My anxiety recovery started when I decided to change who i was as a person. The first thing I did was STUDY the brain and UNDERSTAND Anxiety and why I experienced it. I will get into this more in an up coming blog post.
The second thing I did was find a ROLE MODEL who has gone though the same thing as me and study their mannerisms, their daily routines, and thought patterns.
I used to live my days unstructured and I reacted to everything emotionally. I smoked weed daily, drank coffee three times a day, and procrastinated about everything. I even procrastinated about my career while living in my parent’s basement thinking: “It’ll all come to me eventually, I should just enjoy the now.”
But I wasn’t, deep down I got emotionally upset when I saw people on social media traveling the globe, getting the careers they wanted, and partaking in awesome activities. I was also in a terrible relationship for four years and spent all my emotional energy trying to please her in every way. It got to the point where we were fighting on a daily basis which caused me to feel even more emotionally depleted.
After the relationship ended, I decided to waste more of my energy on dating apps meeting up with strangers for one night stands. Now in this next year of my life, I was working as a Junior Editor at a television station smoking weed before and after work and looking to just hook up with random women. I felt all my problems would be answered by one night stands and drugs. I was sitting for hours doing my job unfulfilled, while deep down I wanted to travel the world and have more freedom.
When you experience Anxiety like I have, then you put yourself down on a daily basis with all the negative self talk. I had low self-confidence, where I put myself down constantly for being too thin, blurting out things to people that I didn’t mean to say, and being too harsh on my thoughts where i would say: “Why did I just think that thought? Thats horrible.”
The third step is create a CONTRACT. Write down on a piece of paper the start date of your recovery and the end goal of your recovery three months from then. Sign it and date it. Boom, you just set your first goal! Even tittle it: “MY ANXIETY PROJECT”.
The fourth step is to get SLEEP. Now this is more important than meditation because your body is totally depleted. Now meditation is important, but if you have to choose between meditation and sleep, your body wants SLEEP. Now before you hit the pillow, you MUST not do anything stimulating, like watching tv or working on your business, two hours before bed. Do relaxing things like read, meditate, or take a hot bath. Give back to your body!
The fifth step is GET PLENTY OF EXERCISE. Get your body moving for gods sake. I remember I couldn’t even walk down the road of my house without feeling I was going to faint from my Anxiety. But it’s about facing your fear and doing it anyway. I felt like I was having a heart attack at the gym and going to faint while on the treadmill but I didn’t. I fought through the heart palpitations and kept on running. I am still alive!
The sixth step is SUBTRACT THE NEGATIVE THINGS IN YOUR LIFE. This includes friends, certain music, stimulants, and TV. When I started my journey, I realized that my best friend of eight years had been a horrible influence on me. He suffered from anxiety as well as my ex girlfriend and I didn’t even know it! He was constantly negative and when we were together, our habits were smoking weed and eating junk food. Then I stopped watching Television. This was HUGE for me. When I quit TV I read 5 books in the span of 4 months while in recovery. It felt amazing to expand my vocabulary and I enjoyed amazing stories. I didn’t know where to start when choosing a book (because people with anxiety have a hard time making decisions) but I just chose something that would be a challenge and got right to it. I was also a huge punk rock nut and alternative music guy but I then turned to classical music such as Bach and Tchaikovsky to try to flush my old self away. It worked, to this day I listen to classical music on a daily basis and it has opened my eyes completely.
The seventh step is to ADD THINGS INTO YOUR LIFE. I added books, hot baths, meditation, healthy foods, exercise, positive people and classical music into my life. The goal is to mould yourself into that person you want to become! I had to take away the things that were contributing to my negative mind and anxiety and add things that will better my future self.
First steps in your recovery:
1. Study Anxiety and how it works
2. Find a role model
3. Create a timeline and contract
4. Reset your Circadian rhythm with SLEEP
5. Get plenty of exercise
6. Subtract Things in your life
7. Add things
Start with these steps and you will see a drastic change in yourself. It takes TIME. But be patient and start everyday implementing things that your old self wouldn’t do. It’s about change. Now get to it.