Speaker 1: Pushkin. Over the past few weeks, we've been exploring how
Speaker 1: to better navigate our negative emotions. So far, we've seen
Speaker 1: that even though it's uncomfortable to sit with our messy feelings,
Speaker 1: committing to getting curious about these sensations and facing them
Speaker 1: head on might be an unexpected key to a happier life.
Speaker 1: In this episode, we're going to tackle a nasty feeling,
Speaker 1: one that I suffer from a lot. Today we're in
Speaker 1: the company of anxiety. Well, I sort of feel like
Speaker 1: I was born bracing for impact. I came out what
Speaker 1: I call a sensitive breed, and many people who struggle
Speaker 1: with anxiety can relate to that. Just always felt more
Speaker 1: fragile than certainly my siblings and most of my friends,
Speaker 1: and that level of sensitivity led to a lot of anxiety.
Speaker 1: This is psychotherapist, author, and meditation teacher Andrea Walkder. Nobody
Speaker 1: decides I'm going to wake up at two in the
Speaker 1: morning and worry. Nobody decides I'm going to have a
Speaker 1: pit in my stomach all afternoon and feel shaky. It's
Speaker 1: just it's these takeover mechanisms that happen automatically and unconsciously,
Speaker 1: and that's why I think we need so many tools
Speaker 1: to help us out. Andrea knows how awful anxiety feels
Speaker 1: because she's experienced it a lot herself, but she's also
Speaker 1: developed a suite of tools we can all use to
Speaker 1: face this emotion head on and to feel better. I'm
Speaker 1: doctor Laurie Santos, and this is the Happiness Lab. Andrea
Speaker 1: is no stranger to anxiety. For more than thirty years,
Speaker 1: she's been passionate about providing people with strategies they can
Speaker 1: use to regulate this emotion. While I have two anxiety
Speaker 1: relief classes on Insight Timer, so people can go through
Speaker 1: these lessons and gather the tools that resonate for them,
Speaker 1: and then practice and practice and practice. Andrea knows the
Speaker 1: importance of practice. He's had her own decades long journey
Speaker 1: with dealing with anxiety. I used to just be walking
Speaker 1: around with fight or flight constantly and constantly thinking and obsessing. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: the tools that I turned to when I was growing
Speaker 1: up were in the form of drugs and alcohol and
Speaker 1: cigarettes and a really terrible eating disorder. I use those things,
Speaker 1: I believe, in an attempt to try to cope with
Speaker 1: and tamp down my anxiety. After many, many strategies, that
Speaker 1: didn't work, Andrea finally tried something new. A guy she
Speaker 1: dated asked her if she'd be interested in checking out
Speaker 1: a new class and I said, what's the topic and
Speaker 1: he said presence And I said like gifts, like stuff
Speaker 1: you get on Christmas and he said, no, Presence like
Speaker 1: being in the present moment. And I thought, well, I
Speaker 1: have very little experience with that. I might as well
Speaker 1: try a class. And I went to this class and
Speaker 1: it was all about being present and they talked about
Speaker 1: Eckertoli The Power of Now, and I got the book
Speaker 1: and literally felt like a bag had been taken off
Speaker 1: my head. I had really been haunted by my thoughts,
Speaker 1: but only for as long as I could remember, and
Speaker 1: just started practicing being present and it was life changing.
Speaker 1: But before getting into the idea that we can arm
Speaker 1: ourselves with tools to navigate anxiety, I wanted Andrea to
Speaker 1: help us better understand what anxiety actually is. Anxiety can
Speaker 1: manifest in several ways, mostly physically and mentally. It's worrisome thoughts,
Speaker 1: it's fight or flight in the body, and it can
Speaker 1: be a variety of a spectrum really of how that
Speaker 1: plays out for people. And so you mentioned this idea
Speaker 1: of a fight or flight, you know, talk a little
Speaker 1: bit about what this means like physically in our bodies
Speaker 1: when these systems get activated. Oh, physically, it can manifest
Speaker 1: as that pit in the stomach, tightness in the chest, shaking, nausea, headaches, fatigue,
Speaker 1: brain fog. There's just so many ways that people can
Speaker 1: feel taken over by anxious feelings and sensations. And those
Speaker 1: anxious feelings, as you mentioned, seemed to go along with
Speaker 1: anxious thoughts. You know, So what's going on there? Give
Speaker 1: me a sense of kind of what anxious thoughts feel like. Well,
Speaker 1: anxious thoughts are usually in the form of what I
Speaker 1: call what ifs, you know, what if this happens? And
Speaker 1: what if that happens, and just worrying. And we're usually
Speaker 1: when we're worrying, we're not in immediate danger. Because when
Speaker 1: we're in immediate danger, we just deal with it. We
Speaker 1: don't have time to worry about it. So anxiety is
Speaker 1: usually about the future. It's kind of a sense that
Speaker 1: something is going to go wrong. It's often based on
Speaker 1: the past that things have happened. It's like a hostage
Speaker 1: takeover of just worrysome thoughts. One of the things that
Speaker 1: can happen when you're in the grip of anxiety, particularly
Speaker 1: anxious sensations, is it can be hard to believe that
Speaker 1: they don't necessarily need to be that way, that you
Speaker 1: can change them around, that you can take action against them.
