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Talking of anxious thoughts, has anything ever scared the living daylights out of you? Have you ever felt jitters or a bad shock or stress while you witnessed an unexpected situation. Did your heart miss a beat in the most unusual or negative way ever? Certainly, once in an entire lifetime it would have.
Having said, all of us be it any age group go through this phase of feeling anxious. It is always easy to tell someone who is anxious that he/she should get rid of anxious thoughts or try and stop those anxious thoughts. In-person if you had to experience the same, do you think you would be able to snap out from those anxious thoughts? Think about this.
One cannot come to a definite conclusion about what level of anxiety or fear a person is going through. We can perhaps relate to the fear but understanding and feeling what happens in the background with a person who is a victim of anxious thoughts is beyond one’s control.
In this article let’s get enlightened about the details of anxious thoughts and how can we help each other cope up and get over the jitters and anxious thoughts.
What Are Anxious Thoughts And What Causes Them?
Here is a definition for anxiety. According to Mosby’s Dictionary Of Medicine, Nursing, and Health Professions, anxiety is the anticipation of impending danger and dread accompanied by restlessness, tension, rapid heartbeat and rapid breathing that may or may not be associated with a certain event or situation.
In a way, one must feel the emotion of anxiety although not too much because it gives your brain the signal that something is not right and you are preparing yourself for a possible negative situation.
In other words, you are just tuning your mind that there could be something wrong or in another way the person who is looking at you feel anxious can identify something is wrong and can be of help. This is useful in case you see someone have a panic or anxiety attack.
To every reaction, be it positive or negative there must be some factor that triggers the reaction. Isn’t it? What could it be in case of a person experiencing anxious thoughts. Here are some of the causes of anxious thoughts.
Cause No 1 – When Pessimism Sticks To You
One of the major reasons for a person to get anxious thoughts is because he/she has this habit of thinking of a situation negatively. It is normal that all of us cannot be positive at all times. However, in the case of a few people, their mind keeps lingering at wrong thoughts only that triggers this anxiousness in them. It could be fear of being hurt, fear of being judges, fear of losing, fear of something going wrong etc.
Cause No 2 – Impact Of A Bad Experience
It is said that until and unless we do not experience something we will never know what it tastes like. Sometimes a person is naturally not a kind who is anxious but every experience always leaves us with either a good or bad impact. No doubt in the fact that we learn. Having said, it does create one kind of tension in the mind that shows up in many other situations. The experiences need not be the recent ones, it could also be away too much in the past that shows its effects even now.
Cause No 3 – It Is Got To Do With The Genes
We are partially what we inherit and partially what we choose to be. What we choose to be is totally in our control but what we become because of our genes is never in our hand and control. It is quite possible that a person has the habit of feeling anxious often probably because someone in the family was or is like that.
Cause No 4 – Struggling With Personal Traits
Not everyone has the same personality although we are all blessed with the same things. Everyone’s way of approaching and understanding things is a different ball game altogether. Having said, one gets anxious thoughts maybe because they are naturally like that. Usually, it happens to people who have esteem issues, who are soft by nature and cannot handle a harsh treatment from life, the ones who were bullied in the past or the one who feels left out and finds it tough to express pain.
Cause No 5 – Inability To Manage Stress
In some cases, it is not that the person is naturally that way or has inherited those traits from one of the family members but it is because of losing track of keeping their mental balance due to what is currently revolving around their life. How can we say what is going on in someone’s mind? Some people have the stress of their studies or job, some may find it a task to adapt to new changes in life, some people might be struggling with their relationships while for some they might be in shock because of a tragic situation.
Cause No 6 – Real Physical Ailments
Over the time when people develop certain health issues such as diabetes, hypertension, heart diseases or asthma chance are that they become anxious and start feeling that way either because of the disease psychologically affecting them that way or because of the side effects of the medicines.
Cause No 7 – Resorting To Unhealthy Habits
It is common that most of the crowd thinks that by being used to a particular habit they feel relieved and fine. On the contrary, people forget to realize that being used to something to get over-anxious thoughts is giving rise to another problem. Overdoing it either hits on their health or it gets them used to an addiction that is going to just add up to the existing stress
Cause No 8 – When Depression Strikes
When a person is unable to take control of their mental health and they get into depression. They tend to develop anxious thoughts because they lose the capacity to think beyond negativity and even if they think of being positive they are anxious of whether or not being positive would do any good to them or not.
Cause No 9 – Not Open To Breakthrough Fears
Some people have a fixed mindset and no matter how much you help them or how much your take steps to make them get over-anxious thoughts they still do not want to break through it and challenge themselves on no to think negatively. Their fixed and stubborn mindset never gives them a scope to see beyond their anxious thoughts.
Cause No 10 – Broken Expectations
Some people are so afraid of being let down or a rejection that they feel anxious before anything new that they start. They go through this because they have always had high expectations and they have often seen those expectations break. This disappointment indirectly makes a person’s thoughts anxious all the time.
Read: 10 Yoga Poses To Cure Anxiety And Provide Stress Relief
What To Do To Stop Anxious Thoughts? Keep In Mind These 9 Ways!
