Category Archives for "Anxiety"

Learning to better handle anxiety is very importan to your menatl and physical health.

How To Reduce Anxiety With More Economic Problems

With what is going on right now with the financial industry, housing, the stock market and the economy anxiety levels are running high. The more things appear uncertain, the more we can imagine ways they can be even worse, humans are creative creatures. And it seems we can imagine the negative quite easily. As we create more undesirable possibilities I our mind we have more to be fearful about.

This can snowball out of control when we collect our worries from several different areas at once, it can be overwhelming. We can feel totally out of control, which can bring on more anxiety by itself, bringing about emotional overload. When this happens we can cease to function in our normal way, giving the vast majority of our attention to all the worries and fears. Your behavior will change, to be more in following your thoughts and feelings. You will find yourself complaining a lot and not able to focus on accomplishing tasks which will increase your anxiety too.

We become consumed with it. As our thoughts are more focused on these fears, then on the anxiety itself, then on worry about being fearful and anxious it becomes a spiral you can’t overpower. You can feel like a beach ball caught in a hurricane being whirled around with no control. When you actually feel you have little to no control apathy can set in, which also will increase the anxiety.

So, you can see, this worry thing can become all encompassing if you allow it. And this is the key, if you allow it? Here’s the thing, any of the situations that you point to as the basis of your fears do not come with these feelings. In fact they come with no feelings at all, that is your doing. This is hard for many to accept but it’s true. Even when someone treats you badly, how you feel about it is all of your doing.

Yes, there are some very common reactions and feelings that you can have, but ultimately you have command over these. They are brought up from your unconscious programming automatically on cue, with out your conscious permission. Much of the reason you have these common reactions is that you tend to easily buy onto concepts and how to feel about when you see this exhibited by many others. You don’t realize how much of your inner programming was developed through modeling others. These common reactions and feelings are passed on by the masses without knowledge. 

However, you don’t need to keep them in place. You can choose to have any reaction you want to something. So, back to your reactions to the fear, worry over the state of things in the economy, you don’t need to continue with them as you have. You can reduce or even eliminate them, thus the anxiety level drops as well. 

The tough part is that right now it is much easier to fall prey to the negative news and your existing reactions than it is to take command of your thought and consciously consider other ways look at the situation and new interpretations that don’t include so much fear. 

I would suggest not listening and reading current news as much as possible, stop allowing yourself to be continuously ‘prodded with a hot poker’ antagonizing your fears. The more news you get, the more this is reinforced. If you are directly involved in one of the problem areas, be concerned based on facts and look at what you can actually do about it, then take action. But just to worry is self destructive because it is based on fiction, choose not to get wrapped up in. And choose to not let yourself worry about anything you can’t do anything about.

Many try to find ways to eliminate anxiety without much success because you must actually look to changing what the anxiety builds on, in this case self chosen fears and related thoughts and feelings. All of these things going on, that you can’t personally do anything about, will evolve as they will with or without your feelings about them. Well, if anything, you will be mentally supporting them with your fear thoughts and even physically supporting them if your behavior follows suit. For example, if you get so fearful that you stop spending money as you normally do when there is no actual reason preventing it, you will be contributing to the economic slowdown. You surely don’t want to do that if you can help it.

Take mental and physical action:

  • Choose to take command of your thinking and analyze the situation.

  • Is your involvement in the situation causing your thoughts and feelings about it, or is it your fears about what could happen?

  • What are your perceptions of the situations, and how can they be changed to bring about different reactions?

  • What are your reactions, and must they be this way? How else can you react that would allow you to feel better?

  • Is there an actual personal involvement that you should be dealing with rationally, or are your actions being motivated by fear?

  • Choose to stay away from the constant bombardment of the news which just highlights the negative.

  • What can you do purposefully to keep yourself positive, upbeat and productive? Look for the good and create it.

 The more you seek out why you think and feel as you do, the more you will understand, the more you can do something about it. When you change the way you look at these things, the way you see them will change, the way you react will change, the way you feel will change, the way you act will change and it’s all based on choice.

Make the choice to take command of your thinking, change it and the anxiety will dissipate.

 

Don’t Let Fear Drag You In, Save The Economy

The economy stinks. What will go sour next? I wonder what will happen? How can it get worse? What if it does get worse?

