My Tips and Tricks for Anxiety and Healing (bonus: Part 6)

As I finish this series, I am dumbfounded by a few things. First, God took a few of the parts in very different directions than I was expecting. It ended up being in directions that I needed to work through and process. Second, I shared more than I expected. Not because I was planning on holding back, but because once I started writing about anxiety, so much got shaken loose. There were a few spots that as I wrote them, I was finally finding the words to describe how things felt. In the end, writing this series was freeing and empowering. There are a few tips that I either wanted to mention again or talk about, so here they are:

1.THERAPY.

The biggest tip I have for anyone ever (whether or not they struggle with anxiety) is to go to therapy/counselling. I personally believe that we all need it. I have spent three years in counselling. The first time was a year as I was finishing high school and the second time was right after I failed out of my first semester of university online. The second/most recent time occurred over a period of two years. I cannot stress enough how transformative it was. And full transparency: I don’t think I am done. I will probably end up back there at some point. Not because I can’t live without it... I just know how much value there is to having help. Counselling helped me see from new perspectives and helped me work through things that I was otherwise struggling to work through fully on my own. It doesn’t matter if you are super self-aware and introspective; there are things that we all struggle to fully get through on our own. A word I often used to describe my thinking was “swirly”. There are some things that we think about and all we do is go in circles over and over again. In order to break the swirling, we need a new perspective.

Some tips:

If the person you are seeing is not the right fit, do not be afraid to switch to someone else. Not every counsellor is good for everyone. Do not let a bad experience, or even a not great experience shut you off. Dig deeper and find someone who works for you.
Stick with it for more than a couple of months. From personal experience, it takes wayyyy longer than 6-8 sessions to really experience significant growth. Honestly, it probably took me the first nine months to really get into the nitty gritty stuff.
Don’t be afraid to take a break/go back. Neither of those things are “failure”. Both taking a break to process for a set amount of time, and going back, are signs of strength. Both are signs of self-awareness and are necessary parts of growth.

Proverbs 20:18

Plans succeed through good counsel; don’t go to war without wise advice.

2. Take care of your body.

You have probably heard this a million times. But that is because it is SO NECESSARY. Eating well. Exercising. Sleeping regularly. Staying hydrated (I suck at that one). See a doctor when things are not right. Get medication if it is going to help you. There is a reason that people use the phrase “take care”. It’s because you should take care of yourself. Literally.

1 Corinthians 6:19

Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own;

3. Surround yourself by people who see you.

This one was a game changer for me. When you feel surrounded by people who are not able to see you for all of the light that you bring, you stop being able to see it yourself. When I started to surround myself with only people who saw it and saw me, I started being able to see it more clearly. The enemy is already going to make you doubt yourself; you don’t need to let in more people who are going to reinforce those lies. To read more about letting people go with grace while also learning to let new people in, read part 4 of this blog series.

The Bible talks a lot about community and the church. It talks about accountability and sharpening one another. I have come to realize that you can let people in who speak life into you and still be sharpened by them. I love to be challenged but I think for so long I thought that in order to be challenged and therefore sharpened, I had to let people in who were difficult for me to understand and who drained me. The cool thing is that every person you meet will challenge you. Give yourself permission to invite people who will love you well in addition to challenging you.

Romans 12:5

In the same way, even though we are many individuals, Christ makes us one body and individuals who are connected to each other.

4. Uncover the lies.

We are all blind to something. We are also all blind to things in ourselves. Take some time to start uncovering the things you are blind to. Whether with a counsellor, friends, or God, start unpacking lies that you have been believing. Then take out the lie and replace it with truth.

An example: when things in my life felt chaotic or out of control, I felt overwhelmed and alone. When things are chaotic, I believe the lie that I am alone and dealing with it on my own. The truth is that God is in that chaos with me and that I have no reason to let fear overwhelm me because He is there. If you have ever taken a ride in my car, you will see that the phrase,“He is in the boat with you” is written on the steering wheel (among others). It is there as a consistent reminder that I am not alone in the chaos.

Write down the truths that you need to be reminded of. Put them in places where you will see them frequently. Slowly but surely, you will start to believe them and you will find that the lies don’t seem as loud.

Romans 12:9

Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good.

5. Value yourself enough to do what you need to.

This might be the most difficult part. You will need to give yourself space. You will need to give yourself grace. You will need to give yourself time to heal. You will need to fight for what you need to heal. You may have to do all of these things and more. But here's the thing: if you don’t see how valuable the work is and how valuable you are to deserve better, you will lose momentum. You will question yourself and your choices. You will back down and you will lose motivation. I have.

I hope that you can learn to see that you are worth it. Your value as a person does not come from the work that you do on yourself. You deserve that work to be done because you are already valuable and you deserve to not be hindered by those hurts and insecurities any longer. You are worth fighting for.

To finish the series I wanted to list the things that I want for you on your journey:

I want you to believe that abundance is for you.

I want you to feel the exhaustion of healing and realize that is sometimes what progress feels like.

I want you to love yourself for where you are at. Whether you are struggling, free or somewhere in between.

I want you to find people who cherish you and hold every part of you close.

I want you to discover a new life filled with freedom.

I want you to struggle a little, because in the struggle is where we learn where to put our roots.

I want you to fail, and then learn to give yourself enough grace to try again.

I want you to fight for the help that you need.

I want to see lies be broken off of you.

I want truth and the One who created you to be where your value stems from. Because they are unshakeable. And one day you will be too.

Luke 6:48

He is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when a flood arose, the stream broke against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built.