It is never evident as to when would anyone feel anxious. But if we understand that we are not feeling normal and that fear is taking a toll on our mind and mental health then it is necessary for us to adopt to all those ways that curtail anxious thoughts.
Here are some of the ways to stop anxious thoughts and find a way to show these thoughts the exit board when they make an entry in our mind. It is time to kick the fear by facing it.
It is time to loosen your stomach, stop the tingles, and ask your muscles to relax by following the below mentioned ways to beat every anxious thought.
Take A Deep Breath – It Works!
This might not sound like a plan but it works its magic. Having said, whenever you feel low, afraid or too tensed. The best thing you can do is to just take a moment to breathe in and out in ease. Just Breathe and relax! The world is not going to get upside down, it is just a temporary situation that will soon be resolved, have this in mind and only breathe.
Step Back And Think If It Is Worth Your Peace
If there is something unusual happening, it is okay to feel worried or anxious. When you get anxious thoughts you cannot even stop them right away, but you can allow another thought to come and ask you if it is worth the tension? Because your stress is anyway going to pass by in time. Although it is easy to say it at the moment it is not going to do any good to you if you keep worrying about it so why make it worth worrying for?
Solutions Are Found When You Look For Them
Only if you take a deep breath, stop taking your stress too seriously and intend to help yourself will you find a way out. Whenever anxious thoughts wander in your mind just see if you have ways to solve it or not. If you do not have any way to solve it then just say that to yourself and let it go right away.
If you are fortunate of having ways out then start working on the ways instead of staying stuck worrying about it.
Say suppose you are anxious and not confident about meeting your targets and for a fact you know you won’t be able to complete it. What you can do is either try harder or ask for an extension of the time period to deliver the target that is expected. It is as simple as that. Do not prolong the anxious thought, cut it right there.
Welcome Your Mind With Positive Talks
The main root cause for anxious thoughts to trespass your mind is because your mind is welcoming and encouraging negative thoughts into your head. This is what you have to change, say goodbye to negative thoughts and be kind enough to let all the positive thoughts enter your mind. You have to stop anxious thoughts from coming in before it stops you from feeling peaceful.
You can say some of these things to fizzle down the anxious thoughts that are pumped up in your mind
It is okay to feel anxious and I am capable of getting over it
I need to focus on the solution rather than letting the fear affect me
I have learned my bit of lessons and it is time that I move ahead and see what best to do
Is There A Problem Or Is it Your Fear?
Now if your mind is investing so much energy in feeling anxious you have to really do a check and see if there is a problem tied to it or they are just your subconscious fears?
Whenever you are anxious about something, try and understand how is it going to affect you. To explain this further, say suppose you are anxious because you are afraid of death. Think about it, no one died at this moment that it has to make you anxious and if one of your past experiences related to death is making you anxious then you better let it be and explain to yourself that what you are seeing as a problem in your anxious thought does not exist at the moment. This way you can motivate yourself as well.
Let Go Of Your Thoughts After Observing Them
When you are afraid or stressed about something it is natural to first only let fear take the place. Let your anxious thought be, do not let it go or push it away immediately because you need to let it go only after ensuring that your mind has looked into it and made sure if there is a problem then how to solve it immediately.
To simplify this for instance you are about to give a presentation tomorrow but before going to bed the worry about the presentation is eating you up. Do not immediately say to yourself that I have to let this thought go, do a self-check and observe as to why are you feeling that way? Maybe you need more preparation which is why that is subconsciously bothering you.
By doing this you are making an observation of your anxious thought and ensuring that you are letting go of it only after you have done a proper check and solved it before letting it go.
Remind Yourself Of What Is Now
Most of your fears build up because of your experiences and if that is true then you have to make your mind understand a simple logic that it is no more the same situation because you have evolved from there.
Learn to walk past the bitter experiences and stop your mind from thinking that the same thing would repeat. Just tell your mind that you are living a different moment now and you will do better this time because you are a stronger person now.
Do Not Dodge Your Anxiousness
The biggest reason for our mental disturbances to settle for too long is because we are tuned to let them stay there and we cling on to them. Just leave your anxiousness alone by immediately diverting your focus to something else when you feel anxious. Maybe pursued your hobby or just get yourself busy by getting engaged in doing something else.
Some of the activities that you can get involved with is as follows :
- Get into practicing meditation
- Learn something new
- Polish the skills you are already good at
- Surround yourself with people who always talk positively about life
- Exercising is any day the best healer to all your problems
Take Help When Needed
If your anxious thoughts are creeping into you so much that every possible solution that you are trying on your own is not working out and it is affecting you at the cost of making you feel lifeless then there is no shame in taking help for this state of mind. You can either talk to someone you are close to who can give you their best advise or look for a therapist who can help you heal.
Feeling anxious is a part of the play, but each of us who goes through it or sees someone go through it must always try to remember that it can be dealt with only if sincere efforts are made to change every negative thought into a positive one and bear in mind that the anxious thought would pass by soon. It is all about effort and motivation to kick away all the anxious thoughts.