 Are you anxious, uncertain and fearful? Most are. When major things happen we tend to get drug into them usually more than necessary. Now, if you have lost your job, your income has dropped because of the financial markets or the work you do has slowed, I understand that you have less available cash to spend. And I am sorry about your situation and wish to see you get back to normal for you soon.

 What I want to address here is the fear and near panic millions are getting sucked into because of what is going on with the different financial problems. What is happening is that as millions of people buy into the mass fear and drastically change their normal spending habits. Based on their anxiety and fear of the unknown they want to hang on to as much money as possible.

 So, then what happens? The flow of cash out in society slows way down even more. And guess what, more people will loose their jobs. Think about this, most of us work in businesses that sell things or services. So what happens when lots of people stop buying? Do you think everyone can keep their jobs when nothing is sold? No.

 When lots of people stop going out to eat, what happens to the restaurant business? Have you ever thought about how many jobs your normal spending activity supports? I don’t know for sure but consider this. If a waiter/waitress handles about 6 to 10 tables in a restaurant, how many people have to stop going to eat there until the server looses their job. And when they loose their job, there is one more person who actually does not have the same spending power. And this job loss scenario is multiplied millions of times over very quickly.

 The point is this. For those who are employed and are receiving regular paychecks I suggest that you keep your spending habits as much as normal as possible in order to prevent a further downturn in our economy. And this is really most people. Think about it, unemployment has risen to about 6 to 7 percent which means that over 95 percent of the population is still working. Now unemployment in the US generally runs about 4 to 5 percent when things appear to be running fairly smoothly. So right now, an additional 2 percent of the population is out of work. Sure a lot of people and I wish it wasn’t so, but should a 2 percent change in employment drive our economy?

 Yes, I know there is a large group of people who rely on the investment world for their incomes and this is down, but still not the majority. And I am aware that the problems with housing and finance appear daunting, but are we allowing the tail to wag the dog? Our economy is based on cash flow. And cash flow is people spending to buy, not holding to worry. Your personal association with money for the most part is one of flow. It comes in to your possession as you earn and then goes out as you spend.

 It’s the same with a business – in flow and outflow. And like anything that flows, it can be stopped at either end. A water hose can be shut off at the beginning or blocked at the outflow end. So it goes with cash flowing through you. So for the vast majority cash is flowing in just fine, but not flowing out. The result is, someone somewhere is not able to receive their in-flow because you have stopped it at your end.

 The real power we have as humans is with our thought. We have the ability to take command of our thoughts and decide what they will predominately be. We don’t need to just follow all the bad news and react with fear. Just because it is the easiest way does not mean it is the best. Fear is made up in our mind, it is the great what if? – based on the worst. There is a law of the universe that states, ‘what you think about expands.’ So what are you allowing to expand?

 This ‘crisis’ we are in right now is a perfect example of something expanding due to how much it is thought about. Look around, millions are holding on to their cash not because they have to but because their obsessive fear thinking has driven the motivation. And thus even more people are loosing their jobs making the real problem bigger. Then there really are more and more people with reduced spending ability, but not because of the original problems. And this just keeps cycling faster as the fear grows because more are loosing jobs, then fewer spend, more job loss, and so on.

 This is happening right now! Those that are stopping the flow of cash throughout society are making things worse. Now it is in our hands. Real estate and the financial system has taken their hits and will gradually recover. And there is plenty of blame to throw out but that is not the point. How far we allow this to go down and how fast it comes back to normal is in our hands now. It’s in the hand of the people who really drive this economy, the spenders – all of us.

 I challenge you to really consider your situation and decide if you truly need to reduce your spending, at least by the amount you have. Going back to your normal spending habits with be the ultimate service to the economy, which does help you personally. You have the ability to take command of your thinking and override the automatic fear thinking that creeps in so easily. This is because of past programming that you react as you do, but it does not mean that it is the only way or the best way. You can analyze your thoughts right now and choose to hold better more supportive thoughts.

 If each do our part by continuing our normal spending habits as much as possible we can support a quick economic recovery without more backsliding. Like anything it’s a choice, your choice. I’m just clarifying it for you to help you make it. Choose to have your reason affect your thinking more than your anxiety.