Anxiety, an evil of our time? How to fight it

The current demand presented by many patients reveals the habit of directing the vast majority of their thoughts and behaviors outwards.

What they usually do is create a whole storm of thoughts and images that act adding even more stress, constantly trying to find solutions that are not enough and before the impotence of having intrusive, recurring and persistent thoughts, which produce restlessness and repetitive behaviors , called compulsions aimed at reducing associated anxiety.

Rumination and its relationship with anxiety

However, things are not as they seem, this behavior is not a disease of modern times. It is a problem that comes from afar. We must find ways that distract the mind from the obsessive search for solutions to pain and the feeling of threat.

We can spend years ruminating with thoughts and images of a former partner, focusing on "those beautiful moments" lived in the first two months, despite the fact that the other has already formed a new family.

I am going to use a story to explain the resonances that I have in clinical practice:

They say that the student asked his teacher: “Teacher, I feel within me two wolves fighting. One leads me to positive ideas, feelings and actions and the other instead is bad, negative, violent. How do I know which of the two will win? "

And the teacher replied: “That is easy. The one you feed will win ”.

Those thoughts, ideas, feelings and even actions that we cultivate, those to which we “feed”, are the ones that will prevail in us in the end..

We cannot help feeling or thinking certain things. We are both that good wolf, with its good ideas and feelings, and the bad wolf with its negative emotions. That duality is in us. We cannot avoid it. But we are also that third party that observes the wolves, that identifies them, and can decide which of the two to feed, which one they want to feed. There is always a part (greater or lesser) of voluntariness in what we can think and even feel.

Imagine that we have an obsessive thought, which we do not want but cannot avoid. It just drains us and takes energy away, and we don't want it.

Tips to get rid of intrusive thoughts

In all these circumstances we can do something to minimize it:

1. Take distance from him. Look at it from the outside, as if it were that wolf. Get rid of it. Do not fight. Well, he's come, he's here again. Nothing happens, it is not my will. It's not me, because I don't want it with me.
2. Be aware that it will not be with you forever. Whatever happens sooner or later will go away. It will take more or less, but it will disappear.
3. And now is when you can start to do something. First of all, don't give it your attention, don't get into it, don't give it your mental energy. Do not explore it any more, all the roads are covered in there. He may not leave right now but while he is there I will not attend to him.
4. Use the STOP of thought. It is a very useful technique: actively and voluntarily stop that thought and put another in your mind. Force yourself to do it. Voluntarily try to think of something else.
5. If suddenly you see that the thought has returned, almost without realizing it, do not give up and repeat the sequence. Over and over, repeat the process of pushing it away and thinking about something else. You will see that the more times you do it, the easier it is for you.
6. If it is an outright obsessive thought, you may not be able to remove it entirely even with these techniques. It's normal, you may need some extra help. But all the effort you make to push it away and not pay attention to it, to observe it from the "outside" and not feed it, is frankly useful. Does not fall on deaf ears.
7. Sometimes you manage to do other things, but you feel that a part of that thought continues in some space of your mind, with less intensity. Okay, again avoid being attracted to him. Get on with your stuff and let it fade little by little. Above all, do not feed him ...
8. Some people find it useful to stare at that “parasite” thought alien to us and imagine how the wind displaces it and sweeps it away, like a bad cloud in the sky..

These techniques serve us both for obsessive thoughts and for when we find ourselves repeatedly ruminating in our mind about something that we do not want to pay more attention to and that wears us down. If we practice it, we will see how it is useful in many cases.

If you recognize yourself with this type of persistent and painful thinking, you are in need of professional help. It is time to consult, without fear or shame. Sometimes some medication is also necessary to better manage anxiety states.