with this. I achieve quite high standards in what I do and a good level of success, I have very many good parts to my ‘being’ including caring about people. However, I get extreme frustration over feeling vulnerable and even when I have an illness etc won’t give in easily and beat myself up mentally over recovery and judging how much is anxiety and how much real. I expect it relates to trying to be in control and fear of not being in control. You are so right when you say we do not have a mental illness, it is just a perception of something being wrong (when there is nothing more than our thoughts about it) which we then train our mind to believe, obviously not on purpose but as you know it’s quite willing to fulfil the remit. It is about being kind to yourself, but also firm, doing things when you don’t feel the impetus to do them, about not listening to the negative thoughts or hearing them but not believing them and understanding they are ‘just’ thoughts. We are all trying to ‘fix’ ourselves depending on what our fear is, it can be many things mine has become ‘fix’ the anxiety which obviously creates more. I think the line you say expecting too much from yourself, how I want to be and how I should be – we want to meet up with the image we have of ourselves and this gives us a hard time. It’s very difficult but I think being kind to yourself starts with accepting who we are good and bad bits. We will always be doers as trying to alter that would be going against the grain but it needs to be a more gentle on ourselves version, accepting when we need to let go or ease up. Great to hear from you and some really well-observed comments Maddy.
Thank you, Ejam, and right back at you – well-observed comments 🙂
I feel like I am reaching a bit of a turning point now. In a positive way. I suddenly see so much clearer what I have been doing to myself and why I always had some weight on my back for years – even if I had times where I felt fine.
Maybe it is always the self-doubt, the pressure and the feeling of “things are not good enough and you are not good enough/feeling good enough” that is creating the nagging feeling?
And then the struggle started of optimizing, fixing, sorting out, getting rid of…
Could it be that I really just need to be kinder, be softer, accepting, and just letting go more?
If yes, it would be so simple! Not easy (as we all know how difficult it is for a lot of us, especially as “doers” with an active dominant character), but simple!
Like Paul also says, no technique, complicated therapy, medication, supplement or tiresome routine – just be accepting, patient and self.compassionate?
I really hope it has now sunk in for me…Like I said, I always heard “be kind / don’t have such high expectations for yourself and everything” and so on – but I never REALLY grasped of how much this affects mental health – if you constantly battle yourself, compare, run after feeling great, make plans of what to change about yourself.
I think I understand slowly but surely why I feel stressed, exhausted, overwhelmed and therefore doubt myself even more.
Am I just blinding myself now, in a way to fix myself again by telling me (and this blog) all of this – or am I really finally getting more clarity and possible space for myself to heal, to feel more at ease, and to be more accepting?
Maddy – I think that with this we slowly gain deeper levels of understanding, eureka moments. Sometimes in periods of outside stress, we temporarily lose it but no more than someone who had never been aware of that level of understanding in the first place. You put it so succinctly and it seems so simple – but yes I too have been told those things and because I have felt so overwhelmed when fighting, self-compassion did not really seem to be ‘enough’ surely there is more. But I believe you are right. Self-compassion is more than a warm bath and some essential oils, it is sometimes dropping a gear and not pushing (which if you are a doer can be going against your instinct) it can mean accepting unpleasant symptoms and not fighting them or looking for a way out which is the same reaction as fighting. It is knowing when it’s ok to ask for help and not beating yourself up about it and also not feeling guilty. Being kind to yourself is as you say ‘simple’ but not ‘easy’. However, it is something that is very doable with practice and forgiving yourself when you slip up. I read Sarah Milligan’s book a while ago and in it, she said that she had been told ‘good enough’ was fine. I think that says a lot – there is nothing to fix. It is the fixing that is the problem. So the answer has to be acceptance. Like you, I am getting there, some days I accept easier than others but have taken my foot off the accelerator and hoping to keep what understanding I have gained and keep practicing it. Hope this helps others too.
Hello, what I find myself struggling with is reassurance. My physical and mental symptoms are pretty bad a lot of days, and I find myself going back to the book/blog/success stories to reassure myself that people do recover. I’ve been dealing with this for several months so I start to scare myself that this is how it’s going to be and I’m not sure how I can do this every day. I know I just need to let my mind think that if it wants to, but then I start to question that too because it’s a thought process that happens so many times each day.
I think the success stories in the book are a blessing and a curse. When I see people say “they gave up all hope of recovery” and that’s when they got better. I know that’s what I need to do, but it just seems foreign to me at this point. I feel like I’m accepting symptoms the best I can, but I’m just not sure how to give up all hope/thoughts about recovery. Perhaps that idea will get easier over time, I’m not sure.
I know it seems counterintuitive to give up hope of recovery, but that doesn’t mean that you’re resigning yourself to a life of misery and torment. What it means is you reach a point where you say, “You know what, enough. I’ve been questioning, struggling, fighting, trying to fix for so long and all it’s brought me is more exhaustion and confusion. So whether this is how I’m going to be for the rest of my life or not, I’m done with spending my time focusing on anxiety. I still have a life to live, a job to do, people to love – so that’s what I’m gonna focus on.” And then that’s what you do. Yes, you’re still gonna find yourself getting involved with your thoughts or bothered by how you’re feeling. It takes time to build new habits. Just remind yourself “So what. I’m done giving these things my time and energy.”
KD, not sure if I can be of help but I will try. I too have done and still do this at times. I think you need to do it to start with, you need to get enough glimpses to give you confidence that the real you is still there. Once you build enough courage to see/feel that you need to put the book/blog down for a little bit and get out into the real world, watch it come and go and try and not be too impressed by it. I am not saying this is easy but you also need to be patient which is something that is in short supply when you just want to be free of ‘it’. There is actually no ‘it’ – it is the need to fix how you feel which is the problem. We are good at scaring ourselves too, it is just that though, thoughts that are not fact-based. If you need to read the book or the blog, for now, I would say read it, build up enough strength and then one day you won’t need it, you will get fed up of it. Good luck.
KD
I can only recall a couple of people ever mentioning they give up all hope of recovery and that is their way of describing surrender, this came after they were done with trying to get better, they were exhausted with it all and realised it wasn’t getting them anywhere. It is also where I eventually ended up through sheer exhaustion of FIGHTING and STRUGGLING to get better.
It is only when you give up trying to fix and solve yourself, when you give up the whole questioning, introspecting and stressing about how you feel that the peace you are looking for finally arrives. Because it is all the fighting, striving, fixing, overthinking and everything else you do on a daily basis that is causing you to feel the way you do, it is the very reason you are staying in a loop of suffering.
So people giving up the whole hope of recovery just means they finally surrendered and ceased trying to feel any different than they did. They had, had enough of fighting and so just give in to it all.
Two people who recovered on my Facebook page put this on there recently after I put the quote
‘I didn’t find a way to get rid of anything, I found a way to be OK with everything’
“I love this I’m there right now after struggling for many years something clicked and I thought f**K it just let it go and see what happens and guess what nothing happened I’m still here I’m still me I just let the anxiety be there it no longer bothers me. try it guys it really works”.
what all of you must understand from Paul’s message is; Live your life as normally as you would if you didn’t have anxiety. Get on with caring about your surroundings, people around you, prepping/ cooking dinner, going out for short walks, window shopping just general day to day activities DESPITE of how you feel……For Example, you could be at a checkout line at a store, and you get your usual sudden rush of adrenaline flow in your body/mind, your anxiety is at peak level and you feel as you can’t stand there any longer…THIS is the critical point that’ll define YOUR own recovery. “Just stay there and feel all the dread, thoughts, feeling grey, depersonalized, empty, scared..whatever, feel it all. For once, promise to yourself that this time you won’t try to feel any different or try to “think” positive, or distract your mind with a crutch like trying to focus on an object etc. Let your mind get cluttered as it wants and carry on with the checkout, smile at people if someone smiles at you, have a short convo with the cashier, ask them how they’re doing. Our brains are incredible, you can do all of this while you’re having all your anxiety symptoms because anxiety never stops you from doing anything, just sends false signals to your mind perceiving oncoming danger. Once you get past this example, the rush of thoughts/ the dreaded feelings physical and emotional all comes to rest. Each time you do this your mind begins to reprogram itself out of anxiety eventually could take months, or a yr or 2 or whenever. You’ll stop worrying about the recovery timeline soon as you see the layers of recovery yourself. Just trust us people who’ve had the worst cases of anxiety and have recovered from all the symptoms. You WILL start to recover the day you STOP trying to recover. EVERYONE recovers, I promise you that.”
Now there is no coincidence that these two people just gave in and allowed themselves to feel how they did. Every success story tells you the same, no one comes on and says ‘I fought like hell and it went away’, ‘I just took my magic pill and hey presto’, ‘I found this technique to get rid of it’ or I thought myself better.
The reason there isn’t one thing out there that someone can tell you to do and it will be gone is that is not how it works. If it was then we would just follow some instructions and it would go away. People always think they are missing something and they just have to keep searching for the thing or person that can make it all go away or that they can fight or suppress it away.
Anyone who says this certain technique will get rid of your anxiety is most likely out to line their own pockets, it’s what people want to hear and so it sells as people want the fast and easy way out that does not exist. The reason people mainly feel how they do is because they are thrashing themselves on a daily basis and creating so much of their own suffering.
If you were hitting a broken leg with a hammer every day then it would never heal, if someone just came along and took the hammer away and said ‘Just leave it, do nothing’ would that not then give the right conditions for the leg to heal? Do you not see that in trying to fix the leg with a hammer then nothing was ever going to change? This is the exact same principle, you are doing it to yourself. When you are doing with fighting, done with techniques and done with all your strategies, when you realise they don’t work, maybe then you will be ready to surrender yourself.
When people do finally just give up then this is just the start of the healing process and so there is still plenty of discomfort for a while but they have now created the right conditions for their mind and body to heal, they have finally stopped recreating the very suffering they had been trying to escape from.
The answer is far simpler than people make it, it is just that people want A – B instructions, they want the quick answer, the one that means there is no discomfort and so they keep fighting and keep searching. The reason I write is to point you to see the truth for yourself, to take the fear out of how you feel so you can finally have the courage to just let go.
Thank you Paul and everyone for the information. All of this hits home and I really just need to move on the best I can. I feel like I’m on the right track, I just need to stay out of my own way sometimes with the worry that pops up and the need for reassurance. Thanks again.
Thank you Ejam and Stephanie, I appreciate the feedback. I will one minute have the mindset that I’m done worrying about everything, and an hour later it’s like I completely forgot everything I just told myself. I know what I need to do, but still struggle with my symptoms when they’re so strong. I still do everything I did before my symptoms hit, but my mind often is on the symptoms and not what I’m doing. I definitely need to work on my patience and hopefully everything gets a little easier over time. Being in a sensitized state it’s funny how fear based and real thoughts seem even when you know deep down it’s all just nonsense. Thanks again!
I am sure we all empathise with what you say and it feels so overwhelming when it is in the midst of it. I think that is why we find such relief from hearing a sane voice saying ‘you will get through this’. I would say at the moment, try not to work it out, try and get on with life regardless of anxiety being there and you will find you will get moments of peace, I really know where you are coming from, but you are not alone and lots of others are recovered, try not to strive for it but know that this moment will pass and you will find practising acceptance easier in time, with this, the searching for peace becomes less important.
Stephanie – Thank you 🙂 I missed your post.
I have been waking up gasping for air nearly every other night. Doctor tells me it is likely panic attacks in my sleep. How do I deal with getting rid of this symptom as I am not awake when it occurs?
Ejam – Thanks for your comments! It all makes so much sense, yet it is still difficult for me to live like this…
I try not to read this site too often now and not get too caught up in reading, replying etc – as obviously it is “healthiest” for the mind if it doesn’t concern itself too much with the subject.
Today I felt like writing here again as I do need some reassurance, encouragement and whatnot 😉
It has been two weeks since I found this site and Paul’s wisdom and since I noticed myself: that I need to stop doing this to myself, I need to ease up and be kind and more accepting, of not only myself but life and others as it is.
I still notice I want to feel better – but I can’t fight with this wish.
At least I notice it, see my old pattern and then try to allow myself to be the way I am right now. Even if this is not how I want to be and reminds me of all of my previous lows.
I have my annual holiday break right now – which is good because I need the rest. But there is also less distraction through work and routine.
I am going outside every day, errands, exploring my city, yoga etc. Have had friends over, and went on a two day trip with a friend.
I still feel like I am only 50% though.
My typical symptoms (low mood, cry easily, fatigue, everything is kind of a drag, nervous easily, dreading things more than usual, not feeling up for things and being in my head and thinking about how I feel) are there.
I tell myself by not chasing after techniques, supplements, etc etc and by trying to be there for myself, I have already made a step in the right direction.
(When feeling like this all the previous times, I would often have to call my mum and have her tell me it will be ok, I would make a plan of how I will meditate every day so the benefits will kick in soon…generally be obsessed of what to do to feel better)
I tell myself that I will always be fine and there is no black hole opening up, no mood that swallows me so that I can never get out of it…
And I try to let the exhaustion be there.
But I would be lying if I said I already feel totally positive about “recovering” and ridding myself of all the depressed, anxious energy I have accumulated over the years.
Paul mentions the feeling of surrendering and not fighting with how he feels and symptoms etc. I can’t really feel this “relief” yet.
So, I guess I just wanted to ramble and vent and if anyone has some words of encouragement and wisdom, would be appreciated 😉
Maddy – your reactions are doing fine. You want it all over, who in a sensible frame of mind wouldn’t, but accept that too. I understand the frustration and the crying and all the other symptoms – as everyone else on here will in varying stages, I too have these days. Some days you will accept them and they won’t weigh too heavy, other days you will want to fight them and if you can try not to be upset by the fact you want to fight them that is progress, that is acceptance. It’s not accepting you will always be like this, it is accepting that this is just now, and continued practice with allowing whatever… will help you not expect so much from life, by not expecting it you stop ‘driving’, ‘forcing’ your way through and life gives you far more. Believe me, I know the theory but I am still practicing the practice – but I have had enough experience in the past to know that giving up is the best way, the path of least resistance. Your posts are very logical and tell me that you understand the way forward, you are lucky, it takes some people a lot longer to see this but you are well on your way already. Keep doing what you are doing you are doing well.
Hi Paul. Thank you so much for your book, I am reading it now. What you say sounds good, and I have been trying to go about my life, and not let the depersonalization stop me. It feels like it has gotten better over the past 2 years that I’ve had it but it’s still there all of the time. I think I have some better moments which is encouraging. What are your feelings about trauma-related DP, in addition to the anxiety? The theory with the type of psychodynamic therapy I have been doing is that DP is a defence mechanism that protects you from painful memories and emotions. The thought is that as I talk about, remember, work through, feel the pain of past experiences, the DP should lessen as it doesn’t have to protect me from those painful feelings anymore. Obviously, therapy requires talking about and thinking about my DP. What are your feelings about trying to do what you suggest, and doing this type of therapy at the same time? I also take medication to help with the symptoms, which does help although not completely. All of the things that the people in your book describe are exactly me. It’s still hard to believe it will ever go, and I don’t know how to accept the terrifying feelings of DP. How do you do that?
Also, I feel line if I ignore it I will disappear.
I can’t figure out how to get to these posts from the home page? Thanks, Deb
Hi Nolan, do you still visit this page? You have really helped me over the years reading your comments. I identified with al the symptoms you were suffering with, insomnia being number 1. For the last three years I have been feeling very well; no anxiety/depression, hence no insomnia. Now that my husband is about to lose his job I feel it creeping back again. After a week of very poor sleep I am worried I am will be back where I was. Do you ever go through these relapses? And is your solution to it always the same; live your life regardless? Urggh, I thought I was done with it for good. Thanks, Anne
Hi Anne,
Yes… every once in a while I’ll feel it spike back up. The fear, for the moment, can become all-consuming. Peace is replaced by the storm of doubt, fear, uncertainty and those thoughts that I am truly broken again.
Does it impact my sleep? It can… but not to the extent that it did early on. And these moments don’t happen all that often.
Big changes/obstacles will come into our lives and we’ll have the option of struggling against them or gracefully accepting them.
Those changes/obstacles can be compounded with not only the fear of the change itself but the fear of what they’ll do to our sense of peace and stability in life.
And with that fear of loss of peace/stability, we also have the option of struggling against it or accepting whatever comes our way.
When I say “gracefully accepting” it almost sounds too flighty to be even possible. For one, we have these habituated behaviours and reactions to things. These come seemingly automatic…. they require little effort on our part: we find a stressful situation and we simply start reacting poorly.
So though I still mean “gracefully accepting” it’s not a switch that we can just flip and voila… now we’re no longer struggling against the change and struggling against our loss of peace. But it means starting to have a new relationship with the change/obstacle itself as well as having a new relationship with your own internal loss of peace (which again, starts to come automatically… because you certainly aren’t making the willful decision to be flooded with fear and doubt).
So, a change is coming what can you do? Well, when you feel the fear bubbling up don’t let that fear dictate what you do. If you were reading a book you enjoy but those thoughts start coming up, let them, and keep reading your book. Opposed to putting it down and walking around the house in efforts to distract yourself from the fear. Or whatever that circumstance might look like. That fear will grip your attention with all of its might… let it. But gently direct your attention back on what you were doing.
With the fear of being broken and that this brokenness will bring back that pain of insomnia/anxiety/depression…. accept that too. It’s going to grip you tightly and fill you with doubt and despair, let it. But move on with your day/life as you had been. This tendency is not coming on because you’ve wilfully conjured it up. It’s a product of a repeated pattern of how you’ve historically handled stressful situations (it goes with me too).
So you change it by developing that new relationship with it. By being fine with its presence and you be fine with its presence by not letting its presence dictate what you do. Taking away its fuel. But you have to be patient with yourself. With all of your slips and falls.
It’s going to be hard, but it’s going to be rewarding. You can only solidify that grounding of peace in your life in these moments that truly test it. Accept the test.
Hi – I am looking for some advice from anyone who can empathise with this area of anxiety as I feel as if I am ‘alone’ in this and although I have had advice before I still feel that I have not put across what I am trying to ask. Over the years I have ‘handled’ anxiety that I KNOW is anxiety in accepting it. It has been a journey of discovery and I know I still have not completely stepped over the line of full acceptance but Paul’s method and the people on here have been the only way for me. However, there is a problem that reoccurs from time to time that is a worry to me. It seems that if I have a physical problem/injury and get pain with it, the anxiety itself seems to hang onto this pain. I then have difficulty with doctors or professionals being able to know when to ‘let go’. It’s as if it takes lots of reassurance that the injury is now ok, and then the symptoms will die away and obviously if I am still complaining of pain doctors or health people are still looking why and are not giving the reassurance but looking for reasons. I have this year had a shoulder injury which has been really hard to get over, I know parts of the pain I am now suffering is anxiety but also feel there may be areas that are real. It is causing me quite a lot of distress and I would really appreciate if Nolan, Stephanie or anyone who has a take on this could give me some positive advice. Thanks in advance.
Hi Ejam,
It’s quite normal to obsess over discomfort and pain, because of the anxious habits we’ve formed. But I’m not quite sure what you’re asking. Are you wondering if the shoulder pain you’re experiencing is actually related to the injury? I know it can sometimes be hard to distinguish between actual concerns and the typical “what if” fears and obsessing caused by anxiety. If you really believe there might be something wrong, by all means, see a doctor. But if doctors are saying everything is fine, then you might need to accept that you are the cause of your own suffering. In that case, what do you do? Same as always, don’t let your fears and anxieties interfere with living your life. There are many people who experience all types of pain on a daily basis but who still live their life.
So let’s say you’re going about your day when you feel some discomfort in your shoulder, which then causes your mind to start racing with worry. Instead of dropping what you’re doing and googling about shoulder injuries, just continue with what you were doing. Let your mind race and fret and worry. Like Nolan says in his post above, this removes the fuel from your anxiety.