Speaker 1: We can't control what thoughts pop up in our minds,
Speaker 1: but we can control how we respond to them, and
Speaker 1: that's the work. That's when we bring in compassion, that's
Speaker 1: when we bring in questioning our thoughts, that's when we
Speaker 1: bring in mindfulness. Coming back to the present moment, you've
Speaker 1: talked about the idea that once we kind of recognize
Speaker 1: this psycho, there are these paths that we can take
Speaker 1: to kind of deal with anxiety, you know, So share
Speaker 1: with me this metaphor that you've been using with your students.
Speaker 1: So imagine that you're on a path, and this is
Speaker 1: the path of anxiety. You might be walking on it,
Speaker 1: you might be stuck or crawling, but you're on this
Speaker 1: path of anxiety. And on this path, there's often these
Speaker 1: anxious sensations in the body, like we just talked about
Speaker 1: these fight or flight. This court as all in adrenaline
Speaker 1: just coursing through you. In addition to the anxious sensations
Speaker 1: in the body. When we're on the path of anxiety,
Speaker 1: there's usually worrisome thoughts in the mind. Now, oftentimes the
Speaker 1: worrisome thoughts in the mind cause anxious sensations in the body.
Speaker 1: But sometimes people can have anxious sensations and they are
Speaker 1: not aware that they were having any worrisome thoughts. So
Speaker 1: many times people will say to me, I wasn't even worrying.
Speaker 1: I was just you know, in the shower, doing my
Speaker 1: day and just taken over. So then people have worrisome
Speaker 1: thoughts about the sensations. So we can have anxious thoughts
Speaker 1: about our sensations, and we could have anxious thoughts that
Speaker 1: cause sensations. In addition, when we're on the path of anxiety,
Speaker 1: we often have a sense of self blame. Just like,
Speaker 1: I can't believe I'm still anxious after all that I do,
Speaker 1: after all the meditating I do, I'm still anxious, all
Speaker 1: the work on myself, I'm still anxious. So then in
Speaker 1: addition to sensations and anxious, worrisome thoughts and self blame,
Speaker 1: there's often a disapproval of the anxiety itself. I hate
Speaker 1: this feeling. I can't stand feeling this way, and I
Speaker 1: understand because it's unpleasant, it doesn't help, and in fact,
Speaker 1: it usually makes things worse. So here we are on
Speaker 1: this path of anxiety, maybe you've been on it for
Speaker 1: two hours or two days or as long as you
Speaker 1: can remember, and you come to a fork in the
Speaker 1: road and you see that there's an alternate path, and
Speaker 1: those are your anxiety relief tools. And this fork in
Speaker 1: the road is when you become aware that you've been
Speaker 1: on the path. You've been lost in the trance of
Speaker 1: worry and sessing on sensations and beating yourself up. And
Speaker 1: that's when we have the chance and the choice to
Speaker 1: choose a new path, and we go down that path
Speaker 1: as many times a day as we need to. And
Speaker 1: every change is proceeded by awareness. So we have to
Speaker 1: wake up from the trance of anxiety and say, okay,
Speaker 1: I've been on it. Now I'm choosing even if you
Speaker 1: still feel it in your body, We're going to choose
Speaker 1: a tool at that moment. When we get back from
Speaker 1: the break, we'll talk about how we can wake up
Speaker 1: from the trance of anxiety and find the alternative path
Speaker 1: Andrea was describing. We'll hear about some specific tools She's
Speaker 1: used to help her clients manage anxious sensations, and why
Speaker 1: finding ways to just allow these negative experiences might, ironically enough,
Speaker 1: be the best path to stopping them. The Happiness Lab.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. I've been talking to psychotherapist and
Speaker 1: insight time or teacher Andrea about anxiety. Andrea's own experience
Speaker 1: with anxiety has made her quite familiar with how this
Speaker 1: emotion shows up in our bodies. Just this pit in
Speaker 1: my stomach, this dread in my stomach. I didn't know
Speaker 1: that my thoughts were largely causing the sensations. I didn't
Speaker 1: know how to quiet my thoughts. I didn't know how
Speaker 1: to come into the present moment. I didn't know my
Speaker 1: thoughts were made up, that they weren't even real. And
