3 Simple Tips for Coping with Anxiety During COVID
Analyze Your Thought Patterns
If you’re an analytical thinker, this is a great method for managing and coping with anxiety. Anxiety is often triggered by negative thoughts that you allow to enter and become at home in your mind. As you focus on the negative, you begin to distort the severity of the situation and you may find yourself getting stressed and overwhelmed. If you find yourself getting into a pattern of negative thoughts and allowing your mind to focus on those things, slow down and take a deep breath.
- Recognize the thoughts that are entering your mind and pay attention to the pattern that you’re allowing yourself to fall into.
- Acknowledge the thoughts and the pattern that you are creating and acknowledge that you want to put a stop to that pattern.
- Express what exactly you want to change and how that will make your thoughts different moving forward.
- Choose and then focus on a different thought or behavior instead of the negative thoughts. Choose something that serves your goals and helps you to move forward instead of dwelling on difficult or scary situations.
By slowing down and allowing yourself to recognize negative thoughts and their patterns, you can help curb anxiety and refocus your thoughts on things that are positive and productive.
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Focus Your Breath
Focused breathing is a practice that allows you to be present in the moment and to focus only on the act of breathing in and out. Focused breathing serves two purposes; firstly, it helps to slow your mind down and ground you on something present and tangible. This can provide comfort, especially if you are experiencing anxiety due to the unknown or uncontrollable circumstances. Focused breathing also evens out and slows down your heart rate, which will help reduce the physical symptoms of anxiety and calm you down.
- 4-7-8 Breathing – One method of focused breathing is the 4-7-8 technique. To begin, find a comfortable place to sit or lie down where you will not be distracted by your surroundings and area able to relax. Next, rest the tip of your tongue on the top of your mouth. Your tongue should be relaxed and should rest right behind your top front teeth. It’s important to keep your tongue in this position during the entire practice, even as you exhale. To begin 4-7-8 breathing, let your lips part with a whooshing sound. Exhale your breath completely through the mouth. Then, close your lips and inhale through your nose. As you inhale, count to four. At the end of four seconds, cease the inhale and hold your breath for seven seconds. Finally, make a loud whooshing exhale from your mouth for eight seconds. This cycle should be repeated for four complete breaths. If you fall asleep, don’t worry! That simply means that you were able to fully relax your body and give it the restoration that it needs.
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Start a Journal
Journaling is a great way to get the stressors and anxiety triggers out of your head. It works similarly to talking to a mental health professional, and in fact, you can even bring those thoughts with you to a telehealth or counseling session! If you struggle with sporadic anxiety rather than ongoing anxiety, writing down your thoughts when you feel yourself growing anxious is an effective way of releasing the negative thoughts and energy from your mind and allowing yourself to focus on more positive experiences.
- How to Start an Anxiety Journal – If you’re not sure where to start with your journal, don’t worry! It doesn’t have to be daunting or scary and in fact, it should be an outlet rather than another source of stress. To help you get started, try setting aside a few minutes every day to write. That will give you the opportunity to spend some daily time focusing on yourself and altering your thought patterns. Next, keep your journal handy. By having a pen and paper or your notebook on you at all times, you’ll be able to write down any thoughts that you feel you want to get out. Don’t worry about structuring your journal in a certain way, either. Many people think that they need to write in a certain style or only use words to express themselves. Do whatever feels right and helps you to focus and ground yourself. A few ideas include:
- Keep an art journal and express your thoughts through imagery.
- Start a journal in a note on your phone or computer.
- Write in poetry or in a language that you speak regularly at home.
- Don’t worry about spelling or what people would think if they read your thoughts.
Whatever you choose to do with your journal, simply know that it is yours and it is an outlet and an expression of you. Keeping your journal may help you to feel a sense of order and peace during chaotic or stressful times.
Stay Strong
All of our professionals are available for telehealth and web conferencing calls to assist you during the COVID-19 epidemic. We’re here to help whenever you need us.
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Brooke Sprowl is an industry-leading expert and author in psychology, spirituality, and self-transformation. Her insights have featured in dozens of media outlets such as Huffington Post, Business Insider, Cosmopolitan Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, Spectrum One News, Mind Body Green, YourTango, and many more.
As the founder and CEO of My LA Therapy, she leads a team of 15 dedicated therapists and wellness professionals. Brooke has been a featured speaker at prominent universities and venues such as UCLA School of Public Affairs, USC, Loyola Marymount University, the Mark Taper Auditorium, and Highways Performance Gallery, to name a few.
With a Master’s degree in Clinical Social Welfare with a Mental Health Specialization from UCLA, a Bachelor’s degree in Neuroscience from USC, and certifications in peak performance and flow science from the Flow Research Collective, Brooke has helped hundreds of prominent leaders and CEO’s overcome anxiety, relationship difficulties, and trauma and reclaim a sense of purpose, vitality, and spiritual connection.
With 15 years of experience in personal development and self-transformation as a therapist and coach, she has pioneered dozens of original concepts and frameworks to guide people in overcoming mental health challenges and awakening spiritually.
Brooke is the host of the podcast, Waking Up with Brooke Sprowl. She is passionate about writing, neuroscience, philosophy, integrity, poetry, spirituality, creativity, effective altruism, personal and collective healing, and curating luxury, transformational retreat experiences for high-achievers seeking spiritual connection.