I hope some of what I said helps.
Thank you very much for your reply Stephanie – I suppose what I am saying is that I wonder if other people have this problem. Health professionals ask you about pain as a signal of ‘if something is wrong’ – they then try to treat it. This is fine when the pain is signifying there is a problem but with my anxiety, it seems to create pain that mimics an injury that is healing or has healed, so progress is hard to define. So for instance – years ago I had a tooth extraction – after the initial settling down period my tooth continued to be painful. It took several return trips to the dentist for reassurance and watching for glimpses in between before my brain would let the pain go. I just wondered if this is common as I feel quite alone with it and would value hearing others who have managed it. The advice you have given me is very helpful and I agree with both yourself and Nolan that to accept whatever is will help remove the fuel and can only help ease the journey -However, at the risk of sounding like someone who keeps asking for answers, I would like to know if this is a fear that has been addressed successfully by anyone, or if not how people feel it should be addressed as once I have recovered from this injury and the anxiety accompanying it, which is a bit of a viscous circle at the moment I would like to not be carrying this ongoing fear of how I deal with health professionals . The more I fear the scenario the more it becomes an issue. Not sure if you can help with this but thank you for your advice – I will take it on board and look at my reactions.
Ejam,
What you’re describing is extremely common. But even if it weren’t, this is why Paul always says to put every symptom or experience under the umbrella of anxiety. It’s easy to convince ourselves that what we’re feeling is somehow unique, so therefore it needs some special attention. But it’s just not true. The answer is always to accept and keep moving forward.
I think it’s very easy to become neurotic about our health or any slight physical sensation. A common cold can seem intolerable to someone who is anxious and sensitive. A twinge in the head immediately invokes fears of a stroke or aneurysm. So again, accept what you’re feeling, accept your fearful reaction/thoughts to the feeling, and then gently move on. If you’re mind is obsessing or analyzing or throwing out “what ifs” – let it. It’s not like you can stop it even if you tried. Let it all be there, as hard and disturbing as it seems.
Hi all,
I’ve been sporadically posting on this forum for several years now. My life took a crazy turn 5 years ago when I experienced a horrific panic attack. What followed was a very difficult period of more than a year during which I experienced anxiety on a daily basis.
About three months after the attack I learned about Paul’s books as well as the books/audiotapes of Claire Weekes. Although I understood the message very quickly, it took me a very long time to put it into practice. I had to practice and let time pass as I went through what can only be described as pure hell. Luckily, I was and still am fortunate enough to be guided by a therapist throughout this experience. Also, I am very grateful for the support of my fantastic wife.
And although she was and still is the rock of my life, my anxious thoughts were mainly focused on my relationship. I got engaged when the “big bang attack” occurred and this – together with a very demanding job – induced the stress that led up to the development of the panic disorder. Day and night I was preoccupied with the thought of whether or not marrying this girl was a good idea. The rumination about this consumed me until I found myself at the bottom of a pit deep inside myself. Lonely. Exhausted. Shut off from the world.
From the first moment onward, I was looking for “the reason” as to why I was feeling anxious. It seemed so important to know what was causing this. I knew that once I knew what was causing this, I could do something about it. I was right. But I was looking for answers in the wrong places. I was looking for answers inside and with my thinking. I know now that I didn’t (want to) address my feelings and as long as I didn’t address them, I wasn’t able to accept them. Gradually, things got better until anxiety wasn’t crippling me any longer.
Now, 5 years later my life is yet again going to fundamentally change. I will become a father. On top of that, there is a lot of uncertainty as to where things are going in my professional career. Change and uncertainty you say? Lo and behold, look who is lurking to get back into my life? My good old friend, Anxiety.
First, I noticed I was getting more and more involved with my thoughts. ‘I don’t want this baby’, ‘I hate my job’, ‘I will lose my job’, ‘I won’t be able to cope’ and the classic ‘I don’t love this kid nor do I love my wife’ are just a couple of the interesting thoughts that my brain is coming up with. Also, my behaviour is starting to be affected: I am avoiding contact with other people, my work starts to suffer in the sense that I am postponing tasks. But not only my thoughts and behaviours are changing, but I notice also my emotional state is suffering. I am feeling more depressed and negative than usual.
It’s time for a ‘battle’ plan:
A. I’d like to accept and stop fighting my thoughts and emotional response to them once more.
B. I want to continue good habits like sports and eating healthy
C. I want to embrace this current state as an opportunity to face some of the core beliefs that make me vulnerable to anxiety every time there is a change in my life
D. I need to remind myself that life doesn’t stop when anxiety kicks in and that time is needed for this to pass.
I wanted to share this with you as I wanted to demonstrate that recovery isn’t about never feeling anxiety anymore. It is about your attitude towards it when it does return
Stephanie – Thank you. Extremely common is what I want to know – I think I have met so many strange looks recently from varying members of health professionals that I really did start to buy in to being in a rare unique group of people – possibly of ‘one’! and this added to my stress. I know the road,and hearing that I am quite usual and common is a great help in travelling it. Thank you.
Belgium, firstly congratulations on your forthcoming big event. It is always an anxious situation when this happens even for people who have never had anxiety. The same with careers. I know you KNOW the way through this, you have given so much advice to so many. However, sometimes it’s good to hear it again. You are so strong after coming through what you have previously been through , you will not have forgotten that, change maybe shaking the leaves on your tree a bit and reminding you but let the wind blow through for now as you say time moves it on. The plan you have put up for yourself and others shows us all that there is a rational side to our thoughts that overcomes the automatic reaction, we have to be strong and committed to that. You will rise to the challenges and once settled find so much joy from the end result. Thank you for your help you have given so many, wishing you well with your forthcoming event 🙂
Just to offer one quick bit of advice:
When my moments of anxiety came on the doubt, despair, and hopelessness were total. I felt defeated with no chance for any kind of redemption. Peace would forever be outside of my grasp. Even now, those moments where it occasionally comes back, for those brief moments the fear is total and all hope feels profoundly lost.
But then the cloud the lifts and I can see clearly again.
Because the pain is so complete it can impress you to the point of being certain that you are forever broken. But even in those moments carry on with your life treating the anxiety the same way you do when the pain is lessened or not even there. Those storms do pass. They may come late in your life of accepting the anxiety…. treat it all the same.
@Nolan: Great advice.
I don’t know who I am addressing right now…guess anyone who is reading and those who can give encouragement 😉
It’s been about 5 weeks or so since I discovered Paul’s site and everything made so much sense.
I also read the “Nothing works” letter 3 weeks ago and it really confirmed everything the “solution” seems so easy.
I still find myself questioning, getting frustrated that I am not making “progress” etc.
In the last few weeks, I hosted a huge party, I went on a business trip and live my life.
But it still feels so tiring and a drag.
I had moments where I could feel how to “Do nothing” worked in that I felt calmer or a surge of desperation got better. I did see these moments for sure.
But over the last days, I feel worse again. That feeling of “you will never be ok, you are always like this” is there again.
I feel more adrenaline hits again, just thinking about stuff which of course makes me sad and also exhausted.
I recognize the cycle, I really do!
It is a feeling I had during all of my previous bad times…And I try to react differently now. Instead of trying relaxation techniques, meditation etc to calm myself down or think “If I do this every day for two weeks, I will be better”, instead of calling my mother when I feel desperate etc I try to ride it out…
But it feels like a struggle and I know it shouldn’t!
So I wonder, what am I still doing wrong? Or am I ok?
I just feel so much dread right now. The dread is because I am scared I will not do things and feel ok.
I also wanted to take a break and not read this site and the letter…because I know the less I fill my head with the subject, the better.
But I still need so much reassurance, it seems!
I wonder why I don’t feel the relief of “Yes, this is the way out of all my mental troubles and I can be free”
Why can I not feel more positive about it?
And another thing that bothers me is all my memories of previous times where I felt that bad and hopeless.
They do haunt me whenever I feel this way and I find it hard not to compare and be scared that it will all be the same again.
I had such a bad patch from last November until spring and of course my mind gives me all these memories now.
So…sorry, rambling.
Maybe this is just another “setback” I have to ride out and I hope I am still being a bit more allowing than I was in previous times.
But I notice I still want the uncomfortable thoughts and feelings to go away and I look for an active way to “accept”.
I’d love to have someone tell me “you are doing ok..you will be better and you are on the right track to recover once and for all..things won’t always feel this way and nothing horrible will happen to you”
Why don’t I believe it if I tell it to myself?
Hi Maddy, after reading your posts I’ve found that our experiences going through this process are very similar. I too am early in accepting this anxiety. At first, I felt comfort after I had finished the book, I felt I had found the right path and the future was great. The symptoms have got worse though, and I remember Paul describing this as a tap, and we have just turned it on and allowed all this energy to the surface. Anxiety can make us overthink this when we are at our worst, and I am guilty of this. Although I must say I am improving my every day.
I haven’t had a “good day” either so far. I have random hours throughout the day of feeling ‘better’ but I would never say ‘good’. I need to be better with my expectations.
These blips I keep happening on a regular basis of intense anxiety that peaks gradually, I no longer call “bad days”. They are bad, don’t get me wrong, but I now refer to them as ‘release days’. Because that’s all it is. We are allowing all this energy to release itself and it makes us feel terrible and question everything but when you stop to really think about it, how can we call it a set back when it really needs to happen, right? These are good days when looking at the bigger picture.
Good days will come, I’m sure of this. And I’m sure you will get them too. You’re doing great and are absolutely doing everything right. The end is there for both of us, we just have to stay strong through this horrible beginning. (Sometimes I wish I could take my own advice, but we all know how hard that can be)
Hi all, I haven’t been here in a long time but tonight I’m having a bit of a tough time. I just felt if I write about it it might help. My anxiety has been pretty good lately. During the day I have had very few issues. But at night, just as I’m trying to fall asleep, BAM! On comes the panic attack. It doesn’t happen every night but I think it’s become something I have started to bring on because I’m worried it will come on. See how that works?! And tonight I’ve had several and the adrenaline is coursing thru me, making it very difficult to fall asleep. I remember Paul talking about this in his book, telling me not to worry and just to allow it to be there but it’s pretty frustrating when it’s 2:45 in the morning and I can’t sleep! Does anyone else have this issue and if so, how are you dealing with it?
Thank you so much Nolan. Very helpful and I am almost back to my old self. Your experiences clearly blessed you with a lot of wisdom. Hope I can say the same some day! All the best, Anne
@Maria:
I don’t have the exact same issue right now, but have had sleeping troubles in previous times when I was going through a time of anxiety/loop of unhelpful behaviour (or however I would call these periods I experience…I am now not a fan of those categories and classifying “disorders” anymore, understanding now that nothing is “broken” and an “illness” and that we don’t need a specific label to fix this etc).
I would also try to sleep and feel tense and feel adrenaline rushes and get more and more anxious. I have scary thoughts about how I will never be ok again and how I will lose control of my life and my personality (which is actually very active, outgoing and usually fun-loving) will vanish etc.
Guess these are the usual scary thoughts that come with feeling uncomfortable.
I never call this a panic attack though – maybe not using such big threatening words would also be a good start to lose the dread for this sensation?
I also get regular adrenaline surges, especially over the last few days (see my entry right above you) and woke up last night, during an unusual hour for me. My normal reaction if I was feeling well would be “oh good, only 1 o`clock, I can still sleep so much longer…bed is so comfy and sleeping is amazing”.
My reaction these days when I am not feeling great is “Oh no, the sleep issues again and I feel tense and I will never feel relaxed and …” BUT I really try to apply all the knowledge from Paul and everyone and just…let it happen.
Adrenaline comes, the butterflies, the heat and everything…I still find it pretty terrible but I try to relax into it by feeling it and adopting a pose in bed that is a bit like surrendering.
Sort of like “ok, come and do what you need to do, stress hormones”
Instead of tossing and turning, breathing deep, trying relaxation exercises etc I turned on the light and read in my book. It didn’t feel great and I didn’t have pleasure doing it, but I wanted to do the “normal” thing. And after a while, I got tired again and went back to sleep.
I woked up in the morning and had the same feeling again, adrenaline, dread and “why is it not getting better although I now know how I should recover”…
so I am still having a tough time implementing everything – or maybe just not noticing positive changes just yet.
But I feel like I handle the sleep issues better than I did in previous times when I would work myself into a full-blown state of despair, sometimes so bad that I almost needed to call my mother or a friend for comfort. (And had I not been alone I would have surely woken someone up).
Congrats on having good days though!
Sounds like you’re on a good way and I am sure the sleep issues will disappear again soon.
Hope this was somewhat helpful – albeit a lot to read..
@Maddy
Thanks so much for your response! You’ve pretty much nailed it on the head there. I finally got to sleep around 6:30 this morning, slept for about 4 hours. Very unlike me to not get a solid 7 or 8. I was so close to taking a Xanax, something I haven’t done in years. I HATE taking them and I’m really glad I didn’t. When the night serges happen, I can usually work through them and eventually get to sleep. I’m not sure why that wasn’t the case last night.
I agree with not calling them panic attacks, I look at them as energy surges. When I’ve had rough times in the past I would dwell on it and worry about it during the day, but if Paul’s books have taught me anything they’ve taught me not to do that. As we all know, that’s easier said than done. But it’s also the best advice.
I also don’t like the term “setback”. We all have happy days and sad days, anxious days and clear days. And for me, I don’t think anxiety will ever be totally gone from my life, and I’m ok with that. Thanks to Paul, I know how to respond to it, and that’s what’s most important. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck when it pops back up! Like many, I find it easier to “allow” during the day. I can let it be there and just avert my attention elsewhere. Not so easy to do at night.
Good lord this is getting long, forgive me! I haven’t felt the need to visit this blog in a few years, but I’m so thankful it is here. And so thankful for people like you, Maddy, that take the time to respond and help. So for that, I thank you!
I am glad you felt somewhat understood, Maria 🙂
Congrats on not having visited the blog for so long. A good sign and I wish I wasn’t visiting it right now.
I tried to stay away from it (only discovered it 6 weeks ago anyway), but the last few days I need so much reassurance again.
I know I shouldn’t read everything time and time again and fill my head with this…
but I am sure lots of people can understand this “compulsion”.
I have such a rough day today and really feel so hopeless again. Rough day means I felt already sad and tearful soon after getting up and couldn’t shake it during the day. I went on with the day as normal, dentist, work, lunch break with colleagues (made sure to involve in the conversation and eat all of my food even though I didn’t feel like both at all) etc but the sadness was there, the dread and anxiety came and along with the despair.
And so I read Paul’s words again and when I am really low I feel like I am one of those people that can’t leave the loop and will be stuck forever – because my personality is just not made for this and/or because my brain is so wired to feeling bad.
So I come home and let myself cry and write on here (and call a friend and my mom)…
And then I feel I am not “allowed” to do this and I am doing it wrong (because I should pretend all is well and just do something “fun”).
But sometimes I have so much tension and sadness in me that the tears need to come out.
Is it also allowing to let the crying spells come?
Sometimes I get so caught up in the “live your life, act normal”-thing that I don’t even know anymore if I can let myself cry and let these emotions out or if this counterproductive.
I don’t know what I want with this entry. I guess venting for myself and still hoping someone will encourage me and tell me that I am still on the right track and that I can’t expect to notice huge effects after a few weeks.
I just feel like I am not progressing at all. At first, I was optimistic and felt like “yes, this is it – I can leave this issue with my moods etc behind me” – but it still feels like a struggle when it shouldn’t.
And I have so many memories of other times when I felt so sad and in despair – and then I think “yes, here we are again – how can this possibly resolve when it keeps happening – why should you be optimistic now?”
And how can I ever feel a distance to these memories of feeling so low?
Oh Maddy,
I’m so sorry you had a rough day. I’m very lucky that I don’t suffer from the depression side of this, just the anxiety. My inclination on the “should I let myself cry” thing is heck yes! Don’t keep that stuff bottled up, that just can’t be good for you. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with acknowledging while allowing, if that makes sense. Allow it all to be there, and acknowledge that it’s there but try to go on with your day. Meaning, at least to me, don’t fight it or try to get rid of it. With anxiety, that only fuels it. I wish I knew more about the depression side of this but I really don’t.
Do you take any medication for depression or see anyone about it?
Hi Maddy,
Allowing isn’t a set of rules or a list of do’s and don’t. It’s an attitude shift, from “Why do I feel this way? I need to fix it! I can’t feel this way!” to “I feel horrible and I don’t like it, but I have a life to live.” It feels like pretending only because your mind hasn’t had time to catch up with your actions. But it’s not pretending in the sense that you have to go around smiling and laughing – that’s just added unnecessary pressure, which you don’t need.
If you feel the need to have a cry or call your mom, do it. But without the thought of “If I do this, I’ll never recover or I’ll undo all my progress!” Again, allowing is your mindset. And as you practice that mindset, you might find that in time the urge to call your mom or visit this blog will decrease because you’ll have learned that the way you’re feeling isn’t something that needs to be fixed.
Remember, the struggle always arises when we try to fight how we’re feeling. Every time we simply allow the feelings to be there, raging in the background, while we go about our life, we create space for peace.
You give a lot of good advice Stephanie
Thank you, Paul! It’s all thanks to you and others on this blog who helped me when I was struggling. I just hope I can do the same.
Maddy – not sure if this will help but I so empathise with the crying. If you can see it as a necessary release rather than something you need to beat yourself up about. I too feel like this – I am caught in a bit of a viscious circle. But, I keep going, keep having some bright days when my problems have the same importance as people without anxiety and others where they don’t and it makes me cry. The strange thing is, that when driven to this point of crying, being needy, being completely opposite to the person I want to be I have to give in and very often that storm clears and things do not seem so bad after it. Today has been a bad day for you but you have cleared a load of emotion out. Stephanie has said it all – I just wanted you to know that you are not alone and I cry loads, it is a release so as the others say, don’t be hard on yourself and add pressure. This isn’t easy and I think you should be proud of yourself coping with work etc through it all. Take care.
@Paul: It’s great to see you on here. Thank you so much for all your work. I can relate to so much and it all makes so much sense.
I admire the clarity and determination you had on your journey to recovery.
It sounds simple, just allow and give up the fight – but knowing how hard it is for me, I am really impressed at how you did it.
@Maria:
Thanks for the kind words.
I am seeing a therapist and she supports me and always tells me to be kind and accepting to myself – so in a way she “gets” it and she gets me.
We have been uncovering a lot of stuff but through this site here I am understanding more about myself and why I keep falling into these anxious/depressed periods.
And I really think once I can implement losing the fear of my “negative” feelings (which to me are anxiety paired and also sadness) I will feel ok.
I don’t have clinical depression. I just get periods where I fall into despair and feel sad and anxious and get these depressive symptoms, but I never get “I don’t care about anything anymore, I will not get up”-etc-depressed.
If anything, I care too much and want to feel good and this is the struggle – I see this now.
@Stephanie:
Thank you and agree with Paul! Your posts are super helpful!
I catch myself still wanting to turn “allowing” and “accepting” into an action. That’s just how I operate. I am proactive and want to fix things, get stuff done etc – so obviously a passive, patient attitude is especially difficult for me.
But noticing that I am “trying to accept” or that I want to force things again is maybe also a first little step forward – I tell myself.
This: “…you’ll have learned that the way you’re feeling isn’t something that needs to be fixed.” is so true and so beautiful!
I realize more and more what I have been doing for years. And even more so the last two or so…
Constantly thinking that I don’t feel good/relaxed/happy/motivated enough and constantly trying to fix myself, optimize myself, plan what I would to in order to feel better and put so much pressure on myself, all the while thinking that I am weak and unstable because I struggle with my moods.
And at the same time I have crazy high standards for myself, how I want to be and how I think I should be…
And then I wonder why I keep falling into slumps of feeling anxious and sad and why I am thinking about how I am feeling so much.
