Welcome to the very first of my monthly ‘ask me a question’ pieces - using my experience as a psychotherapist, a Buddhist teacher & an ordinary flawed human. These pieces will just be for paid subscribers in future months but this one is on me. I hope it may provide a little gentle help. Thank you for your excellent question Amy - over to you…
Dear Satya,
I'm such a fan of your novels I'd probably pay to read your grocery lists. But I especially like when you write about finding peace in the middle of upset and chaos. Lately I've been having a hard time with managing triggers from past trauma.
I've grown bored with plotting imaginary acts of homicide and would welcome alternatives. Last month I mistakenly joined a weekly course at my church called WomenSkills thinking it read WomenKills and kept waiting for the relevant curriculum.
Other things I've tried include yoga, chardonnay, chocolate and Zumba classes. And humor. As you've likely intuited, that works the best.
What do you do to calm the anxiety?
~ Amy in CA
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Dear Amy,
First I’d like to pause to acknowledge how hard your system has been working to manage the triggers and to keep your anxiety at bay. Hurray for your chocolate eating parts! Go your Zumba-ing parts! Hurray for your humour parts, which I’m sure other people also enjoy (I did). They are doing an excellent job!
So – how to calm the anxiety?
For me there are three different and complementary paths. The first is to do the ‘sensible things’ that help, like eating yummy nourishing food, play-chasing the dogs round the living room or having early nights. The second is to use the ‘distractor’ techniques your system is already using, like bingeing Netflix, overworking or good old chocolate (my favourites).
The third is to work more directly with the causes of the anxiety in order to heal what needs healing. I tend to see anxiety as a kind of ‘indigestion’ which is created when we haven’t been able to process something from our past (for a good historical reason). Anything that helps us to take teensy weensy steps towards this unprocessed stuff, as long as we do it SAFELY, KINDLY and GENTLY, is healing.
We might not be ready to go near the trauma yet (or ever) – great – respect that self-protective impulse. In that case, we befriend the parts of us that are protecting us, like your anxiety. If you’re not yet on speaking terms with your anxious part/s, see if you can develop some gentle curiosity towards it. What job does it have for you? What is it protecting you from? What does it think might happen if it stopped making you anxious? You can do this by talking to it in your head, journaling, spending time in nature, speaking with friends or if you’re lucky with a therapist (I always recommend Internal Family Systems – see below).
If you can’t get curious about your anxiety, then what’s in front of it? A part that hates the anxious bit? A part that’s worried about what might happen if you got too close to the trauma? Whatever is in the front of the queue, start with that. Get curious, allow compassion to arise, and listen.
Being listened to and being understood is soothing. We feel less alone. We feel appreciated. We can relax a tiny bit. Maybe we can even rest for a while. I wish those things for your anxious parts, and for you.
You also asked me what I do to calm my own anxiety. I do a mixture of the three things I described above, depending on what else is going on in my life and what feels possible at the time. Examples of what’s healthy for me are early nights and writing. Good distractions are scrolling or eating vegan fudge. What helps to heal is leaving a voicenote for my friend, or sitting with the Buddha and listening to my anxious parts. I try not to beat myself up too much when it’s necessary to have an afternoon in bed or when I’m short with the dogs. Life is a lot! I’m doing my best!
So are you. So are we all. Yay us.
Go gently <3
PS How many grocery lists would you like? I’m sure we can work out a reasonable rate ; )
DISCLAIMER: All ‘Gentle Help’ suggestions are offered without a deep knowledge of your particular interior landscape – please do take what you like and leave the rest. If in doubt, take a few steps back – safety is important and in my experience it never helps to ‘push through’. Go gently! Remember that you always know best when it comes to your own life. If you’re thinking of therapy I always recommend therapists that are trained in Internal Family Systems (IFS) - a gentle and powerful way of working which changed not just my therapy practice but my whole life. For a simple introduction to IFS with pictures, Tom Holmes’ Parts Work is lovely. Richard Schwartz’s No Bad Parts is the standard text and is also great.