Exercises To Calm Your Anxious Thoughts

Here are some simple tips for what to do when you feel your anxiety is escalating.

 1.     Check the facts. When we’re anxious it is generally due to ruminating on “what could or can happen”? Take a minute and ask yourself “What are the facts in this situation”? What feelings am I ruminating on that are not actually facts? The emotions are easy to identify and those are what is feeding the anxiety. Checking the facts helps balance your brain and quiets down your brain’s stress response to anxiety.

 2.     Grab a journal! It can be a fancy one, an old one, or a plain notebook. Anything you can write in. The goal of journaling is writing your thoughts down and getting them released. The reason for journaling is that the emotional area of your brain is going into overdrive, hence the anxiety. When you make yourself write you stimulate the front area of your brain to recall what to write. This will stimulate the front area of your brain (your prefrontal cortex) and this process can quiet down your anxiety. Think of this exercise as balancing the brain to process well with minimal anxiety. Not sure what to write? Write about checking the facts and what feelings you are interpreting as facts at the moment.  

I hope this exercise helps. 

~ Shahna