Today I woke up early and because I had such a bad day yesterday felt these “energy surges” right away. I went to work and really did everything normal and still felt tense and kind of anxious basically all day. I had the thoughts of “what if I will feel like this for most of the time now? Or what if it gets worse..” and the dread was there. BUT I didn’t obsess…I didn’t read on here over and over again (the compulsion of reassurance…), I focused on talking to and joking with my colleagues, I finished my lunch, I could act completely normal in a meeting (well, I always can…).
And I even went out for a drink with a friend – spontaneous decision.
I still felt a bit uncomfortable and not as everything is a-ok, BUT I could see that I can be completely normal, engage in conversations, no one would have a clue I am not totally relaxed…
I hope one day I will just do this stuff again and not even think about it, consider it a success or let alone write on here about it 😉
Right now, I can’t imagine that I will not be concerned with how I am feeling ever again, but I know this is possible.
@Ejam: Thank you for your words. And yes, I agree. It does feel like clearing emotions out and crying is just needed sometimes! Sorry to hear you have these crying spells too, but sounds like you have the right attitude towards it! All the best to you 🙂
Hello,
I’m new to this blog and have embarked on my own recovery journey recently after a long period of intense suffering.
What I wanted to ask is; Paul. You refer to the fact that you suffered from ‘anxiety attacks’, but my anxiety is always there and very severe, with the added horror of awful derealisation. Do you think I can still recover by5 allowing and facing my symptoms?
Also, I wanted to clarify what you mean when you said you stopped putting on an act. I try to carry on with normal life but, like now, I feel low and tearful. Is it Ok to allow myself a cry, or should I try to keep smiling and carry on regardless?
Thank you so much for sharing your experience and providing hope to the likes of me. You have been the one source of information on recovery that I keep returning to, and now the only one I use to keep me going and more importantly, to believe this can come to an end one day.
I am currently on medication and do have periods when my anxiety leaves me completely, but these periods (normally around a week to ten days) are then followed by a return of my symptoms. I have never been able to identify a trigger and I am a classic case of someone who’s anxiety has been fed by my fear of it. My thoughts are always focused on how I am feeling and how weird and unreal everything seems. This definitely scares me the most, even though I know it is harmless and goes when the physical symptoms abate.
Sorry. This post has ended up being longer than I planned it to be. I am sure you are a very busy man but I would be so grateful for a response if you are able to find the time.
Thanks again.
Sam
Sorry…I am replying to my own post as I have read back and realise that the previous post kind of answers my question about having a cry.
My hurdle is definitely accepting the feelings of derealisation. This then feeds thoughts of how weird life is, to the point where when I listen to people talking about places and countries my mind tells me its not real, even though I know it is. My perception of life is altered so much by anxiety that I struggle to ground myself. I know why it’s there and that my brain is actually trying to protect me, but I still can’t seem to help fearing that I’m losing my mind, or at the very least will never feel normal again, even though I have come out of it on plenty of previous occasions.
Sorry. I guess I’m just offloading as I don’t really have anyone to talk to that understands what it’s like.
Sam – I did not reply previously as I am in similar place but with a different reason and symptoms . You will see that Maddy is too. My reply now is for you not to think you have been missed and as you said you have no one else to talk to. We all have had this before and had better times in between. Where we are makes us lose our own perspective and we then seek the reassurance of other peoples minds to try and stabilise our own and put our current problems into perspective. I believe what we are being told (as my perspective is telling me one thing and my intelligence telling me another at the moment) – is that we are fighting anxiety when we should be submissive to it, but without letting it change our normal lifestyle. I too became frightened of certain fears and yet I am fearless in other circumstances, I like you do not believe there is a source it’s JUST fear of fear. I have seen enough people on here to know you are not losing your mind as awful as you may feel at the moment. You will notice that Maddy is describing a similar problem with crying and I am too. I believe the crying as desperate as it makes you feel is a release. Your question should you carry on regardless, yes but not to the point of punishing yourself. Just accept what you can do and try and be brave but don’t punish yourself. Re crying, if you have anyone you can cry to, have a good cry, then if you can be stoic and go and do whatever you would have done if anxiety was not present. Step by step, time moves on and things change – it maybe slowly but they will change.
Hi Samantha,
You said, “but I still can’t seem to help fearing that I’m losing my mind, or at the very least will never feel normal again, even though I have come out of it on plenty of previous occasions.” Then accept that fear. Sometimes we think, “If I accept my symptoms, then I won’t be scared of them anymore.” And that can happen. But often the fear is still there, either as a habit or as an automatic reaction that we can’t control. You already know you can’t rationalize the fear away. So you accept it. You accept the feelings of depersonalization, and you accept your fear of those feelings. Instead of adding more fear by trying to stop the fear and failing – thereby reinforcing your belief that you’re losing your mind or will never feel normal again – practice living your life alongside all these feelings. So you’re going about your day but you’re feeling detached from reality, which then sparks that fear of “I’m going crazy!” Gently tell yourself “I feel weird and it’s scary, but I have things to do.” Then do those things. The scary feelings and thoughts will still be there, but you’re starting to create some space between you and them. It’s in that space that peace will start to return to your life. It might just be little flickers at first. Let them come and let them go, just like you do the feelings of fear. Accept it all.
Ejam & Stephanie
Thank you so much for taking the time to reply, and to help me to understand.
Ejam; I think you are right. Despite wanting to master acceptance I think I am still fighting how I am feeling. Ironically, having said that the feelings of unreality were the worst, the physical anxiety symptoms have now got really bad. My hands and feet are buzzing and my heart is thudding. I have a lump in my throat and feel sick to my stomach but I am just attempting to allow the feelings, as hideously uncomfortable as they are.
Stephanie; you are very wise. I do think that I mistakenly thought that accepting the feelings would make the fear go away, but it’s about accepting the fear as part of it. Accepting that the feelings are so incredibly uncomfortable to bear, accepting that they bring on feelings of unreality, accepting that they affect my enjoyment of life, accepting that no one has caused them other than me. Accepting that my brain is merely trying to protect me. Accepting that for the time being life will be uncomfortable.
I fear that I won’t be able to master this because the feelings are so intense and unrelenting, but I guess that fear is natural, and one that everyone has to an extent. I think Paul mentioned in his book that we all fear that we are the ‘worst case’ and can’t recover. I am, by nature a fixer, always wanting harmony and trying to achieve it by appeasing people around me. I have to resist this instinct and realise that the only way I can make this right is by not trying to make it right. That if I can give up trying, the process will begin.
Thank you all so much for sharing, especially when you are still struggling yourselves. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate it.
Sam
So this is more of an introspective thing that I’m wondering if anyone else grapples with. I have a very social job (a hairstylist) where I’m chit chatting all day long. By the end of the day and often the week, I’m chit chatted out. I’m also a homebody by natural and as I get older I find my need for socializing lowers. I think that’s pretty normal. I also find that I’m less interested in going to “events”, as in parades, concerts (unless it’s a really good band 😊) , festivals, etc.. I’m not a fan of crowds and loud, busy places. It makes me uneasy. But when I think about those things I wonder, is that me speaking or is that anxiety speaking? Sometimes I have a hard time pulling the two apart. Do I not want to go because those situations make me feel anxious/uneasy, or do I not want to go because they’re just not my thing? It’s something that I am trying to figure out. If you have any insight, I’d love to hear it. Thanks. 😊
Hi everyone, I have never posted on here before but I think it’s time I did.
I’ve been going through anxiety now for three months, although I’ve had it on and off for almost 10 years. This particular bout was is on a completely different level to what I’ve previously experienced. It scared the life out of me, the intensity of the feel in my stomach and the thoughts zipping through my mind, the bouts of sadness, the dizziness and tiredness. It all hit me hard and I found myself falling down the rabbit hole. Then I found Paul and his book a couple of weeks ago, Something that I instantly took comfort from, it really stopped me falling even further. I’ve been taking the advice and I feel I am doing this well, I haven’t been doing this long so I’m not expecting any miracles, I know this takes time, I’m happy to allow it the time it needs. Is it normal to feel worse this early though? I have the odd thought now and again that I’m doing something wrong but I quickly realise it’s just the anxiety. I haven’t had a so-called ‘good day’ in over a week and before this new attitude I did. It’s pretty constant, but I know I’m on the right road now. They’re not kidding when they say it isn’t easy.
Chris
I just wanted to post on here to tell my story and see if I can’t get some reassurance and clarification on what I’m doing is right.
I have had anxiety for the last 10 years with some fairly big chunks of it disappearing altogether over that time frame, various triggers but one that seems to stand out more than the others.
10 years ago (I was 20) I had a girlfriend of almost three years, things were ok and I genuinely believe I love her. I started a new job in the summer of that year and I met another girl during the training. There was an immediate attraction but didn’t act on it initially because of my girlfriend at the time. A couple of months went by and I started to notice my relationship taking a turn and my attraction to this other girl grew and grew.
One day out of the blue my girlfriend at the time and I split up over an argument. Upset and confused of how I felt I immediately went towards this new girl I was starting to develop feelings for. The feeling was mutual and we decided to give a relationship a go. In that first week or two, my ex was still in the picture, messaging me, making me guilty, making me feel sorry for her, and I was so confused I actually felt like I loved her. A bit of a mess. I saw my ex again and one thing lead to another (drunk) in the same couple of weeks this new girl and I got together. I regretted it instantly. I immediately felt bad. I kept this to myself as I didn’t want to ruin the relationship I now had, I was stupid, selfish and she didn’t deserve what I had done.
I am still with this girl today, we are married, we have two kids and I have loved her every single minute of every day over the last 10 years. She’s everything to me and I wish I had realised this would be the case at the beginning.
That mistake has haunted me over the years, triggering my anxiety (not always). I have thought about this particular time in my life a few times but a healthy me dismisses it and focuses on the present.
This time was different, I think I got very exhausted over the two months later, a minor operation had me worrying because of some pain I shouldn’t have been feeling, but when this thought came, it hit me hard and immediately. Physical symptoms at first, then the overthinking began, the worrying tormented me for a few weeks until I finally went to my doctor after breaking down in tears at work. I got two weeks sick not and a prescription for Sertraline. I was always reluctant about medication, I never wanted to take them but I guess I just didn’t know what else do. I took one that night. What happened next was the worst few weeks of my life. I started to panic with what the Sertraline was doing to me, convinced I was having some sort of reaction, my pupils widened and my heart raced. I managed to calm myself down and utterly exhausted I went to sleep. I woke at 1 am with the most alarming intense feeling of anxiety in my stomach and chest, I was panicking again so I got myself up and decided I need to do something and went for a walk. I ended up in a park, crying my eyes out, struggling to breathe so I called 111. I got an emergency appointment that day but got no answers. Sent away with more meds and told to rest. That afternoon something inside me forced myself to self destruct and tell my wife everything, I let it all spill. She was upset understandably but for some reason, I had felt relief for the first time in a long time. My wife forgave me and we didn’t want something so long ago to ruin what we have now, we love each other and we feel stronger than ever. But the guilt? The guilt is still there. My symptoms started to get worse and I felt I was inside myself every minute of every day, think horrible things and telling myself I’m a horrible person and I deserve absolutely nothing for what I had done. Am I horrible? Do I deserve all this? Is it the anxiety speaking? I really don’t know. Sadness is now creeping into my life at this point, sadness for my wife and my children.
Then I found Paul’s book, and what a turnaround. I took it all in and took comfort from knowing this was all normal. Although hard I am allowing all these emotions in, letting them stay for however long they want. It’s still hard but I feel different somehow. I just have one concern and I feel it’s holding me back right now. This guilty feeling and thoughts about what happened all those years ago are still coming and I have no idea if they’re creating more anxiety. Because when this thought comes, the symptoms heighten. Am I doing the right thing by letting my trigger in? It’s impossible for me to not give those thoughts any emotion because they immediately make me sad. I know I’m giving them too much attention, but how can I not? Will this trigger me forever? I feel now it’s all out in the open, I might finally be able to move on after this whole process is over, I just don’t want to be creating this anxiety any longer. I can’t tell if I’m releasing this energy or creating it.
Please help if you can. I know this is the only thing holding me back right now, and with a little bit of reassurance I can finally move on with this recovery. Thank you.
Hi Tommy,
You are definitely on the right track! One of your triggers seems to be your reaction towards the thoughts of guilt towards your wife. Read these last words very carefully. Your reaction towards feelings of guilt. There is a difference between your panic and your guilt.
First, let’s focus on what you are feeling right now. Acceptance isn’t about accepting the past. It’s accepting your present state. Don’t over-analyze your symptoms. Just continue to practice acceptance whenever anxiety or panic presents itself in any kind of form it wants to take. Gradually, you will see that your symptoms will lessen in intensity. I can’t stress enough that this takes time. Don’t expect it to come tomorrow, let it come at its own terms as I can guarantee you, it will. Try not to be too impatient as this exercise will bring you so much more in life than dealing with ancient guilt amplified by present stress.
Your first priority is therefore not to solve the puzzle of your guilt but it is to accept your fear. For two reasons.
The first is that while dealing with your own fear, your own current stress you are learning to cope with yourself. It is not uncommon to experience anxiety in your early thirties as it is a time in which we say goodbye to our childhood and have to start to navigate our own life. I see my own experience in that way. The topics of my anxiety were just vessels carrying the most valuable lessons I’ve learned so far.
The second reason why you shouldn’t try to ‘overcome your guilt’ has to do with the timing of your efforts. What you are trying to do is similar to a captain of a ship in the midst of a storm. What you should do is ride the waves and let the storm pass. What you are doing is trying to avoid the storm by negotiating with it. It’s impossible to reason with fear as its purpose is for you to take action and not to solve a puzzle with your thinking. So you first have to ride the waves and leave the thinking to a time when the sea below you is calmer.
Feelings of guilt and love are complex emotions that don’t let themselves confine in absolutes. If you were my friend, I’d tell you the following. “Mate, this thing happened 10 years ago. You were young and only starting to discover the world. On top of that, you were in what I can only imagine a very troubled and insecure time. And although these were hard times, you both made a deliberate choice to pursue a life together. That choice you both made, that is a token of the love you have decided to show each other. Feeling love for someone is the easy part, choosing love the difficult one. This is what you need to do every day also during those times that the feelings of love seem to have disappeared. Give yourself a break. Accept the fact that you are a human being and that you are as faulty as the rest of us. In fact, embrace your imperfectness as this is the only source of true love for yourself and for those around you.” These words are the words you would tell your friend, why won’t you tell them to yourself?
Maybe you find some momentary peace in these words. But even in that case, you’ll find you’ll doubt them very soon. Don’t worry, remember the captain on the boat riding the storm waiting for it to pass. When the water calms down, I am sure you’ll be able to hoist the sails and continue your life’s adventure towards the inevitable next storm and it’s equally inevitable calm aftermath.
Thank you for this Belgian, you have a great personality trait of wanting to help others and you should be really proud of that.
It makes complete sense to me now why it isn’t a good idea to be trying to reason with my guilt in such a sensitised state. My feelings dramatically tell me stories that are complete fiction but to me, they are so real. I know the anxiety is the very thing telling me I’m a bad person and is so unforgiving. I know now to just accept the feelings that this thought brings, be it sadness, fear or anxiousness. Let it all in and just feel however I feel. I’m sure one day in the future I will be able to forgive myself with a healthy body and mind.
I guess my main concern was the thought recreating the anxious energy but I think I realise the fear of it creating anxious energy would be the very thing that creates it, not the initial thought and feeling. I think?
I know deep down that my 21-year-old self learnt so much over these years and I have genuinely improved as a person. I know I need to let myself off the hook but I can see why that’s so difficult at this moment in time. ‘Timing’ as you say is certainly something I should have considered in hindsight.
Thank you so much for taking the time Belgian, you have really made a difference to my recovery and I hope you take some happiness from that.
Tommy
Hi Chris
I too have the same question, as in the last 2 days my anxiety is off the scale. I am shaking as I write this, I feel sick and filled with fear and it’s constant, added to that the feelings of unreality are crippling.
I took my son to Stansted Airport today (a 3.5 hour roundtrip) as he has been over for a visit from Germany. I let my body go loose and just let the feelings come, and experienced wave upon wave of adrenaline surges. I keep telling myself that it’s just adrenaline and that the only way to heal is to accept the feelings, but I just want to ask if anyone has recovered from anxiety this intense and constant?
Because it’s present all the time I find that even though I start the day with a positive mindset I gradually get worn down by the feelings, as they are so hard to bear. I then find myself breaking down in tears and feeling utterly defeated.
I really just would like to know if anyone on here has recovered from physical anxiety this intense and constant, as I worry that the method of accepting is only possible when experiencing anxiety ‘attacks’, with normal spells in between.
Sam
Hi Sam, the one person who had this anxiety so intense every single day is the very person who wrote the book. I have also read so many stories through this blog and success stories in the book to know that people have come through this and there is a way out. You’re doing the right thing accepting all this, but you also sound scared of what you’re are feeling, which is completely understandable. This is all normal what you’re experiencing, and through this method of acceptance you need to have faith in yourself that eventually all this will click into place and you WILL feel better. My anxiety is constant too, I don’t have a day off, but I know deep down that a moment of peace is on the horizon if only for a short time. Continue to do what you’re doing, live your life exactly how you would normally if anxiety was not present, and with time, patience and commitment, you will see changes.
I am going through this process now, I know I am on the right path. After some thought, I now know why we initially feel worse. You’ve stored so much energy over time and suppressed it deep within you continuously, and now your new approach has allowed it all to come out from within. You’ve open the flood gates and that very energy, right now as you shake writing your post is releasing from your body. This is good, this is exactly what you want and need to be free of this. It isn’t pleasant, in fact, it’s absolutely horrible, but you can do this, you can let this happen with the worry and the fear on top of it.
Stay strong.
Hi People,
Wanted to ask Paul / Nolan / Stephanie and any others who have found their way through anxiety about something I am struggling with.
I’ve had anxiety for 10 years triggered by smoking weed that lead to a huge panic attack. I had DP a lot at the start and intense ‘doom’ moments. I started exercising and meditating and read pauls book and claire weeks and it helped a lot. As the years went on I got back to some sort of vague semblance normality but it never really left me.
Then when I went full time at work I developed panic attacks and developed a fear of drinking after I had a panic attack once while drinking (used to just drink for fun on weekends was not dependent). I also developed terrible nightmares and a fear of eating too and essentially stopped eating or drinking alcohol altogether.
Anyway, I was very stressed with work and eventually quit my job but by this time (last January) I had become very disillusioned with life. A few months after leaving work I had a massive meltdown where I felt like I was panicking all day and thinking I might go mad and kill myself (classic anxiety). But it was so acute I had never felt anything so bad.
Anyway, after 10 years of struggling, I think it had all become too much and had a sort of anxiety breakdown. I’d been seeing a therapist and she recommended I take a sedative and go to bed as that was all I could really do, a was just acute anxiety,
Anyway, I started to doing hypnotherapy and continued seeing a normal therapist and it has helped. I haven’t had a proper panic attack since then (4 months ago) and my terrible nightmares have stopped and I can sleep.
But I have become what I guess is depressed and my main issue is massive ruminations and a belief that I will never be able to enjoy life and that I can’t feel any joy and that life is essentially pointless because nothing will bring me joy and I will be unable to shoulder the responsibilities of life. I also have no real hobbies or good interests.
I will have a couple of weeks where the ruminations aren’t so bad then bang 2/3 weeks of insane ruminations and grimness. But also deep introspection and the inability to enjoy anything or see any point in it and ‘what if’ thoughts of ‘what if it all got too much and I killed myself’ despite obviously having no compulsion etc.
I still do loads of stuff though and are high functioning, exercise 3/4 times a week, go on holidays, go to work, eat out etc. Just everything seems futile and I can’t see how I will ever be at peace with the future or life as a whole.
