Stress and Anxiety - The Real World Experience

This is an interview with someone who has suffered with stress and anxiety.

Tony: How did you feel at the time you were stressed?

A: Physically, I felt on fire inside. I felt very, very trapped, but I felt scattered, all over the place. Couldn’t gather myself together. I felt extremely restless, couldn’t sit still, couldn’t sleep properly, not in control of my thoughts, not in control of a lot of my actions, not in control of my dietary needs. I was smoking a hell of a lot. I would flip from feeling very scared to feeling very apathetic to feeling to feeling very excited to feeling very empty, nervous, strong, lost, weak, together. Never long enough in one particular mood. It was just too much, it was all over the place. Very rushed inside, everything felt very, very rushed inside. Like something had to be done, something had to be done, something had to be done, but I couldn’t gather myself together to make sometimes even the smallest of decisions. Angry with the outside world and my own internal world. Sad. Tense. Very aware of the stress.

T: At that particular time, I remember asking you “Were you suffering from anxiety” and you said “No.” But you did say that you had a lot of adrenaline. So what did you think you thought you had at the time?

A: I was not aware that it was anxiety until you described some of the symptoms of anxiety to me, and I realised “Oh my goodness me, this is what it is.” I was just aware that something was happening and I had to get out of it. I didn’t know quite how to get out of it because part of the process I was feeling was that of being very lost. There was a feeling of “Oh my goodness, there’s no way out of this,” and yet there was an underlying feeling of there was a way out of it. I just couldn’t access that.

T: That was your own intuition telling you that?

A: Oh yes. Yes.

T: Did you feel isolated at the time?

A: Yes I felt isolated, but I also wanted to keep myself isolated. That’s the paradox, there was a part where you’re looking for the support, yet you want to go away and lick your own wounds and heal on your own. When you made me aware of the fact that it was anxiety, you also explained to me that “Look, you know what’s happening, you can’t stick with the way things are.” It was things like “What are you giving meaning to?” Those are the things that started to create a big shift for me.

T: What would you say were your thinking patterns at the time? The rules, expectations, beliefs that actually gave you those feelings? The difference between when you didn’t have them and then when you started feeling those feelings?

A: Lots of rules and expectations. Lots of beliefs. Some were like: this is it, this is my role in life, I have to do that, it doesn’t matter whether I want to do it or not want to do it. I should do it, I ought to do it. I’m told I should do it, this is my bed, I should lie in it. I mustn’t complain. I should be grateful for what I have. The sort of should, should, should , should, should. That in itself was driving me crazy. Every should was another stab with a knife, and yet I kept doing that to myself. Feelings like that. Expectations were more to do with my role. This is what I’m supposed to do. How dare I want for anything else. How dare I expect anything else.

T: At the time were you aware that those thoughts were the reason for it? Did you get those feelings because you were buying into the beliefs?

A: Absolutely yes. Yes. More and more and more. Of course whatever I was believing I was seeing the evidence of it externally. So it reinforced that belief, but it also reinforced the conflict as well.

T: Did you at the same time, because you were interested in the mind, body, spirit stuff, and the healing, did that further add: be nice, a certain persona? Did that also stop you then from asserting yourself, almost as if pleasing mode?

A: Oh goodness me, yes.

T: The time that you told me it was worst was when you were particularly, it was a mode of thought that you had to do with those ideas in that mind, body, spirit area.

A: With regards to the whole mind, body, spirit area and the so-called very subtle rules that come with spirituality and following that path and working on the path, that caused so much, so much confusion and it knocked my self-esteem, absolutely knocked my self-esteem, because again, the subtle rules, I had to be a certain type of person, I had to be seen to be a particular type of person, and because of the anxiety and the scattered feelings, I felt bad that I didn’t have those so-called ideal qualities to be doing the type of stuff I needed to do. Yet I knew in my heart of hearts that that was what I was driven to do, and I knew I could do it but I didn’t feel I was good enough to do it, that I was the right person for the job morally, physically, intellectually, whatever. It was like I have no right to be doing that. I believed that I was too wrong for that and that was the wrong thing, so I tried to change, tried to become what I thought was expected of me in that role, and that created the most horrific conflict inside ever. So much so that I became outwardly aggressive which is obviously not fair on everybody else, but it was my own inner conflict that came out externally, which then looks back and creates another level of problems on top of that. Strangely enough, it wasn’t enough to make me want to walk away from it. I kind of hung in there because little by little, my own self-belief came out, and I thought no, this is what I need to do.