Speaker 1: so when we think of kind of what our system
Speaker 1: is doing, you know, I think we often get really
Speaker 1: mad at the system, and we feel guilty about it
Speaker 1: and so on. But in some ways, you know, having
Speaker 1: this fight or flight reaction is a smart reaction. It
Speaker 1: is it's the body's attempt to protect or prepare. It's
Speaker 1: a good try. It's just that the mind doesn't know
Speaker 1: the difference between really being in danger or thinking we're
Speaker 1: in danger. So when we're sitting there obsessing or worrying,
Speaker 1: the mind's going to respond with those stress hormones in
Speaker 1: the same way as if it would if we were
Speaker 1: just had a car accident. And so this is one
Speaker 1: of the reasons you often recommend sort of treating your
Speaker 1: anxtrous feelings like you'd treat kind of an anxious child,
Speaker 1: you know, with the sort of self compassion and kindness
Speaker 1: that comes with that. You know why is self compassion
Speaker 1: sort of so important when we're feeling anxious because we
Speaker 1: need compassion. Imagine talking to a child that came to
Speaker 1: you that was scared and you yelled at them. Not
Speaker 1: only would they not feel better, they would feel worse.
Speaker 1: So we just as human beings, we soften when we're compassionate.
Speaker 1: We soften when we're given empathy and love and tenderness
Speaker 1: and soothing, and we tighten and get more stressed when
Speaker 1: we're given anger or more worry. You know another thing
Speaker 1: we do that I think just absolutely doesn't work. I've
Speaker 1: done this myself. Is this this all this resistance we
Speaker 1: bring to these feelings, Like ultimately they're just feelings, but
Speaker 1: we kind of hate them to the point that we're
Speaker 1: going to stuff them away or you know, get busy
Speaker 1: or run away from them. You talk about why this
Speaker 1: is like not the best way to react to these
Speaker 1: anxious feelings. Yeah, it's like the opposite of the best way.
Speaker 1: And it's understandable because painful feelings are painful, and unpleasant
Speaker 1: feelings are unpleasant. We don't necessarily want them. But like
Speaker 1: I tell my clients all the time, it's not going
Speaker 1: to be seventy with a light breeze every day. We
Speaker 1: have to deal with weather patterns, and we have internal
Speaker 1: weather patterns, and in order to be healthy, emotionally healthy
Speaker 1: and not need to use substances or behaviors to stuff
Speaker 1: down our emotions, we have to befriend them. We have
Speaker 1: to make peace with them and learn how to welcome them,
Speaker 1: accept them, and tend to them in a way that
Speaker 1: soothes them until they pass and then they come back
Speaker 1: again and we repeat. And so this is why the
Speaker 1: toolkit for dealing with our anxious sensations can be so important,
Speaker 1: and so one of the tools in your toolkit, I know,
Speaker 1: is the idea of kind of working with your anxious
Speaker 1: sensations through the use of your breath. You know why
Speaker 1: is the breath such an effective way of kind of
Speaker 1: dealing with anxious feelings. Well for starters, it's an anchor
Speaker 1: that brings us home into the present moment, but it's
Speaker 1: also bringing oxygen into our bodies and really literally calming
Speaker 1: and slowing down our systems. Our breath is shallow and
Speaker 1: we're anxious. When we begin to deepen our breath then
Speaker 1: slow down our breath, it literally calms our system. Another
Speaker 1: move though, is in some ways like the opposite, which
Speaker 1: is to kind of get the system moving, to kind
Speaker 1: of let the fight or flight system kind of run
Speaker 1: its course. And you've talked about doing that through processes
Speaker 1: like exercise, but exercise in a particular way where you're
Speaker 1: really moving your body in a loving way. Yes, And
Speaker 1: this is also why I like to share such a
Speaker 1: wide variety of tools, because we don't always need the
Speaker 1: same thing in any given moment, just like if a
Speaker 1: child is crying, you know, they don't always need the
Speaker 1: same thing, And so we sometimes might want to get moving,
Speaker 1: We sometimes might want to get still into a meditation,
Speaker 1: We sometimes might need to reach out for safe support.