Can anyone offer any advice on moving past this grim outlook I have developed?
Any help greatly appreciated…
Thank you so much, Chris, for your words of support and encouragement.
I know that acceptance is the only way to truly recover and I really believe it; I just fear that my physical symptoms are so intense and overwhelming that I won’t be able to do it.
I am on medication which seemed to be giving me some good spells interspersed with some bad ones, but over the last 10 days my physical anxiety symptoms have got really bad and I feel that the medication has stopped working. I went for a job interview just at the beginning of the setback and have been invited to attend 3 days training on 22nd October, but I just don’t know if I will be able to do it. I know people say just let the adrenaline come and it will always reach a peak and then subside but mine just stays there, at a horrendously high level, all day. I’m worried that I will end up breaking down or running out.
Has anyone suffered from physical symptoms as bad as this? I try to accept them and loosen up but eventually I get worn down. I’m really trying not to be negative but I just don’t know how people manage when physical feelings of fear are so severe. It got so bad yesterday that I had to take a tranquillizer, and I know that’s not accepting.
Btw I’m a 50yr old female who has been experiencing anxiety since the age of 25 I had 10 years of hell, awful DR, terrible physical symptoms before finding success with SSRI’S. I went on to have 15 great years and rebuilt my life before medication stopped working this time last year. I lost my job and 3 stone in weight.
I know that medication is just a sticking plaster and doesn’t cure it. I also know that because I felt good for the last 15 years I hadn’t learnt to deal with it. But my problem has always been that the feelings of fear are so strong, and remain at a high level all the time. I’m scared that it’s not realistic to be able to carry on and accept with such intense symptoms and I guess I could do with some reassurance from others who have had it that bad and seen progress.
Thank you.
Hi Samantha, yes my symptoms were as bad as you describe them. I had severe DP, insomnia, electric shock-like feelings, sweating, no appetite, you name it. On top of it all, I was pregnant at the time. A case of skin cancer during my pregnancy triggered the anxiety (which in hindsight had been there since I was a child), and it didn’t leave me for years. It was a hellish time, especially combined with the guilt and fear for not being able to take care of my child properly. What I learned was that it is absolutely possible to bear the unbearable. I used to lay awake at night, filled with fear and anxiety of not being able to make it through the next day. I always did. Slowly I found ways to help myself. I tried meds, but they didn’t really work for me. I tried CBT, no results either. It wasn’t until I started practicing mindfulness and acceptance therapy that I found a bit of relief in my symptoms. I learned that the symptoms that I felt weren’t anything to be afraid of, rather the fight or flight mode and adrenaline rush that was there 24/7 was nothing more than a protective mechanism. My body was simply trying to protect me. I started to see this mechanism as something to be appreciative of (as funny as it sounds), rather than something to be fearful of. When the ‘anxiety about my anxiety’ left, that’s when the healing started for me. I still have anxiety now and then, but I am not bothered with it too much anymore; I see it for what it is, I let it be there (as unpleasant as it can feel), and then at some point, it leaves me again. It’s the anxiety telling you that no one can possibly feel as bad as you do, or that you cannot cope, I used to feel so too, but please don’t believe these thoughts. Hope this gives you a bit of reassurance. All the best.
Hi Anne,
Thank you so much for your response; it is indeed very reassuring to hear that you also had bad physical symptoms 24/7. I also have horrible feelings of derealisation which feels very distressing.
If you don’t mind me asking, what do you think the turning point was for you, that enabled you to stop fearing the fear?.And how long once you had this breakthrough did you notice things improving?
You say that you still get anxiety from time to time; are these spells less powerful than before?
Sorry for the questions, and again thank you so much for answering me and sharing your experience.
Yes, derealisation is extremely unpleasant. I had these feelings during my first anxiety episode, the episode that I described above and lasted for a few years. When I feel anxious now I don’t experience feelings of derealisation as I don’t have that high state of anxiety any more. So yes, the spells that I experience now are way less powerful than before. I think this is partly because I have gained a lot of knowledge of what anxiety is. When I was first confronted with it caught me so off guard that I was adding extra fuel onto the anxiety that was already there. Meaning I was extremely anxious about these anxious feelings. This will eventually result in feelings of derealisation. Another protective mechanism. Since I am not anxious about being anxious anymore I never reach that full state of anxiety anymore that I used to be in. I don’t remember there being one specific turning point, i.e. a breakthrough where improvement suddenly happened. For me it was a gradual journey; learning what anxiety was, practicing mindfulness and self-compassion, and naturally reaching a state where I simply didn’t care how I was going to feel the next day. These things all contributed to my self-recovery. It took time though. Can I just ask; are you in a position where you can be without work for a while? To create some time where you can focus on your healing? To find out your own path to recovery?
I haven’t worked since last October. In his book, Paul advises living life as if you are not experiencing anxiety so I have been applying for a few jobs lately. The one I have been invited to training for is part-time and I can choose my hours. I also don’t enjoy being on my own at home, so I thought this was something I should do. Do you not think this would be beneficial?
I think I know all there is to know about anxiety and have done for a long time. My trouble is that I have been to such hideously dark places suffering from severe anxiety and DR that I can’t lose my fear of it. From what others have said though it’s not about losing your fear but more accepting it? I think my trouble is that I am naturally a confident person who loved life before this and that makes it really hard to accept how anxiety has changed things.
I wake up every morning and immediately check-in to see how I’m feeling. I just can’t imagine getting to a point where I don’t care how I feel anymore; I struggle to see how you can stop caring about something that has such a negative impact on your enjoyment of life.
I am starting a therapy group in a weeks time which teaches Acceptance and Commitment; hopefully, this will help me to develop this approach.
I just so badly want my life to be normal again and yet I know that this makes me impatient which is detrimental to recovery.
Sorry I didn’t mean to sound demotivating regarding your job. You are absolutely right about living your life exactly as if you were not experiencing anxiety. Everyone is different. When my anxiety was at it worst years ago, personally, I wasn’t able to work; I couldn’t even watch a movie. But then again, I didn’t sleep at night which made everything worse. I had to get up at 6 am and worked full time. What you describe; part-time and deciding your own hours sounds ideal, and it is good to be out and about. It sounds like the A&C therapy will be starting around the same time as your new job, so you can practice what you will learn at the course in your new job. Do what feels best for you. It sounds like you are too eager to develop and ‘get’ the acceptance approach to get rid of anxiety. This is not the aim. You can’t practice acceptance with a hidden agenda. What you want, ultimately, is to be able to be with anxiety and not be bothered with it anymore. The way to get there? For me, it was making peace with the fact that anxiety may always stay around and living my life regardless. At that point for me, there was nothing left to fear. I just stopped caring. This didn’t come overnight though; maybe there was so much suffering that I just stopped fighting. Just remember that you will feel better, maybe not next week, maybe not next month, but you’ll get there. And it the meantime, be kind to yourself.
Hey guys ! Ejam , Paul , Stephanie and others.
So I haven’t come here in a while and I just need to let this out : I don’t know if you all have been reading my comments but January 2016 I had a stillbirth and thank god for this blog, medication and therapy, I was back at work and had on and off panic attacks but they never threw me off the way I have been thrown off now.
If we backdate, about June last year during work, I started having obsessive thoughts – what if I can’t read etc and so I went to a therapist who said she thought I needed to find a less stressful job and then try and conceive.
God works in strange ways and I conceived almost instantly after quitting my job ( FEb 2018 ) and took no meds etc. I did phone therapy or physically met my therapist once a month and there were a lot of obsessive thoughts, fears etc about the birth, the past trauma etc.
Anyway, the good news is I was blessed with a baby girl on October 2018 and now she will be turning 1! However, my obsessions during bed rest (I was on modified bed rest etc ) and now with the baby have grown. The main thought is that I’m losing my mind and there that I am losing touch with reality. I’ve gone back on meds and am still nursing my child but am always questioning reality – is this my daughter’s name? Is this what I was supposed to buy etc. I mean the thoughts are really growing more and now there’s the lack of sleep in the evenings.
so basically, I mean yesterday it was a fear of making sense and talking and while talking I was questioning did this happen or not? It’s like I’m living two worlds. The doctor has said it’s OCD but I got so scared yesterday that I rushed to the psychiatrist. He wasn’t there – attending some conference – but I think my anxiety/ OCD etc stems from pressures of taking care of a baby, financial problems etc.
I’ve always had anxiety but never OCD and now I mean it’s just the idea of what I have become and what I used to be that has also added to the state I am in. I started volunteer work to get out of my head and I couldn’t even think properly. How will I write this? Am I making sense etc?
The constant questioning of reality is really testing me. For eg, I got out today and I was questing if my car is my car and things like that .. how do I get out of this muck? I want my life back.
Like most of the people in this group I was outgoing, fun-loving and had a lot of confidence because I was working and doing things. Now, it’s just difficult even doing things without questioning myself.
I can hear myself when I talk ( something I experienced during the time I lost my son ) but it all went away.
Now hearing myself talk comes with feelings of, am I making sense? Did this happen?
Can someone please explain if this is part of dp/dr?
At points, I think I have really lost my mind ( my main fear) and it’s like I can’t do basic things.
And to add – I can’t really live my life right now as though it was anxiety free because it’s hard to do even basic things – write , talk etc
Alz,
Congratulations on your baby girl. Happy for you. I was reading your comments from years before. .
If doctor said it is OCD, just accept it. It is a part of an anxiety , so do not analyse it.
It is your brain playing tricks. It makes a sense what you wrote , so I think all that “film” is playing on your head only.
All the best
Hi just to add to my last post. I feel when I’m constantly using my logical mind to do things..especially physical things my symptoms reduce but as soon as I lose focus on what I’m.doing the symptoms are so intense. it’s not in certain situations or places it’s just constant..I feel I’m playing tug of war with 2 sides of my brain…when I allow the sensations to just be present I feel like they grow and take over and this creates more panic…I guess I’m confused about where the line is between accepting and giving too much attention to sensations?? I feel I have to keep using my logical mind to keep engaged…is this s form of fighting?? Any advice much appreciated. Deborah
alz you are fine you have been through this before you are just testing your brain. you just have ocd i was asking how u were a few months ago .
Agni and Debbie!
Hope you both are well.
Agni it’s so heartwarming to know that you’ve been following my comments. Thank you for wishing me about my daughters birth 🙂 yes it’s a constant film playing. Went to the doctor again today. He said it is OCD! It’s just escalated.
Debbie how are you after your mom’s death. Yes, you know my situation so well. You have been such s great support! I know Iv been through traumatic events and pulled through. Ur right. This time though, I think the bed rest and being alone most of the day have left me feeling anxious and given me time to develop this thinking pattern. Plus handling a little one comes with so many challenges.
Thanks for asking about me! I think what gets to me is how I used to be and how I have become. It’s a LONG journey. Debbie, I am testing my brain but I mean I have to do things like talk, take care of my daughter etc, go out to get stuff which I can’t depend on others for. So I mean my brain needs some rest but when the rest ( literally sleeping and letting myself be the way I am ) is not possible, how does one get that rest? The thinking is automatic and yes I understand that when stressors are there this new crappy OCD has come in but I don’t understand how I can accept not feeling ok and moving forward. Because the moving forward creates more anxiety .. eg me starting to volunteer at this charity organisation – I couldn’t even use the computer properly – continuous questioning, which leaves me exhausted and then more anxious. Again, there’s a comparison of how I was and how I am. yes, I’ve had bad times dealing with anxiety like I said but where did OCD come in the picture? It’s the biggest pain when u have to kind of pain. I fail to surrender/accept or let go.
Alz I am doing as best as I can after my mom’s death now 5 weeks ago I lost my partner he died unexpectedly and I am very heartbroken over it. Ive lost everyone I loved in the last three years. How is your daughter doing? Alz you will be ok. I always keep you in my prayers we have been through it all over the years with anxiety and we survived and we will continue to survive. Let your brain do whatever it wants it’s just for the day nothing is going to happen to you you will never lose your mind I do what you do at times also I think when I am driving do I know where I am or why did I think I put something in the cabinet but its not in the cabinet than the fear starts rushing in. Than i say to myself this has happened before and you didnt lose your mind. Also a Dr told me once no one has ever lost their mind from anxiety or ocd.
With love debbie
Alz,
Just let this crappy feeling be. It is ok, to feel bad. We are humans. All emotions are ours. I like to think, that they are like little children, who wants attention. If you are not going to listen to them/ let them out, they will hit stronger. So just let them roar. I struggled with my anxiety for 7 years, nów I just learn how to let it go, it is easier. Symptoms disappearing quicker, and they are not as strong as the previous time. I just had an “a-ha moment”, while driving. Even though I have a licence since 2007, I do not drive. While living in central London, there was no need, as public transport was enough. When we moved to a different country, to the 40.000 people town, we need to use the car every day. So I start driving with my husband next to me. And yeah it is still scary to me, but each time is easier. But before I started, I was already getting Adrenalin rushes and wanted to hide under the duvet. A few weeks later ( today), I said to my husband: I will drive.
For me, it is a huge success. And then I realised, that I actually came face to face with my fear and nothing happened.
Alz,
Just let it be, do not fight. I think I start to get it, what Paul’s say, that it is the fighting causing all this pain.
You are a great mom, a wonderful person and for sure you can manage. You just have to leave your head. You can do it. And the cool thing is, that you do not have to do anything. Do not try to keep yourself from feeling more anxious, as it is blocking emotions, and trying to control your brain. Do not. Just let the monkey out and do not disturb her. She will jump/ roar/ scare you and then when tired of it, she will calm down.
Agni, what great advice! I understand this all and should try and look at each symptom as that if anxiety. Every new symptom – physical or mental. By letting it out, you mean I should just do things and expect not to feel good? Also, how much then should one do. Overdoing is also a problem anxiety sufferers face. I want an aha moment too. Happy for you.
Debbie, I’m so sorry for all your losses. Know that ur not alone 🙂 thank you for always praying for me. So the thing is to have that faith that it’s just another symptom of OCD/anxiety and that if I don’t react to it and continue with my life .. it’ll be fine. As this person said -thoughts are automatic but our reaction to them isn’t. We can choose to react with fear or just move on and like Claire weekes said: think of each day like a bead on a string, separate from the day before or the day after.
Alz,
I like to think: “what if it is me till the rest of my life?” If all those symptoms, fears and all that circus will stay with me? Shall I go to bed, cry, feel sorry for myself? Or shall I just get on with my life the best I can at that time? I chose option 2. Yeah, it is uncomfortable, annoying, sometimes painful, but that is who I am at this moment. On Saturday I managed to do lots of gardening, piled up wood for the winter, done 2 washes and ironing. And yeah I was tired, but despite annoying symptom, I was able to do it. So anxiety did not stop me, did not stop me yesterday or any other day. It was me who was pressing “ pause “ button to my life. Now I just try to go with the flow.
Do not expect anything ( neither that you get better or worse). Whatever will be, will be. Go on with your day. Do not put too much, to distract yourself, just what you normally would do. If you need, take breaks. That is ok. Be kind to yourself and patient. It is a process.
I have a quick question – Can I just ask what the best way is to deal with friends and family asking me how I am every few days? Should I ask them to stop?
Also, should I avoid discussing my anxiety with those close to me or is it ok to talk about it?
Hello Anne,
You weren’t demotivating at all I just wanted to be clear that I understood Paul’s message properly.
I don’t think that I will be able to cope with working either, but can I ask how you managed to be at home all day? Were you on your own?
I am feeling despondent today, as after feeling more positive this weekend that I could accept my feelings and feeling a slight shift in my perspective, I have today ‘caved’ in and ended up taking tranquillizers. My anxiety has been horrendous; at virtual panic levels all the time but I felt optimistic that I could cope with it being there. I started the day well, walked the dog, then cleaned my son’s room and then went for a 4 mile run but afterwards the relentless anxiety just brought me down and I just needed a break. My heart was beating through my chest, I was sweating and just had the most overwhelming feelings of fear constantly. No matter how much I told myself its just anxiety and can’t hurt me I literally found myself overwhelmed by it. I took the tranquillizers and slept for 2 hours.
Now I feel desperate that it’s another day that I have succumbed to the feelings and I am no further forward. I truly believe Paul’s way is the only way but I have such constant strong physical feelings that make it so hard to implement.
I have restarted meditation to help me with the concept of acceptance as I know that recovery takes time. When I look towards say, Christmas, I am totally ok with the fact that I will still be on my journey but I just don’t think I can deal with feelings as strong as they are day in day out.
Hi Samanta, in the beginning I was home alone while as my husband was at work, but I quickly realized that having too much time with my own thoughts was creating more anxiety. So I decided to volunteer. I also joined a mindfulness course, and swimming classes. I still experienced high anxiety most of the time, but it was nice to be amongst people and to have a bit of distraction. If you say that your new job would be part-time, and flexible; why not give it a try? I used to work as a nurse fulltime and it was simply unsafe for me to practice, but if your job is not too demanding it might just be a good thing for you.
Don’t feel bad about having taken tranquillizers this afternoon. Instead be proud of the fact that you were acceptant of your feelings this weekend, and you were able to start the day well, and took on all the activities you did today. Recovery is filled with ups and downs. Don’t be hard on yourself when you cave in now and then.
Yes I completely understand how such strong physical feelings make it hard to practice acceptance. Try to understand deeply that your feelings are a result of your anxious thoughts. Your worries about how you are feeling and worries about the future (f.e. when you say that you can’t deal with feelings this strong day in and day out) is what makes the physical feelings persist. You don’t have to get rid of anxious thoughts, you just have to see them for what they are; just thoughts, and not take them so seriously. Try to practice mindfulness. So when a thought pops up in your head saying ‘ughh this feeling again, I am going to be like this for the rest of my life’. Then rather than getting caught up in this thought and believing it to be true (which in turn creates more anxiety), take a step back and acknowledge that it is just a thought (a symptom of anxiety), but it is not true. Try to create a distance between you and your thoughts.
Debbie, Agni both of you are right.
But tell me, why is each and every fear/thought/compulsion now showing its face to me?
Yes, I’m alone all day but with my daughter and everyone’s like, how do u even have time to think? There’s so much u have to do with her. But the thoughts just happen.
This preoccupation with me being able to hear myself talk, several ocd thoughts and fears and then the physical symptoms ( less sleep and ibs ) are all acting up together.
Obviously, there are the real stressors such as taking care of my daughter, not working ( partly because of the above ) and financial issues but for them to have had such an impact?
I know if I resume work things will get better – I will be busy, interacting with people and making money. But, should I start small at this point?
Alz,
I think that you may be trying too hard to feel fine. For your daughter or for other people, you said, that they are surprised that you have time to think, I believe that this may put some pressure on you. But those people are not in your head. I know how it is. My son is 8 and at some point, I felt guilty, that I am not giving him as much attention as he needs and wants, but this is me at this time. I am doing the best to my ability. And I am not going to kick myself for not being who I think I suppose to be.
Just try your best. I think that would be enough. And remember to be kind to yourself.
I just thought I comment on the progress I’ve made the last week or so. I’ve been following the advice of Paul for around a month now, not really know if what I was doing was right or wrong. I never had a good day in that time period so I was questioning wether it was working or not but the patience started to build in me. It hard at first, going through all these feelings and emotions and not really seeing the progress, the self-doubt in me was like an annoying voice inside me telling me I’d be like this forever.
I did tell myself I wasn’t progressing and it was working but I only have to stop and think that this really wasn’t true. The process is so gradual and slow that I never saw the tiny improvements I was making each week. You are blind to it because you still feel terrible and out of it.
I only really saw this when I finally, after 4 weeks of shockingly bad feelings, when I woke up one morning without the horrible feeling in my stomach and without that one question i asked myself each day on waking “is it still there?”. It wasn’t.
