The i newspaper published an article a week or so ago by a University of Cambridge academic. It was entitled 'Want to stop anxiety attacks? Try changing your mindset' and it was an interesting read. I should mention initially that I am very pleased with the way the i newspaper generally reports on mental health; it covers the importance of mental health on a regular basis and this article is another example of that. The i recognises it is a serious issue and doesn't slag off people they are reporting about who have mental health problems, unlike many other newspapers that use careless or deliberate use of language that offends.
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I managed to find a copy of the article online and I have pasted it below and annotated accordingly. Essentially the article, as the title suggests, is providing advice on how to help yourself if you have anxiety by changing the way you take on situations and the way you think and perceive things. I have read numerous articles of this nature in the past so I should emphasise that I'm not singling out this particular article or this author (hence why I have anonymised them in this blog) for any specific reason - my point is that when you're reading articles about anxiety, it is okay - and in fact, important - to critique them and not take their advice or guidance as gospel. This article is perfectly sound, and again I appreciate the i newspaper's efforts in including articles on subjects of this nature, but I thought I'd have a go at providing a response to it from the perspective of someone who has gone through anxiety for many years.
The original article is in black font, my response is provided in red. See what you think.
-Article begins-
Most people experience anxiety at some point in their lives. Yes, but do we mean stress or anxiety? Big difference. Anxiety is generally longer-lasting so I'd be reluctant to say 'most.' It can present itself as fear, restlessness, an inability to focus at work, difficulty sleeping or irritability and more... so much more...
In social situations, it can make it hard to talk to others; you might feel like you’re constantly being judged, or have symptoms such as stuttering, sweating, blushing or an upset stomach too true. It can take the form of a panic attack, or it can be present all the time this is made to sound like panic attacks are isolated incidents - oh it's only a panic attack, not as bad as being there all the time... sadly not, panic attacks can occur frequently, be unrelenting and even themselves last hours. In fact, if you have 'being there all the time' anxiety, chances are you're having panic attacks every now and then anyway... If anxiety starts interfering with your life, including sleep (what's that again?) or ability to form relationships (relation... what?), you might have an anxiety disorder, which affect around three million people in the UK I don't like stats like this... I was never officially diagnosed with anxiety by a GP. So do I not count in the statistics? Twenty years of anxiety? Who knows how these stats are calculated. And anyway it doesn't matter to the person with anxiety how many other people have it at the time (trust me)...
Unfortunately, the medication prescribed to treat anxiety doesn’t often work in the long term I'm very pleased to hear the article not say that medication is the only answer. Even people who firmly believe in meds will largely agree that it is only a short term solution. And anti-depressants are definitely not the answer, by the way. But science can still help with coping skills that have emerged from research – partly from a study I helped run which will be presented at the 30th European Congress of Neuropsychopharmacology (wow...) in Paris.
1) Do it badly
Do you feel like your life is out of control? Do you find it hard to make decisions – or get things started? One way to overcome indecision is to “do it badly”. This may sound strange actually, this will but the fear of God into most people with anxiety, given that is exactly what they are trying to avoid, but as the writer and poet GK Chesterton said: “Anything worth doing is worth doing badly.” Taking on this mindset speeds up your decision-making process. People often want to do something “perfectly” or wait for the “perfect time” before starting sometimes you can't help it if you have an anxiety condition. But this can lead to delays or even prevent us from doing it at all. And that causes more stress and anxiety (which aren't the same thing). Not worrying about how something is going to turn out will not only make it much easier to begin, but you’ll also find that you’re completing tasks more quickly but how does one do this when they have anxiety? If you have social anxiety, this suggests you can switch it off like a tap and do it anyway. That's impossible - otherwise no-one would have social anxiety. More often than not, you’ll also discover that you’re not doing it that badly at all but if you have social anxiety you'll only be able to think you've done badly, regardless - without the appropriate training.