Speaker 1: We need different things. So it's being able to tune
Speaker 1: into yourself and your body like a loving parent would
Speaker 1: tune into a child's needs. And one of those ways
Speaker 1: of tuning in really involves like becoming one with your
Speaker 1: anxious sensations, no matter how they might feel right, it's
Speaker 1: actually leaning into those anxious sensations by noticing what it
Speaker 1: means to be there with those sensations right now. And so,
Speaker 1: what are some strategies in your toolkit that you've suggested
Speaker 1: for how people can kind of be with these sensations
Speaker 1: or just be in their body when they're going through
Speaker 1: something like this. Well, one thing is simply observing them,
Speaker 1: observing them without judgment, observing them like you would observe
Speaker 1: a painting on the wall. And again that's challenging. But
Speaker 1: when we let go of the notion that they're bad
Speaker 1: and they should be gone, then it helps to be
Speaker 1: more of a neutral observer. And then many of the
Speaker 1: tools are about shifting, so shifting to something else, a
Speaker 1: healthy distraction, so to speak, or using a tool, but yes,
Speaker 1: just being able to notice those sensations and even to
Speaker 1: talk to them, even to suit them. I see you
Speaker 1: put your hand on your stomach or your chest, and
Speaker 1: I am with you. You're okay. Imagine it having a conversation,
Speaker 1: a compassionate dialogue with the sensations. Another tool that you
Speaker 1: talk about for kind of dealing with anxious sensations is
Speaker 1: what's called self havening. You know what is self hevening
Speaker 1: and how does it work well? Self havening comes from havening,
Speaker 1: which is kind of bringing yourself into a havening place,
Speaker 1: a safe haven. And it was developed by a neuroscientist,
Speaker 1: Ronald Ruden, and he discovered that there were several parts
Speaker 1: of our bodies that when we use sensory touch and
Speaker 1: in many cases adding calming words and images that we
Speaker 1: can actually calm our systems. We can actually bring ourselves
Speaker 1: into delta brain waves which are calming. And the three
Speaker 1: areas are the palms of your hands and your upper
Speaker 1: arms and the sides of your face. I hear from
Speaker 1: students often that they'll start this lesson out thinking, oh, please,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm just going to rub my hands together
Speaker 1: and stroke my arms and feel better, And then they
Speaker 1: say by the end of the lesson they are actually
Speaker 1: calmer and more relaxed, so it really works. Another thing
Speaker 1: you've advised is really just to start actually paying attention
Speaker 1: to your sensations more directly, not necessarily even the anxious sensations,
Speaker 1: but just the information your sensory system is giving you. Yes, well,
Speaker 1: this is basic mindfulness. So lots of people probably know
Speaker 1: that word, and it basically means coming back to the
Speaker 1: present moment, bringing yourself here, to what's actually factually here,
Speaker 1: where the mind is going to play those mind movies
Speaker 1: and take us away from the present moment. We can
Speaker 1: come back to our senses, so you can actually look around.
Speaker 1: What do I see right now? What shapes and colors
Speaker 1: do I see right now? What do I hear right now?
Speaker 1: What am I touching right now? My body breathing this
Speaker 1: inhalation right now, this exhalation. And even if you're still
Speaker 1: feeling anxious while you're focusing on your senses, that's okay.
Speaker 1: I like the idea of looking at if a fire
Speaker 1: has been burning for a while and you start to
Speaker 1: put it out, it still may be smoky and warm,
Speaker 1: but you still keep putting it out. Another tool that
Speaker 1: you used, particularly for anxious sensations is this idea of
Speaker 1: finding a way to get the sensations without the stories.