I felt so relieved that I have this moment of peace that falling right back into anxiety again was no longer as scary. I was on the right path and what I was doing was right so the anxiety didn’t matter anymore.
The last three days have been amazing and I’ve finally seen the old me trying to resurface.
Don’t get me wrong, the anxiety is still there, but it is weaker like I’ve won the first battle in a very long war.
It took a month for this day to come, and I haven’t been in this condition for long in comparison to others. The process is long and sometimes you may feel you’re not heading in the right direction, but you are. Give it all the time you need and your day of peace will come.
I have just read Paul’s 2nd book ‘At last a life and beyond’ and I am a little disheartened.
Without meaning to sound disrespectful to Paul, as I know he is trying to help all of us suffering to find peace the way he did, but I don’t get the impression that he was dealing with anxious feelings all day every day.
He refers in the book to feeling the adrenaline surge coming and allowing it; likewise, he says don’t avoid places of activities that trigger your anxiety.
Well, my anxiety is with me constantly at a heightened level and I have been trying to follow Paul’s advice of allowing but I just can’t cope with the intensity of the feelings being there all the time. I start my day feeling positive that I will cope and by lunchtime I have broken down in tears and taken some tranquillizers just to have some respite.
I am despairing that I won’t be able to implement this approach and therefore I will be forever stuck in the anxiety loop.
Paul says in his book to just stop thinking about anxiety….how can you. possibly stop thinking about something that is all-pervading? I walk round in a constant state of fear, and although I carry on walking my dog, and going to the supermarket I just can’t be at peace with these feelings. I fear I am a lost cause.
Hi Sam,
I’ll just get straight to the point and say I don’t think you’ve accepted this at all. You say you walk around constantly with fear and you try suppressing all these feelings by lunchtime. Those very feelings that you feeling are the feelings you should be allowing to happen. Allow everything and I mean EVERYTHING. Of course, you will be thinking about the anxiety at this stage, you’ve thought about it none stop prior to this and it has become a habit, allow this to happen too. You know what you are feeling is all normal in the circumstances, you’ve read all this and you’ve taken it in. It’s time to stop asking your questions and let this Anxiety you feel constantly run through you without you thinking “oh no what should I do” “I need to stop this”. No matter how bad it gets, and it does get bad, let it be what it wants to be, let it do what it wants. What’s the worst that could possibly happen? It’ll make you feel terrible? Sure it will, but don’t you feel terrible already?
The self-doubt is horrible, I know it. I found myself questioning this process too, every single day. Even allow this, don’t fight what your mind is saying to you, just carry on regardless.
You need to stop comparing yourself to other people. No two people are the same and each and everyone may feel something different to another.
You HAVE to have patience. It is so slow.
Things seem out of reach at the moment, but if you try, I mean really try and give yourself some commitment, allow yourself the time and space for you to get through this. And you will if you just give up the fight.
Trust me, Samantha, I did feel it 24/7. I was worse than most people I have helped, I was crippled with D.P and anxiety for years.
From your post, it seems like you wanted the second book to ‘GET rid’ of the anxiety, rather than help you loosen your attitude and surrender to it. I feel you arent allowing at all but trying to turn my words into another technique to get rid of it, it seems there is still a huge battle going on within you.
You are getting angry with its presence, frustrated. The fact you are thinking about it constantly tells me you are thinking about it because you are at war with it, trying to figure it all out, question why it won’t go away, going around in mental circles trying to change how you feel. It is all this that needs to cease, it is all this that is causing you to feel like you do.
Anxiety is self-created, if you think otherwise then you will be always looking for something or someone to get rid of it, when in reality only you hold the key. But it takes a true understanding of what I am trying to get across and some patience, there is no instant fix to step out of how you feel. You can’t think or fight anxiety away, you can’t find some technique to get rid of it as all this is built around suppression of it.
You can go wherever you wish but that does not mean you have given up, let go and fully surrendered to how you feel.
Just reading your post tells me there is still a huge war going on within you, this war has to end if you wish to feel some peace. It took me a while to truly understand what was needed, I tried everything and nothing worked, it was then I was just sick of trying to feel different, sick of fighting, sick of trying to figure my way out of this hell and I just gave up. I thought ‘I would rather feel this way than battle every day with it’ this led to my next question ‘What if I don’t try and feel any different than I do, what will happen then?’
It seems you are constantly trying to feel different than you do, ask your self this question on a really deep level and see if the answer is, ‘Yes I am’ and you may find the answer to what allowing/surrendering really is. Because it is not the anxiety that is causing you to feel like you do, but your constant battle with it that is.
In your case it is, ‘I have done what Paul said and the damn anxiety is still there, this isn’t working’ you have totally missed the point if this is the case because I am not giving you anything to get rid of it, quite the opposite, I am asking you to finally allow it. Can you not see what this constant war against it is doing to you? How mentally and physically exhausting it is? How constantly suppressing and resisting it, is not allowing it to leave your inner space? How worrying and stressing about it, is not creating more anxiety?
I get the impression you really don’t want to feel it and so you are constantly at war with it, resisting it, the war and resistance are what intensifies the feelings, what brings on more anxiety and fear. You have to learn to befriend it, you don’t have to like it, it is uncomfortable but so much depends on your attitude towards how you feel, if you just let go into it, instead of constantly trying to fight it and not feel it, you may find you have a different experience.
Paul
Hi. I’ve had anxiety a couple of years now and it’s been quite debilitating at times and I’ve been bed ridden or housebound at times too when the anxiety becomes high daily and some panic attacks. They tire my body and I feel too anxious and unwell to do much at all.
My question is how do I accept it, do I just say so what if I have days I need rest in my bedroom, so what if I have a bad startle response and I jump a lot when someone enters the room (this symptom is driving me mad lately, anyone else had this?) so what if I feel constantly anxious, etc….. just accept my current situation and be ok with it? ie stop fighting it with self-loathing and beating myself up thinking I won’t ever recover, I’m a terrible wife and mother, projecting forward with fear of my future letting people down if this never ends for me etc? Just accept for now it is this way and just say so what if I feel terrible, and accept the situation I’m in and on tough days if I need rest that’s ok too, then sensitisation will calm in my body and I can slowly work on exposures and be more active as the fatigue lifts?
I’m just trying to work out if I’ve understood the book correctly because it’s not easy for everyone to just get out and do it anyway when so fatigued and have debilitating anxiety for a couple of years.
I fear I am the worst case and I know everyone says that but I’ve not attended appointments in 2 years, (telephone call with GP only) have extreme social anxiety so can’t even visit extended family or friends, won’t wander the door unless it’s my children or husband, and can’t have visitors, haven’t been in shops, anxious even at home, sometimes feel too drained and anxious to be around my husband and children when in a bad day but I force myself to.
I fear my future in case I can’t attend my children’s weddings etc with how extreme anxiety has become. I live in fear of needing to see a dentist, doctor etc I can’t imagine myself at an appointment again, even imagining doing them causes me anxiety. Is this something anyone’s dealt with and can it be overcome? Maybe I can’t help myself just with books but I have had therapy and not found it useful at all. I’ve tried it twice and found it useless and draining. I find self help far more gentle and I can go at my own pace but am I a lost cause?
Libby
Thank you
Libby
Hi all,
I wrote a few weeks ago while in the midst of a bad night. Right as I’m falling asleep is when the adrenaline surges seem to hit these days. Thinking back to when it hit then, I did what I seem to always do- I try to figure out why it’s happening, what triggered it, I worried about not getting any sleep, I worried about how long it would last and so on. All while telling myself to just allow those feelings. I now realize how totally counteractive that is. I can’t truly allow if I’m still worried about it.
I’m figuring that out tonight because, once again,
the surges came as soon as I closed my eyes tonight. Funny thing is, I was just thinking as I got into bed how great I’ve been feeling. How “ normal”
I’d been feeling. Ironic!
So right now, as I’m feeling the surges go through my body, and my teeth are chattering and my hands are shaking, I realize that I wasn’t allowing at all. I was trying to figure it out! I was searching for answers instead of just accepting that it was happening. So you really do, like Paul says, have to go through it to learn how to react to it. Each time it happens, I’m learning how to respond. Of course, our knee jerk reaction is to fear the feelings, but I have to rewire that reaction to acceptance.
I have the same symptoms, Maria. Surges as I fall asleep so I end up jumping up shortly after I’ve drifted off. It is frustrating but I’m learning to just let it happen and eventually I drift off to sleep and the surges ease.
Libby
Chris and Paul,
Thank you for taking the time to reply to me.
You are both right; I have done some soul searching and agree that I am not accepting the feelings and ultimately just want them to go away. On an intellectual level, I totally understand how accepting the feelings will defuse the anxiety, but on a practical level, I just don’t seem able to stop resisting them. It seems so simple a concept and yet I don’t seem able to master it. I have been to such horrific depths with severe anxiety and derealisation, that when people say ‘what’s the worst that can happen’ it provides no comfort, as I’ve experienced the worst that can happen and its a terrifying place that I do not want to go back to. Having anxiety prevents me from feeling integrated into the world, and rather causes me to view life as strange, which I find distressing.
I know that by nature I am a ‘fixer’, always wanting everything around me to be harmonious, and wonder if this makes it harder for me to allow feelings of discomfort. However, I am hardly a stranger to them, as I suffered terribly with anxiety and derealisation for 10 long years before finding respite through antidepressants for the next 15 years. I rebuilt my life and ended up working my way up to a good job in management but now I’m back to square one having lost that and being unable to work.
I would never have imagined that ‘doing nothing’ would be so hard. The worst part is that I realise by not doing this that I am creating more anxiety and keeping myself in the loop.
Paul, you are right; I don’t want to feel it and as such, I am constantly in a mental battle with myself. The moment I wake in the morning I check in with how I’m feeling and ‘steel’ myself for the day ahead. I then spend the day trying to figure everything out in my mind and reason with my altered perspective. I know that I should just allow it all without questioning it.
With the guidance, you provide in your books Paul I will not give up trying to give up. God willing, I will get it eventually.
Hello!
I mailed earlier but didn’t get a reply .can someone please answer it? Moreover, I know seeking reassurance is counterproductive but at this point o really need it. I feel like I’m facing a setback and ALL the symptoms I ever felt have manifested themselves. What’s scaring me the most is me being able to hear myself talk- it’s like I’m talking but I don’t know how I’m making sense. I hope I’m explaining this properly. The other thing is, all the symptoms of mental exhaustion are there – the total feeling of not having clarity, doing but questioning continuously if I’m normal is just overwhelming. I know I need to disregard feelings but I’m just slipping too deep into this anxiety loop. Questions like ‘does that make sense? ‘ ‘ is this how I’m supposed to change my daughter’s diaper ‘, is this the medicine she needs? Am I reading things properly or talking properly to her m – all these fears are there besides so many others.
Kindly tell me what I should do. Letting go, or surrendering when my brain is so tired is not easy.
Alz I am sure someone will answer you at some point but can I just make a polite request,
I am having to go through every post you put out to tidy it up as it is full of spelling mistakes and text talk, like u, instead of you and many more, it would really help me if you could make it read better and also put full stops and commas straight after the letters and not leave gaps. Google punish a site full of grammatical errors and it makes it very hard to read for other people.
Thanks in advance
Alz,
Are you going to exhaust yourself to the point, where you do not care any more, or you will let it go and surrender to it? Your choice. Logically, you are doing all your daily tasks. And all this mess, questioning, doubts, are only in your head. Let it be. I know it is very hard. I am struggling to let go of one symptom. but there is no other way. Let those silly thoughts be, do not answer if it makes sense, or if you sound right. Make them rhetorical. It takes time, but you will get there.
Alz,
I’m going to be blunt. You’ve been commenting on the blog for a couple of years now I believe. And during that time you’ve continued to same the same things over and over. People will give you advice, and you’ll come back and say “Yeah ok but what about this?” All of the things you’ve been afraid of have never come true, yet you continue to scare yourself and say you’re going crazy. Don’t you see that you are the one causing your anxiety, day in and day out? All of the reassurance or amazing advice isn’t going to help you if you’re not willing to do the work.
The bottom line is you don’t want to have to feel the anxiety, the scary sensations, the weird symptoms. You want somebody or something to take it away. But it doesn’t work like that. Paul says over and over that it’s the constant search for a way out that is the cause of the pain and torment we feel.
You are the one causing your anxiety, and therefore you are also the cure of your anxiety. There really is no mystery here. All of the fears you’re experiencing really are the result of you constantly questioning and panicking and searching. Your poor mind is trying to help you because you keep telling it there’s something terribly wrong. Please, give it a break. Let all the fears be there without adding more fuel by questioning what it means or trying to run away from them. There is no other magic fix. The only way out is through.
Paul,
Sorry about that . Didn’t realise I’m doing it .
Agni and Debbie, thank you as always.
Stephanie, I do realise that healing comes from within. This is what people like Claire Weekes, Paul, Chris, Dr. Steven- people who have truly understood anxiety -have stated.
I like your bluntness Stephanie ( sometimes it’s needed) and I know that I am creating the anxiety myself. What I haven’t learnt, is how to surrender or let go. It means not reacting to any and I mean ANY symptoms of anxiety and carrying on with my life.
As Agni said, I’m doing everything day in day out but my reaction to the way I’m feeling is something that I need to check and something that I am not doing. I understand that I am not unique when it comes to this disorder ( as this blog shows how many people are also suffering ) and I appreciate your advice.
I do need to give my brain a break and be carried through the day with the help of faith, understanding and sometimes a bit of help from people who have found their way through anxiety ( such as yourself) and all the tricks the brain can play.
I hope this comment didn’t require too much editing Paul 🙂 I think the gaps and spelling mistakes might be happening because I’m always typing from my cell phone.
Samantha,
I know how not working can be a blow to someone’s self-esteem, especially people like us who have anxiety disorders. I commend you on living with anxiety and derealisation for so many years. Yes, we are the cause of this chemical imbalance/ anxiety disorders. I feel like maybe that’s the first point of recovery? I think the letting go and surrendering comes when we have had enough setbacks to know that nothing works and we should just give up.
May God give us all the courage to accept completely and get through anxiety see that it’s a hoax.
Hi All,
It’s been quite some time since I’ve posted here. Seems like Paul has redesigned the layout to the blog and it is much more modern now! I haven’t read through all the comments but it still seems to be the same as when I first discovered this website and blog sometime in the 2011 time frame.
I had gone through a stressful period in mid-2011 with several small things happening altogether in the span of about two weeks. Taken individually, each situation probably wasn’t a big deal. But put them all together and I was mentally stressing over all of them. One day, sometime after the US Memorial day weekend, I had a panic attack. It shocked me and I couldn’t sleep at all that day.
The panic attack just led me down a tough path. Sleep was a challenge. My heart was racing. I had intrusive thoughts that I couldn’t shake. The situation didn’t resolve itself after a few days so I went to a doctor for a check-up and I was fine. I finally gave in and went to see a therapist. The therapist was nice and we talked a lot but it never resolved my issues.
It was during my time at the therapist that I discovered Paul’s website and blog. It was a godsend to see people saying they had the same issues. But there was no magic formula to fix your anxiety. I gave up on the therapist and dug into Paul’s book (which I bought). I tried to go through my day to day routine and it was hard. I learned to try and stay busy as much as I could to keep my mind off my anxiety.
But one thing sill stands out, maybe a year or two later after my anxiety started. I was watching a basketball game one day I still had my anxiety but for a brief few minutes, I remembered my mind suddenly cleared and I felt some relief. It didn’t last that long that particular day. But sometime later (and I can’t remember when), life just went back to normal. I’ve had a few minor relapses but I’ve been able to address them quickly.
So if you’re still struggling, it’s ok. The key for me was not to focus on the feelings, the thoughts and the fear you feel. Just let them be and DO YOUR THINGS. Teach your body to not fear all those things. Because if you don’t, you will be tense for every single thing and that may be why anxiety persists for some people.
Lastly, I noticed my worrying nature faded quite a bit after my bout with anxiety. While I still “worry” a little bit, I get it out of my mind and just live in the “moment” because you can’t control what the future holds.
Good luck!
Alz, surrender is not something you do, it is the ultimate realisation that there is nothing you can do. I got there after utterly exhausting myself trying to fix myself, trying to solve this never-ending puzzle, trying to think and obsess my way out of it all. I finally ran out of strategies and techniques, there was no where else to go with it, I was defeated and at this point something inside me just gave up, I said to myself “I would rather feel this way that spend the rest of my life fighting it” and finally surrendered, I did not have to do anything.
It was not the end of my suffering as I still had to go through a process of healing, in fact finally given up brought a lot to the surface, but I had finally broken the cycle and stopped recreating it, stopped adding suffering to suffering and so now my mind and body had the chance to heal.
All the constant analysing and need for reassurance is due to the fact you are still trying to ‘Do’ something about it’ you are still searching for that magic answer to find something or someone to end how your suffering, not realising that you are creating it by your obsession and struggle to get out of it.
Look in this direction as Stephanie is right, no one here can do this for you, the answer lies within you. If you have read all these books and they are saying something similar then this is where the truth lies, if you don’t truly get the message then look inside and try and understand the logic and science behind it all, coming on here for tips on how to feel better or for constant reassurance is missing the point entirely.
Paul
Paul ,
You’re right. I can’t do this anymore .. I should try and live my life with all the fears. I know it’s a malfunctioning amygdala and I’m creating the loop by adding more fear. But perhaps it’s because I’m now practising acceptance, that the anxiety is so high? As you said, a lot of things come to the surface in the process of healing. It’s just my brain trying to protect me and I’m doing the opposite, not letting it do what it must given the current situation. Acceptance of the low feelings, the fears, the doubts .. if they are me for the time being then I can’t really help. Ironically you can’t help it. You just have to accept and like you said to try the opposite of what I have been doing for the past ten to fifteen years.
I just wish there were more psychiatrists and psychologists who knew the above.
Love and god bless you
Alz
@Paul (or everyone how has the hang of it/has recovered..):
Curious as to how your thinking got more optimistic and how you could believe that you can leave all of this behind you.
My therapist (she gets me and helps me and tells me to accept…accept myself, my feelings etc) is in accordance with a lot of what you say, but she does mention that in order to feel more positive, I need to practice and train the brain to let go of my old fear and think more positive.
I know this sounds like a technique and like wanting to get rid of something etc – and of course I am confused now.
I notice though, that although I am living my life, have moments of peace and relaxation, I still have a hard time to really feel the optimism of “Yes, I know the way now and I WILL leave my past worries and fears behind me and make peace with my low times”.
This is the feeling I am looking for.
My therapist would say that I should tell myself I am ok, and I will be ok and that my brain needs to get used to think new more optimistic thoughts and not follow down the old path…
But it also makes sense that trying to think positively and telling yourself things like that is not allowing?
Am I making again too big of a deal of all of this?
So I just wondered you who managed to think more optimistic thoughts, how to feel you will be ok and if you maybe did “correct” extremely negative and fearful thoughts from time to time?
Hi Maddy,
Acceptance isn’t another method to remove anxiety. So it’s not thinking, “Yes, this is it! Now I’ll finally be rid of these horrendous fears and thoughts and feedings.” It’s actually the opposite. It’s an attitude of surrender: “I’m done caring about how I feel. If this is how I am for the rest of my life, so be it. But I’m getting back to living my life.” I know some people think that’s like a defeatist attitude, almost like anxiety is winning. But it’s actually where you find complete freedom. You are no longer defined by how you’re feeling or what you’re thinking at any given moment. You don’t have to waste any more energy or time questioning, searching, analyzing. You’re free to just live your life, to go anywhere, to do anything – anxiety or not.
As far as positive thinking, I think that’s a good habit to develop. Not because it has anything to do with removing anxiety, but because it’s healthy. So no need to worry about thinking, “Oh no, I didn’t think very positively today, I’m doomed!” A practice I like is at the end of the day to take a few minutes and list 3 things I’m thankful for that happened that day. It’s just a good reminder that whether it was a good or bad day, there’s always something to be thankful for.