T: So what did you do, what happened for you to change?

A: I spoke to you and you made me understand. To recognise what was happening, to really, really recognise what was happening because I was in denial, and quite honestly I actually did not understand what was happening. Once I saw that, it took some time to process that and understand it. You also made me realise that it was because of all these particular beliefs I’d somehow invented. You made me understand about the limiting beliefs, the blocks I was putting up and I had to break them down, that they were not carved in stone, that I could change them. There is something extremely liberating about knowing I could change them whenever I wanted to change them, and it was ok to do that. It was ok by me and if it was ok by me, I didn’t really give a damn about whether it was ok by anybody else. It really didn’t matter anymore. So I started to take the little steps and said I will try it, I will change a particular belief like you told me to, and try it out. You also said you need to do it over and over and over and over again. It may not feel comfortable, it will feel very strange, a lot of discomfort, you’ll probably feel anxiety, but do it anyway. That is what I just kept doing: over and over again. Oh yeah, it felt very strange, extremely uncomfortable, but I just kept remembering the discomfort was because it was unfamiliar and because it was new. So I thought ok, that’s ok. So that gave me like a safety net to be able to do it.

T: Were the beliefs that you were challenging the shoulds and the roles?

A: Oh yes. Yes, totally. Utterly, completely. That was my biggest dilemma, because as you know, you pick up rules from when you’re a tiny kid, and they all just go in there, and they sit and wait, and then different things happen, and oh, each one pops out, and there it is. It greets you and it meets you, stares you in the face and says oh no, no, no, that’s wrong, this is how you should do it, oh what will people think, you can’t do it like this, you know that person will get this impression, you can’t please that one, oh that’s not very good, uh oh. So yes it was all to do with the shoulds and the I ought not to, how can I, it’s not fair on everybody else. Until I realised that I was not actually being fair to myself. Somewhere along the line I had to matter. So I made myself matter first.

T: So you first, and you had the right to be who you wanted to be?

A: Absolutely. If I don’t have the right to be me, where do I get that right from? I have to find that right, no-one’s going to give me that right. I have to find that right, and I believe I have that right, to be who I am. If somebody doesn’t like it, that’s not my problem. That’s their problem.

T: Once you started changing those beliefs over a period of time, those original sensations of anxiety changed. Would it be true to say that instead of spending all the time in your head, you now came back to your middle, and by knowing that, there wasn’t all that going on in your head?

A: Yes, once those beliefs changed, the sensations changed. I felt very much more rounded. Yes, you’re right, I certainly came out of my head. All the scattered feelings seemed to disappear or they sort of garnered themselves all together. That went deep down into my centre, which helped make me feel very whole and less scattered. It’s incredible because when you are in your centre and you are very grounded, you are so amazingly awesome and huge. You feel really ok. The courage comes, the strength comes. I believe all this comes from self-belief anyway, so you learn to trust yourself, you learn how your fears and your anxieties and the old default thoughts and feelings and beliefs and whatever are lies. It’s a total illusion. That I think is the biggest thing. Once you learn that, how you’ve kidded yourself with all the rubbish that’s been going on in your head, once you learn that, once you have found out the magician’s trick, everything is different.

T: Would you agree that the trust and courage and self-belief comes in effect from your middle, or from your body, and all this other stuff is the tricks in your head?

A: Yes, yes, yes, yes. Absolutely.

T: Which is the point about the adrenaline is the trick and once you buy into that, so it’s not to go with it.