Speaker 1: You know, what does it mean to separate the sensations
Speaker 1: from the stories. It means noticing the sensations in your
Speaker 1: body without judgment, noticing the sensations with neutrality, which is
Speaker 1: challenging to do if you've been hating them and arguing
Speaker 1: with them and wanting them gone for so long. It
Speaker 1: is a big shift, but it's extremely powerful. So far,
Speaker 1: Andrea has given us strategies for managing the anxious sensations
Speaker 1: that take over our body. But becoming truly curious about
Speaker 1: this emotion means listening to and maybe even learning from
Speaker 1: our anxious thoughts and stories directly. But how do we
Speaker 1: face all those scary thoughts head on? We'll discuss some
Speaker 1: effective strategies for doing that when the happiness lab returns
Speaker 1: in a moment. The mind movies can certainly feel very
Speaker 1: convincing and very enticing, and so we want to learn
Speaker 1: how to question them. I mean, personally, I was a
Speaker 1: mind movie with limbs for most of my life before
Speaker 1: I started learning about mindfulness and learning too. I really
Speaker 1: was just hijacked by my thoughts, and they were not
Speaker 1: all pleasant thoughts. Psychotherapists and meditation teacher Andrea Walkder knows
Speaker 1: how awful it feels to be stuck in the grip
Speaker 1: of an awful and seemingly never ending stream of anxious thoughts.
Speaker 1: Our stories literally can take us down. So we want
Speaker 1: to be aware enough of when our mind has taken
Speaker 1: over the house, so to speak, and how to bring
Speaker 1: ourselves back to present moment reality. And that's a powerful
Speaker 1: thing because once you've become aware that these things are thoughts,
Speaker 1: I think two things happen. One is that you can
Speaker 1: separate them a little bit more. Right, they're just a thought.
Speaker 1: It's an odd thing to realize, but it can be
Speaker 1: so powerful to be like, hey, this is just a
Speaker 1: thought in my head. It doesn't necessarily mean it's true, right,
Speaker 1: And sometimes people feel so taken over by their thoughts
Speaker 1: that that really feels like that's all there is, that
Speaker 1: one hundred percent of them is anxiety right now. But
Speaker 1: then if they can't find a part that's compassionate or
Speaker 1: a neutral witness, or that they can speak to the
Speaker 1: anxiety from their heart, then we bring in another resource. Perhaps,
Speaker 1: how would you talk to somebody else right now? How
Speaker 1: would you treat a child right now? Because we all
Speaker 1: have compassion inside of us, it's just being able to
Speaker 1: resource that to your most challenging feelings and thoughts. One
Speaker 1: of the interesting tools that you've given your students for
Speaker 1: how to deal with their thoughts and kind of make people,
Speaker 1: help people realize that their thoughts are not themselves is
Speaker 1: through some creative ways of talking back to your thoughts,
Speaker 1: which I quite love, you know, So talk to me
Speaker 1: about this tool and some strategies for kind of like
Speaker 1: talking back at your thoughts in these kind of creative ways. Yes, well,
Speaker 1: one lesson was strong, soft, silly, and silent, and just
Speaker 1: being creative with how you're going to talk back to
Speaker 1: your busy mind or your unkind mind. So it might
Speaker 1: be for some people or in some moments it might
Speaker 1: be a stronger voice. You know that's not happening right now,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to need you to focus on what
Speaker 1: we're doing right now, sweetheart, we are driving to work.
Speaker 1: Or it might be soft, like I know you're scared.
Speaker 1: I know life big sometimes, but right now we're safe.
Speaker 1: Let's take a deep breath. Or silly, just oh you again,
Speaker 1: I've heard of you back again, or silent where you
Speaker 1: just shift you're at focus to something that's healthy, a
Speaker 1: healthy distraction and you don't give it a lot of
Speaker 1: power those thoughts. Have you had students use these kinds
Speaker 1: of different voices with some success, like what are some
Speaker 1: of their stories about these voices working for them all
Speaker 1: the time? In fact, just yesterday I received a note
Speaker 1: in my course classroom from someone taking one of the
Speaker 1: anxiety classes, and he said that the notion of making
Speaker 1: his anxiety into a separate part. When he first listened
Speaker 1: to the lesson, he thought, oh, please, you know that's ridiculous.
Speaker 1: And then he tried it, and he said he was
Speaker 1: able to talk to his anxious part the way he
Speaker 1: would a friend, and he began to look forward to it,
Speaker 1: like how am I going to roll up my sleeves
Speaker 1: and help my friend that I care about? And he
Speaker 1: said it was really calming his anxiety and none of
Speaker 1: one of the famous tools you've talked about in your
Speaker 1: anxiety course. Is this method the work? What is the work?
Speaker 1: And how do you do it? So basically the work
Speaker 1: was discovered by Byron Katie. She's an author and spiritual teacher.