Thank you, Stephanie!
I know now that acceptance isn’t a technique and nothing should be used as one. That’s why I was a bit “confused” with what my therapist said.
She also suggested thankfulness and made a point that we can practice how we think.
I notice I still have a tendency to think that I will never feel better or never get past these issues (I have had rough patches where I feel anxious and mildly depressed for many years…and then times when I am fine but the fear and doubt of “it” coming back has manifested itself).
And I know I need to lose believe and interest in these thoughts..but damn it is hard.
That’s why I was wondering how Paul and everyone who came through this maintained some optimism or how the thinking got more hopeful and positive.
Hi Maddy,
Those thoughts are normal. In fact you may even find months or years down the road when you feel a spike that the thought of “oh no, what if IT returns?” automatically pops up. It’s not a matter of outthinking that thought or suffocating it with positivity and optimism – it always comes back to acceptance. “Oh well, I have a life to live.” And then let the fear and doubt be there.
The more you practice acceptance, the more your thoughts will calm, peace will return, you’ll find yourself having more interest in life and a more positive outlook. This all happens naturally. You don’t need to work for it anymore than you need to fix your anxiety. But don’t put a timeline on the process. Don’t check in with yourself, “Do I feel more at peace or positive today than I did last week, last month?” Leave it all be and focus on just living your life.
So last week I had 5 great days in a row. I woke up without that feeling and the anxiety was so mild, I actually felt that happy feeling inside that I’ve missed for so long. It had been a couple of months before I felt that way, it was such a relief to finally have some peace. Over the weekend I woke up and it had returned, which was fine, I can handle this and it just carried on regardless (slightly disappointed) I gradually got worse, it did not worry me and I did not break in my acceptance of anything. I’m writing this because I like to get this off my chest sometimes when I’m feeling low. The anxiety I have right now is new and different from what I had been feeling prior. I feel I have this horrible dark disturbing energy surging through me and waiting to pull me in on everything I think. It’s just hovering there inside me. It worries me for a moment until I remembered what I learnt and I immediately became positive about it all over again. I guess I was just disheartened and felt I was getting worse than before my good spell. It’s confusing if I’m honest with you, I expecting the symptoms to return but never worse when they did. This dark energy is horrible, and the sinking feeling from every little thing is upsetting. Has anyone experienced anything similar going through this process?
Hi Chris, anxiety takes on many forms and is quite creative, but it is really just noise from tired nerves. I cannot remember how many forms it has taken when I had it. Please be assured that the noise will die down eventually. I do not remember the exact day it went away. It went away when I was not counting. Best wishes on your road to recovery 🙂
Hi all, I’m including writing of Jeff Foster. Someone who, together with Paul’s writings, helped me overcome anxiety. Thought it might serve as some relief for those suffering at the moment:
WE ARE WARRIORS OF ANXIETY
Sometimes anxiety lives as a gentle rumble in the background of our daily lives.
But sometimes, the floodgates of our experience are flung wide open, and raw anxiety surges in the body like a tidal wave.
Maybe we are going through a tough time in our lives, a crisis, a change, the end of a relationship, an illness, the sickness or death of a loved one, or the falling-away of an old dream or “safety net”, and scary thoughts trigger an anxiety response in the body. Maybe our anxiety comes out of nowhere. Maybe we are touching into a past trauma, and old painful feelings are threatening to emerge into conscious awareness. Maybe we are simply imagining things that aren’t really true, invoking things that aren’t really there. Maybe something just needs to be processed in us, dealt with, felt to completion, brought into love, integrated into a bigger picture of self.
Yes, sometimes anxiety comes, unwanted and unexpected, into the foreground of conscious experience, instantly bringing a pounding heart, a racing mind, heat and sweat and tingly limbs, nausea and tightness in the belly and chest and throat, and a feeling of the ground falling out from under us. We feel like we want to run, to crawl out of our own skin, to escape to safety, to find solid ground again…
Anxiety can be mild, or it can be really intense and scary and powerful like this. When anxiety comes in such a tidal wave, it can really feel like “Something is going horribly wrong!”. Our thoughts may tell us that we are about to die, or pass out, or have a heart attack or stroke, or go completely mad, or lose ourselves in some terrifying void.
The anxiety itself can feel unsafe. We can become anxious about our anxiety!
The truth is, these symptoms of anxiety are completely safe. Pounding hearts are safe. Muscle tightness is safe. That ‘sinking feeling’ in the belly is safe. Racing thoughts are safe. Heat and sweat and that dizzy, groundless, disconnected feeling is totally safe. It might not feel safe in the moment, it might not feel pleasant, but it’s totally safe. It is just a passing storm of sensation and thought. It’s the body deep in protection mode. It’s nature at its most brilliant and ancient and fierce. It doesn’t mean that something “bad” is happening or is “about to” happen.
We learn to ‘lean in’ to the storm of our anxiety, to let the body do what it’s doing. To recognize that we are experiencing anxiety in the present moment, to name the visitor, to bring mindful awareness to it, and to compassionately touch into it, with courage and slowness and breath. We begin to allow the heart to race and pound, and we allow the shakiness and trembling and the heat, and we allow the tight belly and the tingles and that doom-laden sinking feeling. We allow the moment as it is, messy and intense and uncomfortable and alive, as it is. We tell ourselves, “Yes, I am experiencing anxiety right now, it is really really intense, but it is totally safe, it is the nervous system rushing to protect the organism, and nothing more than that, and it will pass, and I can hold it all…” We learn to step into that bigger part of ourselves, that ever-present Being in the midst of the somatic storm.
We learn to stop fighting the anxiety, to stop shaming it, to stop calling it bad or wrong or dangerous (and if these thoughts come, we recognize them as anxious thoughts too!). We learn to stop running from our anxiety, stop trying to get to some “safer place”. We learn that the safest place is actually right here, where we are, at the very heart of our anxiety! We learn to bow to anxiety’s awesome power and intelligence and to ride the wave of anxiety as it arises, reaches its peak, and crashes back to its source.
We become warriors of anxiety! We get brave enough to touch into our fragility and vulnerability, to meet this most sacred and ancient of somatic visitors, which is only trying to protect us, keep us safe, and remind us of our true power.
– Jeff Foster
Thank you, Augustus. I guess when something new comes along our extinct is to ask why and what it is. It didn’t take long for me to stop questioning it though, it went straight into the anxiety bin. I suppose this is really the first time I’ve crossed from a really good spell to a really bad one, so it took me by surprise I guess. I feel it peaked yesterday and is now easing slightly. Maybe this weekend I’ll have some peace again. Thank you
Anne, thanks for that post. I really enjoyed it. Really puts some strength into you to keep fight by not fighting… a sentence that would make sense to nobody, but us that are going through it.
Anne,
This was so deep . Thank you 🙏🏿
I posted a new success story on my page below that really explains the process
https://anxietynomore.co.uk/success_stories/
The story is entitled ‘Andrews story of recovery from Anxiety and depersonalisation’ and the first story under the video
I’m having a really bad time at the moment and it seems I always come back here just to get some reassurance from people, I know I shouldn’t, but I just feel a little lost. Some days I feel it’s all coming together and then out of nowhere the symptoms just get worse. I clearly haven’t taken on the advice like I thought I had. The doubt always seems to win at the moment. I know this is a setback and then I start thinking is a set back supposed to happen to recover or have I caused it myself? Are setbacks part of the recovery or are they hurdles we have to overcome to get back on the right path?
I just want to point out I am not running away from how I feel, I am still living life to the best I possibly can, I sometimes give thoughts the attention they do not deserve but I feel I am doing better with ignoring them. It’s just I read back on other people’s stories and I immediately do the one thing I shouldn’t and compare myself to them? Why do people talk of good days and bad days? My bad days are for weeks at a time with little to no relief. My wife feels like she’s lost her husband and I can’t help feeling bad for her.
I know all this information now, I know the true way to recovery but then I guess I’m just not very good at applying it. How I can go from 5 unbelievably great days to this most intense feeling and disorientation is absolutely baffling. I expected it to return but when you hear people say it comes back weaker than before I get completely disheartened that mine is worse.
I know comparing is wrong, so why am I still doing it?
I just feel lost.
Hi Chris
I wanted to reply to you as you were kind enough to give me some guidance when I needed it.
I thought something had ‘clicked’ with me last week, in that although the anxiety was there, I was able to stand back from it a bit mentally if that makes sense. It was a small breakthrough, but given that I have physical symptoms of anxiety constantly, and severe derealisation to boot, it felt like I was on the right track.
Then the weekend came and I seemed to lose the ability and became overwhelmed with how I was feeling.
The point I realised is that I’m not really accepting; I’m really trying to, which is not the same thing. I think you are doing the same. You’re actively trying to accept when accepting should be inactive. I am also struggling with this big time, as my life feels so alien to me right now that it scares me so much and I fear I’ll lose myself forever. I know on an intellectual level that this isn’t true, but it is so hard to allow and accept the feelings, even when I truly believe it’s the only way to recover.
My point is that you’re not alone on your journey, and it’s not an easy one. But I believe the more you practice acceptance, the easier it becomes.
Your wife hasn’t lost her husband; You are still the same person you always were, but you are temporarily thwarted by fear.
Keep on keeping on; keep rereading Anne’s post about Anxiety Warriors, and keep telling yourself, no matter how scary your symptoms are, that they are just the result of overstressed nerves, and nothing more.
Hang in there x
Stephanie:
Thank you for your reply regarding positive thinking etc.
The “what if IT comes back” thoughts have been with me ever since I have had these issues with mood, sadness, anxiety.
So around 10 years…
I would really like to believe that by now using this different approach, accepting the feelings and not trying to constantly fix myself I am on the path to become more stable and to not be so scared of these feelings anymore.
But I am not there yet.
And I do compare and secretly count the time. I also still notice that I consider how I have been feeling the last few months another “bad phase” again..which I want to step out of. I guess this is also counterproductive.
But beating myself up over “doing it wrong” also is…
I still need the reassurance…is time really working for me?
I have been really active in the last few weeks. Tons of social stuff, two short trips.
The shadow (or nagging feeling that something is not quite right)is there though.
I want to be optimistic though that the shadow CAN lift if I just keep doing.
Right? 😉
Someone sent me this email today and I thought I would share, it is exactly where he needed to get to, it was an inner surrender that just happened to him, one that usually comes through being tired of fighting or a huge insight.
The same surrender happened to me through when I had just had enough of fighting, something deep inside of me just gave up. That surrender and a deep understanding of how I was keeping myself in a cycle of suffering eventually gave space for these thoughts and feelings to be felt, acknowledged and freed up. This surrender also stopped all the questioning, obsessing and figuring out, giving my poor brain the break it so craved.
Hello, Paul,
Last Sunday I was walking with my wife and youngest son and dog on the beach and I had all the symptoms of anxiety and things were difficult.
I was stressing about my paranoia and fear and disconnection from life in front of me and all the other unpleasant things that I associate with anxiety and I was in the loop, as they say.
As we were returning to the car I was having one scary thought after another and analysing all of my experience and trying desperately to get a different thought in my head, trying to remember what you’d advised and I couldn’t manage it, then…
Suddenly something happened. I had a brand new kind of thought.
It was “Stephen, you can think WHATEVER you want!”
“you can feel WHATEVER you want!”
It was like a permission to have ALL of the really unpleasant experiences that were happening.
It felt very different and freed up my mind for many other very positive thoughts which were not affirmations or techniques or forced positive thinking, but actually true on a level I had not previously experienced.
It was about finding a very big, friendly space in which I could think and feel things which previously I would not allow myself to feel and also judged myself harshly for having these thoughts and feelings.
My day changed from that point.
Since then I’ve had quite a bit of anxiety and panic, maybe even more than before, but I have not forgotten that space.
It felt like a real breakthrough. I can’t try and get it back or use it again as a technique or method because it was natural and unforced but I know its there.
Recovery is slow and not smooth and usually painful and in the “think/feel WHATEVER you want” space recovery does not even actually matter. it’s just another random thought.
I’ll keep going.
thanks for reading,
Stephen
How have people dealt with constant intense physical feelings of fear? I am trying not to resist the feelings but they are so strong and continuous they are overwhelming me.
Hi Samantha. I have dealt with strong feelings of fear, and I am sure so have many other people. I can not say they were constant, but every person is wired differently. The answer is the same, let the adrenaline burn out, let it overwhelm you. You are always safe. Nothing bad will happen to you. Your body is just on high alert trying to protect you.
Dear Paul and other ex sufferer,
I am currently having panic attacks during the evening when I lie in my bed, I feel then my heart racing with 120 bpm, then I freak more out because Im afraid that I will have a heart attack and then it goes to 160 bpm and I think Im dying.
but my main problem is:
As Im telling myself during this attack that nothing will happen, its just panic and try to accept it, another half of me is still fearing the symptoms : fast heart beat, sweating, dizzyness, hot flashes/feelings, shakiness.. so I guess Im not really accepting because I still fear it?
My question would be:
how do I accept this symptoms( and they really feel so dangerous) like the racing heart.. without fearing them?
cause‘ my fear this dreaded fear comes so automatically and I cant control it. Its just this fear that im going to die..
I tried also lying with it and it really goes away after 40min till 1 hour.. but still I fear the next one coming.. 🙁
Would be so glad to hear your reply.
Thank you so much,
Ruby
Hi Ruby,
the good news is, what you are experiencing is not as serious as it seems to you. You are describing very typical, I would say textbook symptoms of an anxiety panic attack.
And this entire website is dedicated to point you out to a solution to your problems. Have you read the articles and forums that have addressed these symptoms for so many times? I mean Paul had described the importance of “not doing anything” so many times, that it is disheartening to see these questions still being asked again and again.
You are fueling every attack by building up adrenaline from fear. There is no wonder it then manifests itself that way. Once you stop dreading it, it will slowly go away. You are basically keeping yourself in constant “fight or flight” state. It really is that simple.
Dear Notorious,
thank you so much for your reply!
And I actually read anything possible/ available about this subject of anxiety and acceptance.. also both of Pauls books and his posts on this forum..
And it really seems so simple but somehow too simple, cause‘ my brain always tells me it cant be that simple. 😑
And still even if I let it wash over me, yes the attack stops then but still I fear the next one will be worse and maybe kill me.. it sounds stupid and I logically know that nothing will happen but as Im in the middle of this „fear/dread“ I cannot think anymore..
It really is a loop which I cannot seem to escape.
I also read Claire Weekes – Hope and help for your nerves.. twice!
AND it is all so clear and I understand what happens with the body but I cant somehow drop the „what ifs“- what is when this time it’s actually the heart and I will die and so on and so on…..
😞
“And I actually read anything possible/ available about this subject of anxiety and acceptance.. also both of Pauls books and his posts on this forum” Great! It is actually the knowledge of what is happening that helps losing the fear.
And it does not matter whether it is fear of dying, fear of losing ones mind (that used to be my favorite) or any other fear. They are all the same. Your overworked mind is latching onto whatever is your biggest fear. If yours was let’s say fear of being lonely, than your brain would most likely be thinking a lots of scary thoughts about that.
So you are afraid of dying? OK. That is one of the most common ones. You should understand that if you were not afraid of dying, your brain would find something else to project your fear. Because of an anxious state you are in. Brain is a thought machine, it creates thoughts. See them for what they are, just thoughts.
When I look back at my old days as anxiety sufferer, I see how much time and energy I wasted trying to analyze all the thoughts that bothered me. There were sooo many every day. And it was all created by me. By my tired mind. Once I fully understood what was going on, I stopped fearing my thoughts. I gave my mind the break it needed.
And when the anxiety tried to creep back in, and boy does it try (now not as much anymore), I never do anything to stop it. I just continue my day without any expectations in regards to anxiety, without checking back to see it it is gone, any of that. No unnecessary additional fuel is being added. And then after few hours/days I realize there is no anxiety feelings anymore. This whole process now became so automatic that I barely even acknowledge it anymore. I stopped playing the game.
As somebody once said: “Anxiety is the game where the only winning move is not to play” It is so true.
Dear Notorious,
Thank you for your reply.
To be honest the thoughts are not my biggest problem, its more the fear of this overwhelming symptoms, like racing heart, sweating, dizzyness, breathlessness and this overall feeling that I am about to die any other minute..
I just dont get it, how do I lose the fear of fear????? I try to let it be, but after the attack is over I still fear the next and monitor my heart and everything.. because it felt so REAL and DANGEROUS.. my brain is creating this fear and its so automatic..
How do I accept all this and believe that I wont die?? 🙁
Would be happy to hear your advice Notorious & Paul.
Thank you!
So much truth in that reply Notorious
Hi Ruby,
There are some people who, once they understand the mechanics behind anxiety, lose their fear of it. But for many of us, that fear is still there. Why? because that’s how it was designed, to scare us and get our attention! The fear is coming pretty much subconsciously, right? So it’s pointless to try to convince yourself not to be afraid. Instead, just allow yourself to feel the fear – but without adding any additional fear. So the next time you have an episode and that fear flashes, just allow yourself to be. Feel the symptoms and that automatic fear of the symptoms, but don’t add any “I need to stop feeling this way! When is it going to end?! Is it getting worse? Oh no, oh no!” As Claire Weekes says, it’s all of those “oh no’s” that add more fuel to the fire. Let the fire burn out on its own, it always does. You don’t need to stop being afraid, you don’t need to do anything. That’s allowing. It’s accepting your symptoms, accepting even your fear of the symptoms, without trying to change anything. That bit of separation that you start to create between yourself and your symptoms/feelings/thoughts is the space where peace will eventually return to your life.
Dear Stephanie,
thank you so much for your helpful reply! I really appreciate your advice.
It’s just so fearful to me, and when it’s over. I’m feeling very low for feeling like this and being like this.
I don’t know how to not do anything Stephanie, I always get this feeling that I need to do something or I’ll die. It’s so scary to me, to feel like this.
Hi Ruby,
All the times that you’ve tried to do something, has it worked? No, because this huge, scary “it” is nothing more than your poor tired mind and body trying desperately to help you. And instead of giving your mind and body the rest they need, you continue to frantically struggle and fight. Until you realize and accept that it is you causing your own suffering, nothing will change. Your mind and body cannot heal until you provide them with rest. You give them rest by accepting how you feel (no matter how scary or uncomfortable) without trying to escape or change how you feel. The only way to be free of how you feel is to allow yourself to feel it all.
Thank you so much for your reply Stephanie!
I really try to let it all be there.. but Im still fearing it all and I know that this is what keeps me in the cycle.
I just dont know how to not react to the thoughts and feelings, because when I feel or think like this I automatically think that Im weird and a failure and that something is wrong with me..
Because normal people dont stuck all the times in there heads and cant think of anything but anxiety.
I just cant stop thinking about it anymore..
😫😔
Stephanie, Paul..and all those who support here. Big thank you for all the patience and commitment to help those here that still need so much comforting and reassurance!
I myself notice I still am so caught up in it all and feel the need to come here for support.
Is this a part of what keeps me a bit stuck?
I know we shouldn’t count weeks, shouldn’t wait for “it” to go away but I am still hoping to feel more normal and carefree.
I have been starting to use the acceptance approach since mid-August. And I feel like I am not making the progress I “should” make.
How do I know I am on the right way?
I am living my life and do basically everything I d normally do…but with a lot of effort most of the time.
My attention still stuck on me and my feelings.
When I discovered Pauls site, I was just slipping into a rough time so the months before were a bit better. So it’s not like I went from horrible/not doing anything to now living my life.
I feel like now my whole issues and fears and symptoms are “on the table” and I know now that I have to confront myself with it all.
But I notice how impatient I can get and how I still fear “maybe it will always feel like this.”
Would go cold turkey, not reading up on here help?