A: Absolutely. You just stand back and observe. You’ve got to become an observer of your thoughts. You’ve absolutely got to become an observer. It’s the only way. Otherwise, you’re finished. They come at you so fast, so fast, within nanoseconds, and so many of them as well. If you stand back, almost as if you hold a net, and you think I’ll have that one and that one and that one and not that one or that one or that one. It may sound like its hard work or it takes a lot of mental energy to do that, it doesn’t. Within a very short period of time, you start to become an observer. You know which ones to buy into. You also know you have a choice. You have a choice. When you have adrenaline surging through your body, if you have anxiety surging through your body, you feel as if you have no choices, which is why you feel so trapped. But when you become an observer, you have a choice. To observe your thoughts, you don’t leave your body, you don’t go out of your head, you don’t go someplace else and observe from a different perspective, you have to observe completely associated. So you become the watcher. The thoughts are outside, the thoughts are not inside you, you do not let them in. You only let the ones in that you want. It’s like being in a house, they can come knocking at the door, they can come rapping on the window, they can surround your entire house, you decide to let them in. But you do not leave your house to go outside to watch them from outside. They’re in, otherwise. As to go outside and watch, you’ve got to open the door, and they come in.

T: Can you sum up what you’ve said?

A: Don’t believe the lies. Trust yourself. You are much, much wiser. You are much stronger than your silly little head.

T: You know the bit where you said about the knocking on the door, I see it as from an OCD perspective, a person has a strong urge to go and check, or over responsibility, or a worry about contamination and they give in to that urge, I see it as like the ultimate lying conman salesman knocking on the door. If you go to the door and let them in, you’ve accepted that thought, it’s in your house and then you’re in negotiation, so if you’re trying to reason your way out or argue your way out of it, you’ve bought into the fact that you’ve let them in, so you’re stuck either way. So there’s believing it and then there’s wrestling with it. If you go to the door and have an argument with them, tell them to go, it’s like fighting against it, but you’re still looking at the thoughts all the time. Ultimately with these things, it really doesn’t matter, they can knock on your door all day long, they can be there, that urge can be there, but you can get on with what you want in the house, at some stage, they will get bored and go. So you can be in the house and rail against it, but you’re still fighting with it. The thing is to get on with whatever you want no matter what until it goes. Even if it comes back the next day and knocks for a while, get on with whatever you’re doing. This is like do your things no matter what, and at some stage, it will give up, and even if it comes back occasionally, it will give up. That’s an analogy for dealing with it. What are your thoughts on that concept?

A: I agree with what you’re saying. If you stay in the house, if you look at yourself, your higher self, the greatness of who you are being, as being in a house, thoughts keep coming, bombarding, unwanted visitors at your door constantly. Have nothing to do with it, you don’t have to worry about it, you don’t even have to think to yourself I wish they’d stop making a racket, they become nothing, its just white noise. That’s what it is. It’s irritating because there’s white noise, but you don’t have to waste time even on the irritation, get on with what you have to do. You have to be in your body, you have to be centred, even if you’re really ok, and you can only do that if you operate from the higher mind, not from the low mind. That small mind is saying just open the door once, just once, go out there and say just be quiet and go away. Don’t do that, don’t negotiate, have nothing to do with them whatsoever.

T: When the little mind takes over, the part that because it is so uncertain, wants to control and order and wants things to be right, and is the part that tries to take over the things that its not responsible for because it has a whole set of rules and expectations above. That can manifest as severe anxiety and OCD type stuff. When you have that type of mind, which is really the worry mind, but it doesn’t manifest as severe anxiety or OCD, but because it never gets so bad, the worrier can go a whole life worrying, but the things that you find when you ask that person will be they worry to much. They will always be overly responsible for things they don’t have to be, there will be like a cautiousness, over conscientiousness, a tendency to want to be right, to want certainty, to want order and symmetry and structure. What do you do to lessen that influence?