Speaker 1: She goes by Katie, and these questions came to her
Speaker 1: when she was at the bottom of the barrel with
Speaker 1: addiction and eating disorder and suicidal and completely anxious, and
Speaker 1: she took or came up with these four simple questions
Speaker 1: and what she calls a turnaround, and you take a
Speaker 1: thought that is causing anxiety, and you walk through these
Speaker 1: four questions and a turnaround. Should we try it together? Yeah,
Speaker 1: let's do it. Okay. So let's say someone is thinking
Speaker 1: the thought I'm never going to be okay? So the
Speaker 1: first question in the work is that true? And Katie
Speaker 1: asks her a yes or no answer? So I'm never
Speaker 1: going to be okay? And you go inside and you
Speaker 1: feel is that true? I'm never going to be okay?
Speaker 1: I want to say I don't know, but she says no,
Speaker 1: yes or no. If I say yes feels true? I
Speaker 1: would go to the second question, are you absolutely sure
Speaker 1: it's true? She gives you a second chance. So am
Speaker 1: I absolutely sure that I'm never going to be okay?
Speaker 1: And I would really feel into that, really think about that.
Speaker 1: Probably I would come up with no, I'm not absolutely sure.
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't really know anything. If I think
Speaker 1: about it, I don't really know that that's true. Question
Speaker 1: number three, how do I feel when I believe that
Speaker 1: thought and I really feel into it, I'm never going
Speaker 1: to be okay? Dread? Perhaps hopeless, perhaps throw in a
Speaker 1: little anxiety and depression, and then four the fourth question.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I feel like it's not even in the language
Speaker 1: of which I speak. It feels so deep and foreign.
Speaker 1: It's who would you be without that thought? And sometimes
Speaker 1: a thought can be so sticky and so convincing that
Speaker 1: it's hard to imagine who you'd be without it. But
Speaker 1: she asks us to meditate on it, to really go
Speaker 1: inside and think if I didn't have that thought that
Speaker 1: I'm never going to be okay, and I would feel
Speaker 1: like I am okay. Actually I'm just sitting in a chair.
Speaker 1: I actually am okay. So we realize that it's the
Speaker 1: thoughts that take us down only every time. And then
Speaker 1: the turnaround is basically, you play with that original thought
Speaker 1: the opposite I'm never going to be okay. I am okay.
Speaker 1: I'm always going to be okay. My thoughts are never
Speaker 1: going to be okay. You play with the thought and
Speaker 1: see how that feels. I love the word because I
Speaker 1: think it's just so powerful, because when you get to
Speaker 1: that fourth question, this idea of like who would I
Speaker 1: be if I didn't have this thought? Often you're like,
Speaker 1: I'd be badass. If I didn't have this thought, I'd
Speaker 1: be fine. I wouldn't be you know, shaking, And so,
Speaker 1: you know, I've found the work to be helpful for
Speaker 1: dealing with anxious thoughts, you know, which are often you know,
Speaker 1: untrue or at least uncertain, right, because that's the nature
Speaker 1: of them. But also just for so many of my
Speaker 1: negative thoughts about myself, it's like, well, if I didn't
Speaker 1: really believe this, who would I be? Like what I'd
Speaker 1: be better? You know? Maybe I need to go back
Speaker 1: and work on those thoughts and kind of make them
Speaker 1: a little bit different. Is this the kind of reaction
Speaker 1: you get in students? You know? Have you had the
Speaker 1: stories of them use the work for their anxious thoughts
Speaker 1: to make a difference. All the time people are really
Speaker 1: affected in a positive way by the work. It really
Speaker 1: is one of the keys to breaking free from thoughts,
Speaker 1: because it's so easy to think that our problem is
Speaker 1: what's going on in the world or our bodies, But
Speaker 1: the problem is what we think about what's going on
Speaker 1: in the world or our bodies. Certainly there are real
Speaker 1: life issues, but when our thinking is clear and present,
Speaker 1: then the problems lesson and the anxiety really diminishes. And
Speaker 1: so we've never heard a bunch of different strategies both
Speaker 1: for thinking about our anxious sensation and thinking about anxious thoughts.