I hope I still have learned something over the last two months even though I haven’t had that “now I really know recovery is around the corner”.
And why is it that reading up and even writing this is somewhat calming.
Any words of support appreciated!
Hi Maddy
You sound very much like me; I think we are gritting our teeth and ‘putting up with’ our symptoms instead of truly accepting them. Also, the fact that you are saying you don’t feel you are making the progress you ‘should’ make indicates that you are looking for improvement rather than letting improvement come naturally. This is adding further stress to your already exhausted mind.
Believe me; I am in the same boat as you and despair that I won’t be able to adopt the necessary approach in order to recover. I struggle when people on here say anxiety/panic always passes as with me I have high physical anxiety constantly throughout the day along with crippling DR. I start the day with optimism and determination but by mid-afternoon am so worn down by the constant feelings of intense fear that I lose my resolve. I would like to hear from someone who has recovered that had the same severity of symptoms as more commonly people seem to have experienced anxiety/panic ‘attacks’.
Don’t feel disheartened that the last two months have been wasted; my understanding is that learning to truly accept can take time, and in itself is a process. You are moving towards this each day so don’t lose faith.
Hi Maddy,
Paul has used this analogy before, but it bears repeating. When we have a broken leg, we don’t wake up every morning and poke and prod at it to try to gauge how much healing has taken place. No, we trust our body to heal it and just go about our life in the meantime. The same is true with anxiety. Our mind and body know what to do, but we’re constantly interfering with the process by trying to gauge our progress and then getting frustrated because it’s not happening quickly enough. Then we think, “I must not be doing this right, maybe I need to exercise more, stay off the blog, take a different vitamin, etc.” No, the whole point of acceptance is there is nothing you need to do! Be on the blog, be off the blog, none of it matter because, ultimately, you can do whatever you want when you’re not dictated by your thoughts/feelings. You wake up and you’re anxious? Who cares, on with the day. Your thoughts automatically fixate on yourself – oh well, back to what you were doing. Your thinking feels sluggish? Big deal, you have things to do. This is acceptance; this is true freedom; this is recovery.
Samantha,
When I was at my worst, I was literally a dysfunctional mess. I was suffering from PPD/PPA and I went on medical leave from work and had to go stay with my parents for three months so I could have help taking care of my 7 month old daughter. I was filled with so much fear that I was afraid to move. I would spend all day sitting in a rocking chair convinced I was trapped in this nightmare forever. Even the task of taking a shower made me panic. I was nauseous all day long. I lost so much weight I looked sick. I could barely sleep. It was the hardest, darkest period of my life. And yet here I am. So, please, don’t think that your suffering is unique. It doesn’t matter what your symptoms are, or the contents of your thoughts, the way out is always the same.
I can’t add much to what Stephanie says as she sums it up perfectly. You may think, why doesn’t so and so just tell me what I need to do? But there is nothing to do, only when you see this for yourself will this constant battle cease. You have to see that you are creating your own loop of suffering by constantly fighting, figuring out, worrying, overthinking and every other technique or ritual you have to cope or manage how you feel.
I hear many on here say ‘But I can’t accept how I feel’ which means, so I will keep fighting, searching, thinking and so stay in a loop. The truth is you have no choice, your battle and refusal not to is exactly what is causing the majority of your suffering. This is what is causing all the obsessing, resistance, overthinking, fighting, everything that makes you feel like you do is caused by your attempts to find a way out.
How did I allow how I felt? I eventually realised I had no choice, when I let go of this battle then a little window of peace opened up as I had finally stopped recreating it, I had broken the loop.
Did this mean I was OK? Not at all, I still felt detached but I took this detachment with me where ever I went, I did not fight with or get frustrated, I was the reason I felt this way so I would only be getting mad at myself. I felt a lot of fear and anxiety but I just allowed its presence, to be free of it, I had to allow its presence. My anxiety coming up was my bodies way of releasing it from my inner space, it was doing me a favour, it was actually a good thing, like a drug addict going through a detox, the body is just releasing the toxins so as to be at peace again, but I failed to this for years and so constantly tried to suppress it.
My mind still raced but I just allowed it to race. It was filled with intrusive thoughts and images but I just accepted them without being too impressed by them. My mind would obsess over something and so I just allowed it to obsess without getting involved in its obsessions, I felt hyperaware from all the studying of myself I had done for years but I allowed this feeling too.
All this was still hellish at times, there was no liking it but I just accepted it as part of me for now. What so many do and I see that in Maddy above is try and use this as another technique. People even say to me I have been trying your technique, this is not a technique, there is nothing to implement, allowing is not a doing, it is the end of doing, the end of all techniques.
Although I made slow progress and it took a few months to feel pretty much back to myself, I could start to see little windows opening up. The first day I smiled without faking it, the first day the subject did not swim around my mind, the first time I felt real clarity return. This would yo-yo from good to bad days but I allowed the bad days to return and did not fall back into any rituals to try and change my experience.
It is like going from resisting your suffering to falling right into it, from trying to figure it all out, to being happy not knowing anything, from trying to control the mind to letting it run as it wishes I could go on but no matter what question anyone asks, this is the stage you need to get to. Both books and everything I write is to allow you to get to this point, there is no knowledge to carry around with you, no mantra that needs repeating, no technique that needs mastering.
There is no coincidence that the few people who have recovered on here tell you the same message, because there is no other message to recovery. I have yet to meet one sufferer in 20 years of doing this that ever recovered any other or similar way. The internet is a very big place, if there was a course, pill or technique that would help you step straight out of it, then you would of all heard about it, the reason people keep searching and rarely get anywhere is that they are looking for an answer that does not exist.
The truth is every attempt to escape your current state keeps you trapped within it, really try to understand see this for yourself. Read some of the success stories on my site and you will see they all went through a similar process, the long but right way home, not the instant answer that does not exist, no one thought or fought theor way out.
Thanks, Stephanie (again! So patient with everyone here!).
Everything makes so much sense. I really have understood everything on an intellectual level. It is just – and I guess we all know this – so hard to really implement.
Maybe it is harder for some…I am such an impatient person with such a strong will. Fighting, fixing stuff, doing something is my modus operandi. So the total opposite of this – letting go, not doing, accepting, waiting – is against my personality.
And yes, with this:
“But we’re constantly interfering with the process by trying to gauge our progress and then getting frustrated because it’s not happening quickly enough. Then we think, “I must not be doing this right, maybe I need to exercise more, stay off the blog, take a different vitamin, etc.”
you describe me a a T! Makes me almost giggle 😉
Trusting my mind to heal is not easy for me because I have had these issues on and off for many years, and with each bad time I lost more trust to ever really be free of these low times and fears that come along with it.
I can see now that I was always trying to fix myself (in different ways) during all these years – and I know that now I hopefully found the right approach to remove the root of all of it…but so much doubt still.
I also had some health stuff going on over the last two years (which is also a reason why I got deeper into the loop of worrying about myself, feeling like I am not ok, losing trust in my body), so overall, my trust in my body and mind has been really shaken.
Which is part of the issue. The feeling of “you’re not really ok/healthy/strong” has just added up over the last 2 years and I really want to get trust in my self-healing powers back.
And something I also struggle with (yes I know..struggling isn’t the way!) and where I’d love to hear a scientific explanation of how this work:
Those connections and memories my brain has made. I have many memories of feeling the same/bad over the last one or two years and I know about the pathways in the brain and neurons that wire together etc.
I know we need to make new good memories, enforce the “good” pathways, show the brain we are ok…
How does it work, when I feel bad? Assuming I accept that I feel bad/anxious/depressed – how can my brain “unlearn” this though?
I guess I am obsessing about my poor brain too much..but it really is a fear of mine that I have spent too much time in a sad or anxious state and my brain just can’t unlearn this.
@Samantha: Thanks for your reply. I guess yes, still too much fighting. But we probably need to be kinder and more compassionate and accept that yes, there will be some fighting, even after weeks. Because it isn’t easy…
Maybe some people really make huge progress after a couple of weeks, but a complete change in attitude is expected to take time.
I wish you lots of patience and trust, and we have Stephanie and others here, who always put things into perspective.
The thought that everything is a process and that understanding oneself is also a step helps me to not feel so stuck…So yes, no time is wasted for us!
@Paul:
Your message was posted while I was writing mine to Stephanie – so thanks for taking the time to reply!
Like I said, your message is so clear to me. Giving up the fight is the hard part.
I get that this is NOT a technique and that we shouldn’t try to feel better or manipulate our feelings in any way.
I have stopped with the obvious techniques like meditation (right now, I ‘d use it as a means to make something go away…and it gives me freedom not having to meditate!), relaxation techniques, trying new supplements and so on.
This is quite liberating indeed.
Maybe I am actually allowing sometimes and don’t even realise it…
I just still catch myself wanting to feel better. At least I notice it. But I can’t make this wish go away either – which would also be fighting.
I think I just thought it would be easier with quicker “results”.
Reading your experience and those of others who are better now always makes it sound easier than what I feel! I know this is typical me, my suffering is bigger 😉
But you make it clear that you still had many bad days, horrible feelings and it took time – so that should tell me to not expect too much too soon.
But you said you trusted the process and felt optimistic that you’re on the right way – and this is the feeling that I am missing.
It is/was there in glimpses but it is barely noticeable and the doubt is still so easily washing over it.
Again, thanks for taking the time, Paul!
It must be frustrating to having to tell us all the same things over and over…
Maddy, there is no endpoint through knowledge, you don’t have some revelation and then it is all behind you, knowledge just finally helps you to let go, to really understand the process. But you still have to go through a process of healing and it isn’t always pleasant, it can’t be, as everything you have suppressed comes up to be released.
You may still have to deal with an obsessive mind, the detachment and anything else you are currently experiencing. Knowledge won’t bypass this and it does take time and so you have to be patient. Progress is never measured on how you feel as that will fluctuate, it is measured on how allowing you are becoming.
You may understand what I am saying on a conceptual level but your mind hasn’t got it yet, it isn’t convinced. I was the same until it hit me so deeply I could not see how I had not seen it before. It can take time for the message to really sink in so don’t be too frustrated at not getting it yet.
Thank you, Paul!
I like the thought of releasing, purging, “detoxing” all these anxious and negative thoughts and feelings I have stored up over many years.
If that is it – great.
My mind, doubting as it is now, will tell me though:”Yes, that was true for Paul, he could release all this energy and was recovering that way. But you just keep yourself in the loop. No detox here”.
I know this is also just a thought though…
I also liked how you let the habit about obsessing about yourself and how you feel die down. This is something I really want to let go of and what has been with me for a long time – even in times when I felt pretty much ok, it was kind of nagging in the back of my mind, as I always feared getting worse again.
I’d love to get over this habit for good. So hard to believe that this can die down…
But yes, maybe my mind isn’t fully convinced yet. On the conceptual and intellectual level, I really got it though. As I said, I read it all and it is so obvious as to why I feel the way I do…
All I can say is that I am handling the really intense feelings a bit differently than in my last “episode” about a year ago.
Back then I would make more “comfort phone calls”, cry more in more despair, cancel more things, and constantly try to do relaxation stuff as soon as I came home from work.
And I have days when things feel a bit easier. And maybe I am not that deep in the dumps, because I have had days where my smiles and even my laughter was genuine.
I have been extremely active over the last weeks..tons of social stuff (that I was dreading), and I am always ok.
I might not always feel good doing all of this, but my fear that I will kind of break down and not be able to stand it never happens!
So..maybe I am already doing things to recover, and I just haven’t noticed it yet…
Hi Maddy,
In response to thoughts and the brain, again that’s something that will happen naturally. There’s nothing you need to “do” to rewrite your pathways or whatnot. The less you consciously engage with your negative thoughts (by accepting whatever thoughts you happen to think, as well as your automatic reaction to those thoughts), the less your mind automatically jumps to those thoughts. But ultimately the point is, whatever feelings or thoughts happen to come up, you’re not controlled by them. They can be there, and you can still live your life.
Like Paul said, you can’t measure your progress by how can feel (or how many bad versus good thoughts you have) at any given moment, because that’s constantly fluctuating. Progress is allowing anything and everything. You can go about your day and constantly have the thought “my mind and body are broken”; as long as you aren’t questioning or trying to rid yourself of the thought, ultimately it holds no more power or meaning over you than the other many thoughts you have like “That window is dirty” or “I forgot to buy bread.”
Remember, the goal is never to be rid of any particular thoughts or feelings. That’s where frustration and impatience arises. “Why am I still thinking this thought?!” “Why do I still feel so strange?!” Again, true freedom is feeling anything, thinking anything, without being controlled or defined by any of it.
Stephanie,
again, many thanks! Your contributions on here are so helpful. My hats off to you how you came through your own tough time and how you support others now. Really inspiring!
Thanks for the info on the rewiring…I was always scared my brain had made so many memories of feeling low or anxious over the last two years that it will be stuck with them forever. (Although I have proof that this isn’t the case, since memories from feeling bad in – say – 2010 rarely arise…my memories that “disturb” me now are from my last rough patch last winter..).
You wrote:
“Remember, the goal is never to be rid of any particular thoughts or feelings. That’s where frustration and impatience arises. “Why am I still thinking this thought?!” “Why do I still feel so strange?!” ”
Yup, that’s still me a lot of the times. But I am really letting it all sink in more and more and shift towards fully allowing.
Hi
I really need help, I have been living quite a stressful life for a few years, working has been very difficult. I have a son who is 10 and constantly try to pretend all is well, I have another son who is getting married at the end of November, he is busy working to save for his wedding and has a stressful job.
I have suffered from OCD and anxiety for as long as I can recall, but last weekend something happened after an awful day of tears, I was driving down to London from up north to work at a conference and tears flowed all the way, sobbing, thoughts just racing through my mind, even things I had forgotten about from my past, all rushing, literally fighting with each other to be at the front of my mind. I literally froze, held my head, and wondered what was happening. That night I was consumed with panic in the hotel room, but somehow managed to get through the conference the next day. Although now a week later i cant recall much of the day which also scares me.
I have felt since the conference day a complete not present feeling, I have what I can only describe as electric shock feeling in my head, I feel completely consumed and can’t talk or move without massive effort, I have spent a week going for walks, trying to stop this cycle. I can’t sleep without waking to feelings of sheer panic. When I wake I have about 10 seconds of peace before it begins and boy it’s so all-consuming. I am so so so exhausted, but can’t sleep as I have a son to care for. I have had thoughts that I would prefer not to wake up but then this thought is followed by selfish woman thoughts. I am so desperate for relief. My mum is a pull yourself together advice, and my eldest son is supportive but is far from me. Every part of me aches and literally struggle to walk from room to room. I went to the doc and the nurse gave me some beta-blockers and ‘Ive referred to CBT.
I want to know the electric shock and awful scary head tremor feelings on waking extreme tiredness to the point I can sleep sitting up – are these symptoms of anxiety?
I ask anyone who can reach out to me to please do so as I feel so alone and afraid, I can’t find the words to describe how completely desperate I am. I am reading Pauls book but am struggling to take any words in as I can’t focus on anything without wanting to sleep. I am on day 8 of this and in desperate desperate need of advice please
Hi Deborah,
It sounds to me that you are suffering from derealisation. Your body has responded to over whelming worry and stress and decided enough is enough. Paul explains derealisation perfectly in his book. I understand you are struggling to take anything in so I would like to point you in the direction of his audio book. I have personally listened to it many many times and it is brilliant. Everything you are feeling is normal in the circumstances and there is so many people going through everything you have described. Every symptom is anxiety.
“I have spent a week going for walks, trying to stop this cycle.”
This line stood out to me. You are doing everything you can to rid yourself of how you’re are feeling when you should be doing the exact opposite. This is why you have hit the point you are in right now. What Paul teaches in his book is knowledge and understanding of how you are feeling, he aims to change your attitude and to live along side everything. I am not saying there is going to be a switch off moment and you will be fine immediately as there is a lengthy process of healing ahead of you. Listen/read the book.
It is time to stop running away and pretending you are fine. If you don’t feel fine, then you don’t, it is as simple as that. The process starts the minute you let go and allow everything in. It isn’t nice, in fact it is horrible, but there is an end to it all. You can do it.
Read the book. I can not stress this enough.
Just following on from my last post, I ask please someone to answer me I don’t know what to do. I have an overwhelming feeling of helplessness and realised I have nowhere to hide, I have lain in my bed so desperate to sleep but with being jolted awake every few seconds by my head tremors. I feel utter complete fear, I kept repeating to myself accept it .. its anxiety and it needs to release itself, but the fear was like nothing I have ever felt. I had rushing thoughts about how I could explain this to someone anyone but it seems impossible and then I feel that my only help was on a laptop via Paul site. I am trapped in my head.
Please, someone answer me I ask you sincerely. I cant pay for private counselling but I am waiting for nhs referral, and the thought of trying to explain this seems impossible. Why, is waking the worst of it, the jolts in my brain, the rushing thoughts on a loop, the memories that flood from 40 years ago that I’ve never thought of before, the utter and sheer terror I feel, I am convinced I am broken.
Please any advise what I can do to self-help, I am in such need of help and this is the only way I can seek it at this time.
Chris – Thank you so much for your reply, I cannot explain how much that means at this time, I actually purchased the audiobook today and am working my way through, definitely a great option when the focus is difficult. I do agree what I feel is derealisation and gosh it’s so terrifyingly awful, this evening I forced myself to go to dinner with family and I spent the whole evening feeling like I’m not actually there. I have no idea what I said if anything or much of the drive home. As I have ‘never’ felt this deeply low previously it is a complete fear I have. As I said I have tried reading the book but now I’ve moved onto the audio and I am finding so many things that resonate with me.
I know its early days for me with Pauls advice but I just don’t seem to get it though – I keep re-listening to the acceptance parts but still don’t fully understand how I should embrace it, an example of which is today I felt a sudden whoosh of anxiety creepy over my body – a feeling I know well so instead of my usual ‘oh no, not again’ feeling I told myself ‘ok your anxious, accept its part of you, carry on as normal, your body needs to feel it at this time’. But I didn’t feel better, calmer, I just felt I was talking to nothing. I have most certainly peaked in a heightened state of anxiety for 8 days and I am so so exhausted. I am desperate to sleep but so afraid of the head jolts Im having and the slightest noise sounds like a cannon to my ears and wakes me abruptly.
Anyway, any more advice is warmly received in what I can only describe as the scariest and most isolating time in my life.
Straight away Debbie when you say this
“an example of which is today I felt a sudden whoosh of anxiety creepy over my body – a feeling I know well so instead of my usual ‘oh no, not again’ feeling I told myself ‘ok your anxious, accept its part of you, carry on as normal, your body needs to feel it at this time’. But I didn’t feel better, calmer, I just felt I was talking to nothing”
You are not suppose to feel better, that is the whole point. You are using the state of allowing(my words) as a technique to feel better, that is not what it is about at all. When I finally allowed myself to feel the way I did, then I had to go out and feel awful, detached and not with it with anxiety coursing through me. There is no escape through some saying or technique, this is not what it is about and looks like your mistake.
You can come here and list all your symptoms and to me that is a sign of you not allowing, it says to me you are constantly fighting, monitoring, trying to find a way out, constantly overthinking, struggling. This is what causes you to feel the way you do, it is not the way out. The way out is a long road, there is no instant fix, no way of suddenly feeling better, You have yet to grasp what allowing really is, it is not about finding a way to feel good, it is allowing yourself to feel at your worst. It is the allowing that finally kick starts the healing process as it stops you doing everyhting I mention above that is keeping you in the cycle.
You really ned to see this, once you do, it is not the end of your suffering but it is the start of your healing. So many people say ‘Well how can I accept feeling this way?’ when it is the struggle with it that is making them feel far worse and keeping them in the cycle of suffering. There is no way out of this without feeling uncomfortable, it is seeing this that is key, constantly looking for reassurance says that the person has yet to surrender, as you no longer need to look for reasurance, you just fall right into how you feel, as awful and as painful as it can be. When you do, you may feel a sense of peace, even in a storm as you have finnally stopped addingmore suffering by constantly struggling with your suffering.
