Can we start a thread with things you do to manage your anxiety? Whether its anxiety over the world falling apart and going to hell in a handbag (lol) or other things you may get anxious over... what helps? I deal with severe anxiety daily & panic attacks where I have to find ways to calm myself down. My husband just offered me a shot of tequila, alcohol does work but I try to drink wine only in the evenings and not every day (which is not a rule lately, lol). Currently, I am implementing these things: Coloring with prismacolors and a few different adult color books (outlander, disney, harry potter) Binge watching shows with no drama/end of the world stuff Resting my tongue between my teeth so I don't clench my teeth together. Trying to do more watercolor but I am terrible at it and its messy. Creating projects (that never get done, some barely started, lol) Playing sims 4 (anyone else play sims here? follow me @mrstank in origin/gallery) What else you got? What anxieties are you struggling with? How do you stay hopeful with all the heavy stuff happening?
Anxiety often (maybe not always!) results from a thought. For me, what works is to change my thought. I learned of this site while taking courses at Academy of Art U. This post is really cool, and though I couldn't actually do it, I imagined myself walking through these beautiful calm spaces! Who knows, maybe someone(s) here might attempt a small work of art via nature!! If you do- please share!!!
Getting outside and getting my hands in the dirt and gardening always helps me. I mulched a little the other day and cleaned up some leaves and debris in the flower beds. Today we started a raised garden bed since our soil is more clay than anything. Also, (for all the Grey's Anatomy fans!)dancing it out always helps! ....and I can't get the gif to work
I try to get outside as much as possible but I created this layout out of complete anxiety and frustration.
The only thing that really works for me if I start feeling anxious is to just get up and do something. Usually, I start on a project that I've neglected or just find something that will occupy my mind and help me feel some accomplishment. It's not something that I deal with very often at all, so I'm not much help, but I'll keep you in my thoughts and prayers!
Music, hands down quickest & easiest way to drown out my own thinking, that or an audio book (but the subject matter can sometimes make my mood worse, it's sometimes easier not to care about the characters at all lol!); or if I'm near the water, looking at & the sound of the ocean (but I'm not about to head to the beach now but looking at one of our fishtanks has a similar effect)
I shared this is another thread, but thought I would share it here as well! Going outside. I've made a point to go outside for at least 30 minutes. Yesterday ended up being an hour + and today was an hour-and-a-half +. Fresh air and sunshine are great combatants of this virus. Reading. I picked up the Outlander series again. I've read it multiple times. It's comforting because I know the story and the characters, so it's like meeting up with old friends. Creating. I've been scrapping and designing. Even when I don't feel particularly creative, I make myself open up a canvas and just START. Then I'm in there doing it, and it's fun. I'm also participating in a couple of online challenges for scrapping, and that helps keep me focused and motivated. I'll be painting and/or drawing later this week (I hope), and I'll also be continuing my cross stitch project. Limiting social media time. I've been trying to do this since the first of the year. Having an online business that relies heavily on social media, it's hard to make a line and decide what's personal time and what's business time. So I had already limited how much I was reading, but now I've really just stopped scrolling my main feed. I check in with my family members to see what they're up to, and I check quite a few scrapbooking groups to see what others are creating. Limiting news reports. I need SOME information, but not ALL information. I have picked a handful of places where I will go for updates. Most of the time, my hubby ingests the news (he's not affected like I am), and then he will share. That's my preferred method, actually. LOL Organizing. So far, it's only been one cabinet, but with my daughter's help, I was able to get it cleaned out and much more accessible for me. It's a lower cabinet, so it's already hard to reach things, and it was just overrun with objects. It was time to let things go that I wasn't using regularly so they will bless someone else. There's something about this that empowers me.