Speaker 1: But I know when I've like in the grip of anxiety,
Speaker 1: it can be very hard to remember how to do them,
Speaker 1: And so any strategies you can share for how to
Speaker 1: remember what to do and to remember to use this toolkit,
Speaker 1: we're kind of in the thick of our anxious moments
Speaker 1: absolutely well. One of the things that I recommend to
Speaker 1: my students a lot is to gather a list, start
Speaker 1: a tool kit, if you will, of what your favorite
Speaker 1: tools are, whatever tools resonate for you, and practice them
Speaker 1: till you really know how to do them, till their
Speaker 1: second nature. So that way, when anxiety takes over and
Speaker 1: your logical mind might be a little quieter, you already
Speaker 1: practiced and put that toolkit. Put that list in a
Speaker 1: place where it's easily accessible, and set yourself reminders, whether
Speaker 1: they're on your phone or post, it's on your computer,
Speaker 1: or your dashboard or a piece of jewelry sometimes people
Speaker 1: will wear to remind themselves to use a tool. And
Speaker 1: even if you're still anxious while you're practicing your tools,
Speaker 1: keep going, because if you quiet your mind and question
Speaker 1: your thoughts and soothe your body enough times it can't
Speaker 1: help but quiet down the anxiety. Speaking with Andrea made
Speaker 1: me realize that we don't need to run away from
Speaker 1: our anxious thoughts and sensations. I mean, I'll be the
Speaker 1: first to admit that hanging out with anxiety can feel
Speaker 1: very uncomfortable. But by making the choice to sit with anxiety,
Speaker 1: by agreeing to listen to it and talk to it kindly,
Speaker 1: we can find ways to really learn what this sensation
Speaker 1: is trying to teach us. Andrea is living proof that
Speaker 1: with practice and patience and even more practice, your anxiety
Speaker 1: will start to relax over time. I hope andrea Is
Speaker 1: toolkit is a resource that you can come back to
Speaker 1: whenever you find yourself in the path of anxiety. When
Speaker 1: you notice you're at that fork in the road, remember
Speaker 1: to take a moment and tune into what you need.
Speaker 1: Take a deep breath, and remind yourself that you are
Speaker 1: not your thoughts, and that you can start down a
Speaker 1: new path, one of calm and clarity. In our next episode,
Speaker 1: we'll focus on an emotion that I find to be
Speaker 1: the absolute scariest, especially when I see it in my
Speaker 1: friends or in myself. That emotion is anger, but it
Speaker 1: doesn't feel good like it doesn't feel good in our body,
Speaker 1: and there's a physiological reason for it. Our body is
Speaker 1: pushing us to do something. It's a very protective mechanism,
Speaker 1: and so the body is determined to force us into
Speaker 1: act in order to protect us, which is why it
Speaker 1: is so incredibly uncomfortable to feel angry and to want
Speaker 1: to do something about it. As soon as possible, we'll
Speaker 1: look at what anger actually is, how it works in
Speaker 1: the body, and what it's trying to tell us. We'll
Speaker 1: see that even a potent emotion like anger might be
Speaker 1: there to help us more than we realize. So I
Speaker 1: hope you'll join me again soon for the next episode
Speaker 1: of The Happiness Lab with me Doctor Laurie Santos. If
Speaker 1: you love this show and others from Pushkin Industries, consider
Speaker 1: subscribing to pushkin Plus. Pushkin Plus is a podcast subscription
Speaker 1: that offers bonus content and uninterrupted listening for only four
Speaker 1: ninety nine a month. As a special gift to pushkin
Speaker 1: Plus subscribers, I'll be sharing a series of six guided
Speaker 1: meditations to help you practice the lessons we've learned from
Speaker 1: our experts. Pushkin Plus is available on the show page
Speaker 1: and Apple Podcasts, or at Pushkin, dot fm, slash Plus.
Speaker 1: The Happiness Lab is co written and produced by Ryan Dilley,
Speaker 1: Emily Anne Vaughan, and Courtney Guerino. Our original music was
Speaker 1: composed by Zachary Silver, with additional scoring, mixing, and mastering
Speaker 1: by Evan Viola. Special thanks to Miilabelle, Heather Faine, John Schnarz,
Speaker 1: Carli Migliori, Christina Sullivan, Brandt Haynes, Maggie Taylor, Eric Sandler,
Speaker 1: Nicole Morano, Royston Preserved, Jacob Weisberg, and my agent Ben Davis.
Speaker 1: That Happiness Lab is brought to you by Pushkin Industries
Speaker 1: and me Doctor Laurie Santos. To find more Pushkin podcasts,
Speaker 1: listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
Speaker 1: listen to your podcasts,