Trying to get out of it how you are is like going for a run to heal a broken leg and wondering why you feel more pain. The answer to heal would be to accept the pain and do nothing, it is the same thing.
Paul
Thanks, Paul – I will read and re-read your words over and over and hope that I can, in time, fully absorb your advice, in addition to the audiobook.
Must be tough watching people like me not get it….. particularly as from what I have read and re-read on your site there is true and beautiful peace to be had in time.
Truth is, I’m almost certain no one gets it straight away. Even Paul himself admitted some of his own mistakes at the beginning.
There is literally no doing involved at all. The knowledge you gain on knowing why you feel the way you do is the part that stops the overthinking when a sudden influx of anxiety comes along. You will still feel terrible but you won’t be wondering “why’s this happening, I must make it stop”. You don’t need to stop anything. Instead you will think “I feel horrendous today, but screw it, on we go”.
Good luck Deborah. You are not alone.
As Chris said, Debbie, it took me a while to see this for myself. I exhausted everyone avenue. I could list 101 things I did to try and feel better and all I did was get myself stuck further, I stopped living because all my life was based around getting rid of how I felt. I lost connection with my surroundings because I was so internal, constantly stuck in my head looking for solutions. I was so mentally exhausted through constantly overthinking that sleep had no effect on me, I just felt constantly tired. Eventually, something inside me gave up, some small voice inside said ‘There is nothing you can do about this Paul’ I then said ‘What if I no longer try and feel any different than I do, what will happen then?’
This understanding then grew stronger in me, I realised I had been doing this to myself, realised why I was stuck in a loop of suffering and why things were generally getting worse and not better. This was not the end of my suffering, I had a lot of healing to do and stayed feeling pretty crap for a while but it was the end of me recreating my suffering and so that healing process could begin.
This is what you need to see, the point you need to come to, not look for someone or some new technique to feel better, otherwise, you are again not allowing, you are back suppressing, struggling, fighting and so nothing changes. The anxiety is recreated because people worry about how they are feeling, worry how it is affecting their life, worry they will never get better, spend all day overthinking, is it any wonder the anxiety continues, it is a shift in attitude that stops this too.
If you heal a broken leg, it is not complicated, there is nothing you need to do, anything you try to do will just halt the healing process. This is true with anything, your body knows exactly what to do to heal you. Imagine someone coming on here complaining their broken leg hurts and constantly obsessing about it, trying to stop the pain, coming on here asking for advice on how to stop it. Do you not think they would add a huge layer of suffering on top? Do you not think the answer on here would be the same, in ‘There is nothing to do, just leave it’.
It is so simple that people miss it, they really think there is something they need to do, when it is the doing that is causing them to feel how they do and gets in the way of healing, stop trying to heal yourself, pass that over to the best healing system in the world, all you need to do is step out of your own way.
Thank you. I truly hope I can.
My life as far back as I can remember has always been searching for a solution, spending my whole life running from my past, myself, the fear of what I may actually feel if I gave myself time to think or to feel it. It feels so true to me that my mind has said ‘Enough ! – Im not running anymore’ and so here I am face to face with my worst fear, my inner self. I am totally and utterly exhausted from the running and hiding and small pointless avoidance things I implement to hide and avoid my anxiety.
I literally have nothing left in my armoury, I’m running on empty and the white flag is all I have left.
@Paul (or anyone really):
Curious as to how the need for reassurance and comfort basically “stops” recovery…
I know that true allowing means you don’t need someone to tell you that you will feel better again…
I find myself still stuck in this behavior.
Did anyone notice that not reading up about the subject, not talking to people about how you re feeling and asking for reassurance every day breaks this loop a little bit?
I feel like this can turn into a bit of a compulsion and surely the mind can also reverse this again as well?
I know Stephanie above said “on or off tte blog..doesnt matter” but in order to move away from this subject of getting better, mental states etc..a break could help?
Are we otherwise constantly feeding the subject of “me and my feelings” into our minds?
Hi Maddy
Great question as I have asked myself similar, I am keen to see responses.
Like many I have read about on here – I became obsessed with knowing details, symptoms, is this normal is that normal, am I normal, what other people felt, I even asked my family trick questions to see if they ever felt certain ways, whilst hiding my internal turmoil. I feel I did this for the reassurance and the hope of a light at the end of the dark tunnel I was in. When I read about recovery of others I told myself, they’re the lucky ones, they don’t have what you have, your way to deep for recovery. I liked to think I am fairly rational but now I even doubt that as I have recently been telling myself that I may have a brain injury and that’s why I feel all this chaos and confusion. And then the thought of me coming up with that idea also freaked me out!
I cannot begin to explain my relief though when someone answered my question on here. But I also worry maybe this will become a habit on which I will rely and not myself. Reassurance is good but I also find it an easy option for asking myself the same questions.
There is a fine balance between gaining the knowledge to let go and then constantly reading up on the subject, the reason you keep obsessing about it, is a lot to do with constantly reading up on it. It is just like the person who can’t stop thinking about their partner because they keep going over old letters, thinking obsessively about the time they spent together, stalking them on social media. They can’t stop thinking about them because it is all they fed into their brain.
The person who moves on much quicker is the one who throws all trace away and gets on with their life. They will still think about them now and again through habit, but they won’t actively do so and so the habit dies away on their own and then they find they hardly think about them at all. It is the same thing, you need to read up at first to educate yourself, but there comes a time when you just have to let the subject go and live your life.
It is the only way to break out of the cycle, the only reason you think you need to talk about it constantly, is because
A. You have not accepted at all and so what something to make it go away, so you obsessively look for solutions.
B. The subject comes up constantly due to you obsessively thinking about it and so you think it is important to keep solving it, well if I keep thinking about it, then it needs a solution, not realising you are creating this constant loop.
Many on here who found the answer, if not all, eventually just gave up this blog and lived their life, that is the point everyone should get to. I just threw all my books away, stop researching it, stopped seeing anyone and just moved on with my life and in time my attention came off me and the subject and new things entered my day.
So many people think if they just find the answer to this question, then they will be fine, only for another to replace it, it is a never-ending game of whack a mole and the game only stops when you stop playing it.
The answer is very simple but way over complicated, as the mind always wants a solution, it always wants a technique to play with, an A to B instruction to execute. People can point you to this truth all day, I can post the same thing over and over in different ways but you have to see why this is how recovery works, it can’t come from any technique.
I will never point you to some technique, what I am pointing you to is to see something for yourself. This is not about giving you any instruction, hence why you never find the answer you are looking for, the one that says ‘How can I stop feeling like this?’ the answer is when you no longer try to feel any different, when you realise there is nothing you can do, when you finally wave that white flag. When you no longer need any answers, constantly asking questions says you still have to see the truth behind this, the science behind it.
Don’t read a post from me and anyone else and just dismiss it and go back to your default setting of searching, suppressing, questioning, obsessing. Look at the truth in that post, really try to understand it, ask your own questions, stop looking for someone else to herd you around. Look deep inside and try and find the true source of your suffering. Debbi, you have been here a long time and yet you have just admitted you do everything but what has been advised here, how can that ever work? If this is the case, then there is no point asking anything, it shows you are still looking for that instant solution. Ask and then really soak up that answer, this is coming from people who have been through it and come out the other side.
Nolan who posts here was the same as you when he first came here, constantly looking for reassurance or that silver bullet and nothing changed.
He then decided to try and grasp the message. What people were saying started to hit home and he began to not only trust but also implement the advice. As he improved, he then began to see the whole truth and science behind it all and went on to fully recover.
I don’t think anyone on here gives better advice, you can see clearly he got the message very deeply and he did that by having the courage to fall right into his suffering, to no longer spend all day trying to get out of it, no longer trying to solve it, no longer asking for reassurance, if he had he would still be where he was today. This is why you eventually have to take responsivity for yourself and stop looking at others to fix you; people can point you to this, only you can do it.
You have to realise you are doing this to yourself, even if that comes down to believing an intrusive thought, is it the intrusive thought that created the suffering, all the worry and obsessing or is it your belief in it that did? These are the things you need to look into for yourself. Constantly telling people you have believed another thought and how it has caused you so much turmoil is never going to solve it, only when you see it for what it is and pull your identification from it will (there is a whole page on my site on this). As I keep telling people we create our own suffering and so we have to take responsibility for it as we are the only ones who can stop creating it.
Hi Maddy,
I made that comment about the blog because people who are caught in the anxiety loop want a list of do’s and don’ts to “fix” how they feel. So something like, “You can only recover if you stay off the blog completely”; or, conversely, “If you’re constantly coming on the blog you’ll derail your progress.” But that’s not what allowing is about. I think you’ll find as you practice allowing you’ll naturally visit the blog less (or talk less about anxiety, read about anxiety less, etc.) because you’ll no longer have a desire to question, seek reassurance, or fix how you’re feeling.
But if you find yourself thinking, “Maybe I’m still struggling because I’m coming on the blog” then I think your focus is in the wrong place. Even if you forced yourself to stay off the blog, but still spent all your time mentally questioning, obsessing, looking for an exit or solution, what’s the point? A break from the blog isn’t going to fix you. You don’t need to do anything to fix yourself! Give up the fight. Stop the search. Just be. Feel how you feel. Allow it all. That’s it. It really is that simple.
Hi Paul,
You said I have been here a long time? Are you confusing me with another Debbie?
Can’t agree more with what Stephanie said, perfectly put.
Sorry Deborah, yes, your name is very similar to a regular poster and I got you mixed up, apologies
Phew… no problem!.. as that would have caused me a whole new concern, if i’d been posting and not realised !🤨
Dear Paul
As you know I’m fairly new on here but I am in very disturbing state. I have read your book but realised I was not able to focus so brought the audiobook which I found much easier than reading, As I mentioned previously I have been struggling for a few years in a busy job which is stressful, I also work alongside very stressful and vocal colleagues, I never searched for a solution till recently, the only reason I searched was one day after almost a whole day of constant crying I had this huge outburst of anxiety and I utterly panicked and as I was alone I literally ran to my laptop and started searching. the point was I didnt even know what to look for which seems bizarre so frantically typed in the word Help. I am re-listening to the audiobook and I am beginning to understand the advice but I have to honest and say it’s difficult, as I feel my head is too full to take in anything else. wanted to ask a question, although I thought my anxiety was brought on by an ongoing stressful job I have begun to think and remember parts of my past, neglect, unhappiness and such like. When I begin the thinking I literally feel that I am being sucked into some dark hole where every bad memory is waiting, I am 50 years old but it is absolutely terrifying. all the keywords that someone may use to describe being in such a heightened state are relevant to me. I don’t know how to stop this remembering, thinking, it serves no purpose but to remind how awful those times were and brings on immense deep sadness, this leads to my thinking this isn’t anxiety this is something deeper because of how deeply my thinking and remembering go and how its can last for hours and hours all on one subject. I have no idea why all these boxes have opened or how to close them. I don’t want to remember the past I want to live in the here and now so why has this happened.
I guess you must feel like banging your head against a wall listening to people such as me, but I am absolutely alone and need some guidance,
Hi
Can anyone advise me please
Hi Deborah,
What you’re experiencing is no different than what the rest of us have experienced. You’re in a high anxiety state and are desperately searching for a way out. But it’s this very search that is fueling your anxiety and keeping you anxious and on alert. Personally I don’t think it matters what particular circumstances or events led to this moment, or what particular symptoms you’re experiencing. Why? because the end result is the same: You don’t like how you feel, you’re full of fear, and you want it to stop. But it will never stop as long as you’re trying to make it stop. That’s the crux of acceptance. There’s no other special advice or guidance needed.
@Stephanie:
Thanks for explaining. I totally understand what you mean.. I always do but find it so hard to implement.
Why is allowing so difficult for some of us?
I really feel like a failure because I can’t seem to let go. I notice myself struggling.
I know feeling like a failure and beating myself down for “not doing it right” is not helpful at all.
I am just scared because I can’t feel any optimism about how I will be ok again.
And shouldn’t I feel like ‘yes I am on the right track. I will get better”.
Maddy just hearing you say ‘I am not doing it right’ is telling me you are trying to execute something, you are trying to use allowing as a saying/technqiue to feel better. If there is nothing to do, how can you be doing anything wrong? Only if you are trying to do something are you on the wrong track.
Allowing is not always easy to grasp as firstly it is your instinct to fight and secondly there is still part of you that believes you can find a way out through some mind trick or technique. Trust me if this was the way out then someone would be along and tell you do ‘Do this Maddy, that works and then you will be fine’, the reason no one does is because recovery will never come through any technique, through some sort of suppression. This is not about GETTING rid of anything; this is where so many go wrong.
How would you get a bowl of water to stop sloshing? What technique would you use? None, you would just put it down and it would come to rest all by itself. You understand that and so it would make no sense to slosh it around, it is the same when you truly understand the message conveyed here.
Allowing happens when something clicks inside of you. When you understand the science behind it and realise you have been creating your own loop of suffering. Then allowing just happens naturally and you just fall into it. Don’t for one minute think when you do, that is the end of your suffering; you will have to go through an uncomfortable and at times painful recovery process, there is no short cut to this, if there was then trust me I would tell you.
I will do my next blog post up on surrender to try and help in sink in
Thank you Paul!
It must be so frustrating to have to repeat the same thing over and over to people like me – all the more thanks for being SO patient!
I do understand the science behind it and I can notice how me constantly thinking about my state, about when it will be better, about what could help (other than “allowing”) makes me worse and how my mind is totally unsettled and negative.
On the other hand, I have already often put it “into practice”, to let myself feel anxious and sad and still just keep going…
But how can I even tell if this is “recovery” including feeling awful, dealing with all these symptoms and fears I have had over years (and often surpressed…) or not?
I have also tapered down down my SSRI – which I have been on for years so this is most likely an extra challenge. but I am commited to make it this time and learn to deal with my negative feelings.
My big fear ever since my first episode of anxiety/feeling low is that one day, my mental health will be so bad that nothing will be ok anymore
The fear of losing control etc is behind this, of losing my personality (that usually is active and fun loving )
And I would love to “desentisize” myself to this fear, but it is still there…
I hope even my brain can also recover and settle, even though it has been on ssris for long.
I just have this feeling with me that something might happen with me, some weird apprehension, some constant dread…
and that I have been feeling this for too long so that it is “stuck” in my brain.
And to allow this, along with the loss of appetite, nausea and sadness…is so hard.
Looking forward to your blog post!
Maddy you don’t understand the science behind, you may have a conceptual understanding, but that is not enough. If you truly understood then you would allow all these worries to arise without getting involved with them, the worries (which are just thoughts) are not the problem, your identification and involvement are, this is what is causing all the suffering. You still think something outside of you is doing this to you and so keep searching for something on the outside of you to get rid of it, but it is your lack of understanding of what causes suffering that is. Do you really think I did not have all the same fears and worries? Do you think I obsessed them all away? Had numerous discussions with them all and eventually, these fears just left or that I worried myself better? Or do you think I just saw through them all and so stopped getting involved with them?
If you truly understood allowing then you would allow your mind’s fears, you would allow yourself to lose control, allow something to happen to you etc, this is what allowing is, to abandon yourself to your emotions, thoughts and minds fears. If you were allowing, you would not be monitoring how you felt, not wishing it all away…..By reading your words, it is clear you have not reached the place you need to reach with this yet. That does not mean it is wrong; it just needs more time for the message to sink home with you.
You are free to leave this blog and find another way and when you have exhausted every avenue, when you have tried everything and nothing has worked, when you have been left utterly defeated and when you can fight no longer, then maybe that surrender you need will come.
Just read your message back and see how many worries there are, all the attempts at fixing and you will begin to see how much suffering you are causing yourself. This is why no one can give you a solution or technique to get rid of anything, how can they when you are creating so much of your own suffering? The message is to see this and then stop doing so; this is why the message on here never changes.
It is no coincidence that the same message comes from all those people on here who have recovered. There is nothing I can add that is not on my site, here or in both books.
This blog is all about truth, not some feel-good quick fix. I have no problem if anyone wants to go away and try all these ‘Be anxiety-free in a week’ programs or wants to search for that someone or something that can get rid of it instantly. Sometimes that is the only way that people can finally end that search and find out the truth for themselves.
Hi Paul,
thanks, you’re right, obviously.
I obviously know also that me getting involved with my thoughts is the issue and the fact that I am doing this to myself and haven’t been able to stop it, is almost worse as if it was an “it” or an illness etc.because I am responsible for it because of the way I am and can’t stop it.
Which is a helpless feeling.
But yes, you’re right – letting go of control. Big one for me.
I don’t want to find another way, as I know this is the way I need to go (and I never believed all these quick-fix programs etc)
It is just frustrating that I have basically “tried” to implement advice on here for three months and have confirmed now that I am not on the right path just yet..I hope these last three months have still paved the way for a deeper understanding though…thinking I am back to square 1 or even further is a bit defeating – then again, it is just a thought, right?
Again, many thanks for your words.
Maddy it is about realisng that you can’t do anythig to feel better and falling right into where you are, as ugly and tough as that is in that moment.
You may not be able to do anything about your current expereince but you can certainly make yourself feel worse by doing what you are currently doing, this is the whole point. When anyone says they are feeling better it is because they have stopped doing what was causing the majority of their suffering, not that they did anything to get rid of it, they just stopped creating more of it. This is why if you keep trying to find something to feel better, keep trying to get rid if something, then you will always fail. All this does is create more of it, the answer never comes through trying to get rid of anything, it just keeps you in a loop and makes you feel worse, as you have found out to your cost.
Yes.It sounds so simple but for some (e.g. me!) it seems to be a long process of really implementing it.
Falling right into all these feelings probably scares me because I feel a dark whole will swallow me up – again, a typical fear you also had, I am sure.
I find it so hard on days like this – where I have been on here for way too long, thinking about me and my feelings way too much – to get out of my head at all.
I can literally feel how my mind gets more and more worked up and cluttered. When I write or read on here, I feel focused, but as soon as I am back to myself, my mind is noisy and confused.
I want to do something else then, some normality, but find it really difficult to read or watch a movie (which I know is typical and to be expected).let alone I am not interested in a lot in that state.
I can so see what you mean when you keep saying the mind needs a break…
I hope it gets at least a little break when I am sleeping…
I apologise in advance for continuing to come on here. I feel I have nowhere to turn.
I feel I have been making huge progress with my anxiety, my symptoms lessened and made life so much easier, it hasn’t gone and I’m not expecting it to disappear just like that but progress is something I have noticed. The main thing I struggle with is thoughts and my initial reaction to one thought specifically, it is a thought I don’t need to really get into but it is one of guilt and shame. When this thought comes in, my automatic response is a flood of anxious energy regardless of how I feel about it. Some days I don’t react to it and I can immediately dismiss it as just a thought but some days it is charged with anxious energy. I know in my head this thought is ridiculous, I know it but my reaction to it is still the same.
Like I said on a good day it’s easy to let the thought go and be on with my day without any reaction at all.
After several days of doing and feeling ok I hit a bump in the road and I, unfortunately, gave the thought too much attention which triggered a setback and on came the flood of symptoms.
This is really affecting me and my wife. I know she is struggling to see me sometimes out of it and zombie-like and it really got to her today. She got really upset and it caused a bit of an argument. To cut the story short I am currently at my mum’s house away from her and our two children. It’s absolutely heartbreaking feeling I am such a burden to everyone. I feel I’m going to fall right back into this whole because of all that has happened. I feel like I am going to start all over again and be right back where I started. I do not want to lose my wife but I feel that’s starting to happen.
I feel I have no one right now, so I’ve come here because I literally have no one else to turn to.