Exercises To Calm Your Anxious Thoughts
Deep breathing, positive mantras and tackling negative thoughts can help get you out of your head and cool down your anxiety
You have deadline pressures at work. Your relationship is getting complicated. Or your kid is having problems at school. Maybe you even have a health concern nagging at you. Before you know it, it can feel like anxiety has taken over your life. So much so that you’re feeling a sense of dread even when nothing stressful is happening.
“Anxious thoughts activate the limbic system — the fear center in our brain,” says psychologist Susan Albers, PsyD. “Just a simple thought can easily trigger this part of the brain in a split second. I think of anxiety to be like walking around with an umbrella waiting for it to thunderstorm.”
The annoying thing about anxiety is that it’s fairly impossible to avoid. It’s a basic human emotion, and we all feel it at times. After all, it’s normal to worry about a make-or-break work deadline or a serious medical diagnosis.
But when you worry all the time, or it interferes with everyday life, it’s a problem. “It’s an overwhelming, out-of-control feeling, and it can feel like it comes out of nowhere,” Dr. Albers adds.
Here, Dr. Albers gives some pointers on how to work through anxious thoughts and find peace with your mind.
1. Deep breathing
It sounds like a cliché (or an irritating way to tell someone to “calm down”). But, in fact, your breath is an excellent tool for calming your body.
Think of yourself as a firefighter and your anxiety a fire. You can put out the flames of anxiety with some cool breaths. Breathe in and out, deeply and slowly.
You can practice breathing whenever anxiety hits – at work, on your daily commute or even before bed. “As you move through your day, pay attention to your breathing,” she advises. “Regularly stopping to take some full, deep breaths keeps your brain from reaching the tipping point where anxiety takes over because you have been shallow breathing or holding your breath without realizing it.”
Try breathing techniques like:
“When you slow down your breathing, you trick your body into thinking you’re relaxing or going to sleep,” explains Dr. Albers.
2. Put a halt to negative thoughts
When we feel anxiety, it often causes an avalanche of nasty thoughts. “Thoughts like, ‘I can’t stand this; this is awful!’ fuel the fire of anxiety,” points out Dr. Albers. While it’s good to validate your feelings, don’t let the spiral of these thoughts take you over.
“Remind yourself that you encounter stressful things every single day, and you find ways to handle them. Bad things happen relatively sparingly and our brains are well-equipped to handle a crisis if one occurs,” says Dr. Albers. “Be engaged in your real life, not in imagined moments, and don’t create ‘what-ifs.’”
The best way to begin is to work on developing a new relationship with your thoughts – which is easier said than done! You can do this by catching negative thoughts in the moment and becoming mindful of them, instead of entertaining them.
For example, if you’re in the shower and you start thinking about a negative situation that happened in work, this may cause you to go into an anxiety spiral. Instead, try and tell yourself: “I’m having this thought and it’s okay to be aware of it. But I’m not going to entertain it any further.”
Instead, Dr. Albers suggests thinking about what you can and cannot change about the situation. Then, take steps to change what you can, and work on accepting what you can’t.
3. Focus on your senses
One of the best ways to get out of your head is to bring yourself back to the present. This is where your senses can help guide you out of your spiraling, anxious thoughts.
“Focusing on a sensory experience moves you out of your head, away from your thoughts and directly into your body,” explains Dr. Albers.
A good technique is the 5-4-3-2-1 exercise to tune into your surroundings:
5: Identify five things you can see around you — anything from a pen on the table to a stray cat hair on your pants.
4: Find four things you can touch. Notice the soft texture of your pillow or the smooth coolness of your water glass.
3: Listen for three things around you. It might be birds chirping, your breath or your foot tapping the floor.
2: Name two things you can smell. Maybe it’s as simple as having a whiff of the freshly made coffee in your hand. Or the aromatherapy oil diffuser running on your desk. Or the flowers in the vase on the side table next to you.
1: Identify one thing you can taste. Not currently eating? Pop a peppermint or piece of dark chocolate in your mouth.
4. Have a mantra
When you’re in a state of anxiety, your brain is trying to convince you that you are in physical harm's way — even when you’re actually not. So it can be helpful to say things out loud (even if it’s to yourself) to contradict those messages your brain is sending you.
When your anxiety wheel starts spinning, repeat these words to yourself:
In this moment, I am OK.
This moment will pass.
I am in control of my thoughts.
I am safe and secure.
I am taking things one step at a time.
I am enough.
I’m letting go of what I cannot change.
I am grateful for the present moment.
Everything is unfolding as it should.
