If you’ve come here looking for answers, there are two things you must accept: your mental health should be the most important thing in your life, and when you’ve worked yourself up, you’ll need to calm down. so here’s how to calm the eff down for panickers.
Active Breathing
Focus on taking deep breaths and actively counting the seconds or beats of your breath. Breathing exercises are a good way to slow your heart rate which can speed up in times of high anxiety or panic. Count in intervals of eight, breathing in for eight counts, then out for eight counts at least ten times.
Practice Grounding
Grounding practices are essential in the day-to-day life of someone who suffers from anxiety or panic attacks. However, grounding practices are still good techniques that help you slow your heart rate and gain touch with reality. Easy grounding practices are reciting the colors of things near you, counting objects near you, or touching different parts of your body to the floor or wall and focusing in on those sensations.
Optimistic Mindset
Having an optimistic mindset can help curb the natural paranoia and fear someone with anxiety may feel. The power of optimism is enormous. If you choose to keep a constant supply of positive energy in and around you, it will be more difficult to upset you. Repeating positive mantras are a great way of actively producing positive energy. Guard your energy and take a deep breath.
Have a stress tool
When having an anxiety attack, try to think rationally and calm down. A good tool to aid in that process is a stress tool. Commonly known stress tools are fidget spinners and stress balls. They are useful tools because you can manipulate them and keep your focus on one object. This should help you calm down. I know they seem pretentious and obnoxious, but stress relief is their intended use; show your younger siblings the potential of the correct usage: benefitting your mental health.
Remember to relax and breathe. Be aware of your mental health and seek help before it’s too late.
-HXCO