We are dealing with 2 pandemics.
A health and mental health crisis.
Thereâs no doubt everyone has felt some anxiety, stress, lack of clarity and pressure regardless who or where you are.
Even the top 1% are dealing with the mental health strain in their cabins to resorts as they arenât out and about on their usual excursions and feeling the pressure of not knowing what to worry about!
But even during pre-pandemic times, we still had anxiety and it is normal to feel this way.
Having anxiety is the way our bodies respond to stress, reactions, upcoming events or nervousness. If we werenât nervous or looking forward to something, we wouldnât be excited.
Itâs just the way we handle it that counts.
Unfortunately like many subjects that arenât taught or addressed in school including financial literacy, networking, handling emotions, mental health is also on that list and it matters more than ever to take control of it these days.
Without your health you have nothing. Seriously, if youâre obsessed with the 80 hr work week for that dough hold your horses. After a few years I almost guaranteed you you will have to deal with hair loss, depression, addiction and suicide from it. Thereâs no turning back. Your health isnât a light switch. Diet and exercise are even easier to change than your mindset.
Weâve never been taught how to control the most dangerous part of our bodies, the mind.
Our brain dictates our every move and the words that come out of our mouth so how do we expect to know what to do with it?
Weâre putting too much pressure on ourselves. The more time we spend at home, the more we feel we have to get more done even though we are getting less done in more time.
So how can you realistically get more done in less time?
-Understand your flow and energy peak states-when do you work best?
-Try working harder physically and mentally-see what that produces if anything
-Limit distractions and resources
-Perfection doesnât exist-practice doesnât make perfect, perfect practice makes perfect defined by you
-Focus on quality > quantity
-Stop staring at the clock or timing results
Old Stressful Advice
The reason you feel anxious can be triggered from a variety of places that you didnât even know existed.
Little triggers turn into big moments that are usually exaggerated and hard to avoid.
This old advice doesnât help anyone and Iâm tired of hearing it:
-Loosen up and take a chill pill
-Take a walk
-Eat something sweet
-Take a nap
-Cry it out
-Live in the moment
And the worst one: stop worrying
Sorry but simpler doesnât always mean better. We must dig into the cues of why we are anxious and more often than not they happen because we are unaware how we are dealing with our emotions.
5 Unexpected Causes of Anxiety
Whether you have a big test tomorrow or donât know how to impress your date tonight, we all have reasons to fret and subconsciously have millions of thoughts going through our mind a day that we have a hard time controlling all which inevitably just spiral into something crazy.
The problem is we have never been taught how to control our emotions.
We believe talking to ourself is dumb, strange and only little kids do it with their stuffed animals to enhance and grow their communication skills but the truth is, adults need more help than kids.
No wonder kids never seem to have as many mental health struggles, breakdowns, depression as adults!
They have less thoughts and are more carefree.
But in this digital age with responsibilities, families, expectations, distractions, soccer practice, ACT prep, pressures to succeed, yada yada, it is scary and thereâs always something on our mind affecting our hormones, sleep schedule and lifestyle.
From laundry to the dishes, even though these shouldnât worry us they do because they need to get done and we donât want to do them.
Most people assume anxiety is from the big moments like public speaking or going on a first date.
It usually isnât.
Itâs from the least unexpected small moments that trouble us daily and make us annoyed.
Trying Too Hard
When I signed up for the most popular college class: Science of Happiness at NYU last semester, to be honest, I wasnât surprised I wouldnât learn much.
I didnât necessarily learn how to become happier.
Iâm the unhappiest Iâve ever been during this pandemic and even prior to enrolling in the class, the happiness class made me feel that I needed to be constantly happy which is simply unrealistic.
After completing it now I have the tools that Iâve seemingly already forgotten, except for the CBT thinking and mediation method that really doesnât help much either.
Anyway, one thing that I did learn that was briefly touched in the course for about 2 minutes was to think about thinking.