A: I feel as if some of those qualities are sitting in my head. I allow some of them to come down towards my centre. I actually tell myself that I am comfortable with some of them. Then I check to see if I’m comfortable with some of them. Those that I’m comfortable with, my behaviour will dictate what I do. The ones that I’m not comfortable with, I leave there. There’s always an awareness that I can feel it – I can feel this sort of thing make sure that the cups are tidy or the house is a certain way, make sure this is the right way around. I’m aware of that and sometimes I have to admit that I do allow some of it to come down, but then I only then act on it if I’m comfortable. If I’m still feeling jittery about it, I either wait for the feeling to pass, sometimes it passes, and sometimes it can be very, very strong and I can feel it coming lower and lower down, forcing me to act out what its telling me to do. Straighten the cups or whatever. Whether its done to suit me or make me feel better, to stop the adrenaline flowing or the anxiety or whatever comes with following all that, I tell myself that if I have that kind of order I will feel better because it will then reflect some sort of order inside. Whether that’s an emotional order, a chemical order, I don’t know. I just know that when things are externally in place, I can look at it and it reassures me that everything is in place inside. If I see chaos or a lot of clutter around me, to me it is a mirror of what is going on inside me. I don’t like to look at it, and sometimes I feel like I don’t have time to deal with the inner clutter, so my thing is just clear the outer clutter and the inner clutter will settle itself. Sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn’t. All these feelings are in my head, none of them reside deep in the centre. I always know when I’m functioning from my core because there is an incredible stillness, an incredible peace. It’s such a settling, calm, very, very powerful feeling where everything is ok no matter what is going on. I believe that’s the ideal state. Everything needs to be done from the core, every single thing like this. Any time there is conflict, go to the core. The answer is always there. It is never going to be up there in the head. Never.

T: The core in your middle?

A: Absolutely in your middle. When I’m being very rational and logical and analytical, I can feel in my body it is coming very much from the left-hand side of me. It is so clear to me, so clear. I would not have that clarity if I had not been attached with my core. My core gave me the wisdom to see it like this. I actually feel it. I never feel it on the right-hand side of my body. Never. All my analysis comes from the left side. So any thoughts to do with excessive logic, excessive analysis, perfectionism, or detail is so obviously coming from the left-hand side. Having become a good watcher of my thoughts now, I’m very aware that that is where its coming from. Its still up there in the head, but if it tries to kick in, what I do is try to put it towards stuff where it can serve a purpose. Where it does not create an unacceptable or uncomfortable emotion with it.

T: Would you say that it is true that if you are using that quality for organisational type skills, but not as an over emotion? So that bit has nothing to do with emotion, and the emotions have got to be faced up to, but if you’ve got that ability, the likelihood is you will be a good organiser, you will be able to sort things out, and all of those types of things?

A: Yes. You don’t see it as an enemy, you don’t see it as something that is obtrusive and blocking everything in your life, and blocking the way you feel. You see it as what it is. It has it’s place. Every single thing has its place. The problem is if it has no place to go, it tries to bombard everything else. If on the emotional side, you happen to be having a low day or sad day or whatever, it comes in there, and you don’t want it to come in there because it tries to organise your emotions. Emotions aren’t meant to be organised, they’re just meant to be felt. That’s all it is. Flip it around the other way: if you’re too emotional, and you’ve got emotions swilling around in your body and you don’t know what to do with them, allow the left side to come in. Allow the analytical side to come in and just take some of that away, or just feel the emotions, let them subside, don’t be frightened of your emotions. Don’t be frightened of them, its only the thoughts that are going to make you think oh my God, I’m feeling like this, and then fear kicks in. Then you’ve got a whole different scenario going on there.

Oh what are you going to do with this, you’re feeling like this now, this means this will happen, this means this and this means that etc. Then you start to give meaning to everything, and before you know it, you’re caught in a quagmire. A total mess. Nothing makes sense. You can’t use the left brain, you can’t use the right brain, your emotions are all over the place. You’re just a quivering mess. You’ve got to give it somewhere to go. It all needs to be channelled somewhere, and if at that time, you can’t channel it anywhere, let it be. Just let it be for a while.

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