“Positive, truthful words are helpful as an affirmation. What we say can become our reality,” Dr. Albers says. “Thoughts are like clouds. They’re not good or bad, they just come and go,” she says. “You don’t have to react to them — ‘Oh, wow, that’s interesting. I wonder where that thought came from,’ works better than ‘Oh, no, that’s terrible.’ Being grounded in the present moment, without judgment, is the place to be.”
5. Try to adopt a positive outlook
Don’t worry —we’re not talking about feeding into toxic positivity. But even when difficult things are happening, there are usually some good things to notice.
And the more attention you give those good things, the easier it will be for your brain to notice the good instead of the bad. “Our perspective is powerful,” Dr. Albers emphasizes. “Focusing on the things you’re grateful for is a great way to pull yourself out of anxiety.”
Anxiety can stem from needless worry about a lot of things that aren’t important in the long run. “Consider how this will really impact you in five minutes, five months or five years,” advises Dr. Albers.
6. Connect with things that give you strength
Anxious thoughts can make you feel alone and, in many ways, powerless. When you’re in this state, it’sa good time to pull strength from the things that inspire you. How can your mind serve you something empowering instead of destructive?
Maybe it’s a role model who you admire and look up to. Maybe it’s your spiritual beliefs. Or it could be an accomplishment from your past that you’re proud of. “Tapping into those sources of strength can bring a sense of calm, comfort and safety,” Dr. Albers notes.
7. Soothe your body
A racing brain is a hallmark of anxiety. Yet the feeling isn’t just in your head. Anxiety affects your whole body, including your heart rate and breathing patterns.
To dial down the anxiety, Dr. Albers says you can use tools to address both body and mind. Try some yoga stretches, or take a tennis ball and rub it under your foot or behind your back. “Find gentle ways to calm your body,” she suggests.
Other techniques may vary based on what you find calming to your body. Maybe it’s a quick run around the park to take the edge off. Or maybe it’s having a hot (or cold) shower to “reset” your nervous system
8. Ask for help
If you still feel like you’re drowning in worry, it’s OK to reach for a life raft. Counselors and therapists have a lot of experience treating anxiety — and it can be successfully treated. “It’s been proven that simply naming your feelings can help calm you down,” Dr. Albers points out. “This is easier to do when you share your feelings with others.”
“Anxiety is more common than people realize,” she adds. “You might feel embarrassed, but the truth is that this is part of being a human, and it’s OK to ask for help.”
Things to avoid when anxious
Just like there are things that can soothe your anxiety, there are also things you should steer clear of. “Avoid soothing your anxiety with things that can lead to more anxiety,” advises Dr. Albers.
If you’re experiencing anxiety, here are some things to avoid:
Unhealthy coping mechanisms. Anxiety is like a red flag, telling you that something needs attention. “Don’t ignore this sign — contact a professional to help you through it,” says Dr. Albers. “For example, stress eating is like putting a Band-aid® on a gaping wound,” she says. “You want to deal with your anxiety directly.”
Specific triggers. Pay attention to the things that make you anxious. If you can, try to limit those triggers. If the news and media are making you anxious, give yourself a window of time to check the headlines, then avoid for the rest of the day (and especially before bed). “Stick to accurate news sources and stay away from sources that are speculative and overly negative,” Dr. Albers points out.
Caffeine and alcohol. You may think that having a drink is a good way to take the edge off or that a cup of coffee can knock you out of your anxious spiral. But in truth, caffeine and alcohol can flare up your anxious feelings even more.
Lack of sleep. If you’re feeling anxious, now isn’t the time to pull an all-nighter. Try to go to bed early, practice mindfulness before bed and get those 8-9 hours.
Isolation. The last thing you need when you’re anxious is to bury yourself into your thoughts even more. Try calling a friend, going out for a quick bite with a family member or even chatting with a colleague or community member. That bit of support can do a lot of good, and gives you a much-needed break from your thoughts.
Overstimulation. If you’re easily overstimulated, avoiding loud, chaotic or crowded environments is probably a good idea if you’re in a state of anxiety. Quiet your mind and surroundings as much as possible and if you need to take a rain check on that concert, that’s A-OK.
The bottom line
Anxiety can leaveyou feeling out of control. But that doesn’t mean you have to let it take over your life. Having different techniques and healthy coping mechanisms in your anxiety toolkit will make you feel more in control of your mind and feelings.
“Sometimes, you just have to let anxiety come and go, like riding a wave,” says Dr. Albers. Remember that it’ll fade and that “This, too, shall pass.”
At the same time, it’s good to know that you can always ask for help if it gets to be too much. “If these tools aren’t working, or your anxiety is becoming more intense or more frequent, it’s helpful to seek out someone to talk to,” Dr. Albers recommends.