We are riding through life not living it.
We forget how we treat ourselves because we are usually our worst critics more than our loudest cheerleaders.
Thinking about thinking is powerful.
Stop and pause for second.
What are you telling yourself right now when you are reading this?
Are you proud of yourself, rushing through it or actually internalizing it and being present?
If I asked you to tell me what you just read, could you remember?
Donât worry, youâre not alone.
Half of the things I read I donât remember not because I have a bad memory or Dementia rather because we are thinking and distracted by other unimportant things in our life clogging our minds.
Being present doesnât mean spending an hour within your thoughts pretending you are on a beach while actually stuck in a dark cold classroom in a mediation class.
It means really digesting where your thoughts are coming from and how to avoid them.
Let them pass.
You are thinking about things right now without realizing and once they become present and you notice them, you will naturally calm down and understand you have control over everything you feel, the happiness you have and what comes out of your mouth.
Our minds are dangerous.
No words can be reversed and they can make or break our reputation, connections, etc.
Listen wisely.
So letâs identify the real causses for your anxiety and how to let them go for good:
#1: You Desperately Need Control
When things are uncertain or you arenât the leader of the group when you want to, you feel pressure to excel and take control.
Donât get me wrong, controlling things is important for your health. Being able to lower your blood pressure by excising regularly and eating well is vital for your health but many things in life arenât in your control.
For example with recruiting, about 60% of the interview you can control.
You can control how you dress, look, project yourself, lie or tell the truth, whatâs on your resume, your first impression and thatâs it.
Everything else is up to the hiring manager/recruiter to control. Their mood, their background, what they did that day that influenced their judgement, if theyâre tired, if they like the color of your resume, their preferences and worst of all, who you are interviewing against.
I once found out I was interviewing against the hiring managerâs son for a top prized internship I wanted. No wonder I didnât get it even after a stellar conversation.
If you want to lower your anxiety for good, stop living in denial about your ability to control things you canât.
You can only control how you react to things, what you feed yourself and your day to day activities.
Everything else leave behind.
#2: Youâre a People-Pleaser
Since I enrolled in Pre-K, I always craved friendships but it didnât start bothering me and turning into an obsession until middle school when I wanted attention. This lead me to do things I wasnât comfortable with and make people like me in order to stay in their group and be tagged in that photo.
Fast forward to today. Iâm no longer on social media, have 2â4 close friends that are 10+ years older than me and could care less about what people think. Yes, it is vital to put on a good first impression before an interview, but outside of work and family, what you wear and what you do to feel yourself shouldnât affect anyone.
You cannot go into debt to buy luxury goods just to impress others. That is the worst financial mistake you can make yet majority of low income Americans do it to impress people they donât know with money they donât have.
At the end of the day, when you go into debt or find yourself deep into depression, those people who you tried to impress wonât be there for you.
Quality > Quantity and you do you.
#3: You Donât Know What You Want
We chase things what others have because they enjoy it without realizing what we need.
Living the frugal minimalist stealth wealth lifestyle was one of the greatest changes in my life to feel grateful and appreciative of what I already have.
Junk wonât make you happier. It stems from the inside not from others.
#4: You Cannot Deal with Uncertainty
Similarly to the first point, thereâs only so much you can control outside of your emotions and yourself. You shouldnât be someone to rely on for everything and you cannot do what you donât know. Donât try to fake it till you make it because itâs not worth it.
#5: You Face Dramatic Highs and Lows
During this time, mental breakdowns are more common. With stimulation from the fake news media to fake lives on social media, we are constantly on our screens and this inhibits us from projecting emotions so we hide them until we pop.
Ride the waves and understand no day is perfect. How you control your emotions is the best way to control life. Donât overanalyze or rationalize. Spend 5 minutes being elated or sad and move on with your life because it always moves on itâs just up to you to do so as well.
The quality of your mind is the quality of your life.
Step into what you know and what you have in order to escape your toxic mind.