2) Wait to worry
Are you critical of yourself and the blunders you make? Imagine if you had a friend who constantly pointed out everything that was wrong with you. You’d probably want to get rid of them right away. But people with anxiety often do this to themselves so frequently that they don’t even realise it this is certainly true. Perhaps it’s time to change and start forgiving ourselves for the mistakes we make how?. If you feel like you’ve embarrassed yourself, don’t criticise yourself – simply realise that you have this impulse to blame yourself, then drop the negative thoughts and redirect your attention back to the task at hand again how? I'd like to see a reference to CBT here (and above) - it took me 50 sessions of CBT to begin to change my thought processes in a similar way to this so I would expect CBT to be emphasised here. Another effective strategy is to “wait to worry”. If something went wrong and you feel compelled to worry about it, postpone it – set aside 10 minutes each day in which to worry about everything. If you do this, you’ll find that you won’t perceive the situation that triggered the initial anxiety to be as worrisome when you come back to it yes again all sound ideas, but someone with chronic, chaotic anxiety wouldn't be able to do this without intensive support. This is, again, training your mind and it is a CBT technique - you need lots of practice. This article infers that it can just be done at the flick of a switch, which is absurd. I'm sure the author doesn't intend this but this is how it comes across and could make someone with anxiety seem even more inferior, thinking it must be 'that simple' when in reality, it isn't!
3) Find purpose in life by helping others
It’s worth considering how much of your day is spent with someone else in mind. If it’s very little or none at all, then you’re at a high risk of poor mental health so do all selfish people have anxiety? I'd like to hope that I consider and think about other people a reasonable amount and yet that didn't stop me getting anxiety (although I was only 11 so who knows, I guess!). Regardless of how much we work or the amount of money we make, we can’t be truly happy until we know that someone else needs us and depends on our productivity or love given that loneliness can be a cause of anxiety I can understand this point, but again this is written as though someone who gets anxiety is a selfish, self-absorbed person. This can't be true in every case!!. This doesn’t mean we need praise, but doing something with someone else in mind takes the spotlight off us (and our anxieties) and places it on to others ah OK that's making more sense... – and how we can make a difference to them. Being connected to people has regularly been shown to be one of the most potent buffers against poor mental health tips on how to foster these connections would have been useful here given that making connections with others is often impossible for anxious people! The neurologist Viktor Frankl wrote: “For people who think there’s nothing to live for, nothing more to expect from life… the question is getting these people to realise that life is still expecting something from them.” Right OK... not sure this is helpful for someone in the midst of a panic attack...
Knowing that someone else needs you makes it easier to endure the toughest times. It could be as simple as taking care of a child or elderly parent, or volunteering again for someone with anxiety this would initially be too big a step - so how do we get there? Even if these people never realise what you’ve done for them, it doesn’t matter, because you will know. And this will make you realise the uniqueness and importance of your life moon on a stick... this won't help someone with anxiety initially.
-END-
I think you get my point. The article has been written with perfectly good intentions, but is not remotely helpful for someone in the grips of crippling anxiety, not least because it doesn't explain how you're supposed to implement these mindsets. Without the explanation, it could actually make someone with anxiety worse, given that they might start to get upset thinking they are inadequate for not being able to do it!
So my message is this - if you have anxiety and are in the grips of panic, social phobia or health anxiety, if you come across an article written by an expert please don't take it as red. Don't think that 'they make it sound easy, so why can I not sort myself out?' All this will do is make you feel more inadequate which is far from helpful. Had this article given advice on how to change your mindset and who can provide this advice, then fair enough. But just talking about it like it's the world's most straightforward thing is no use. If it were that simple, surely no-one would have anxiety?
Before I sign off, I'd like to thank those of you that read and/or commented on my recent 'Five Blogs of Thanks' series, which celebrated the fifth anniversary of this blogging website. I still can't quite believe it's been that long! It meant a lot to hear your comments and thoughts and that what I have been writing has had a positive impact on at least a few people. So thank you! If you haven't seen them, you can catch up here:
Best wishes,
Al
