anxiety and body process
Good Morning dear ones,
Welcome back to CypressTreehouseCounseling's sketchbook. Thank you warmly for your interest! (We are a treetop refuge for healing, life review, and re-invigoration through artistic process infused counseling.As such, our occasional email sharing will offer encouragement and insight from both an artistic and a therapeutic perspective. Hope you enjoy! Also, check out “Sketchbook of Ideas” on our website!) Last time, we read,The Pandemic Halo, by Jim Moore and continued our celebration of the beauty of both contrast and stillness.
This time, I want to offer as a gift the, "Anxiety Identifying Worksheets," that I’ve been promising. See Attachment above.
(Please note:These worksheets are a clinical tool that can best be utilized in conjunction with mental health support and counseling. Here, they are offered as an overview, as food for thought, ONLY, not as a diagnostic tool.)-Please schedule a session for further information and support.-
Anxiety and body process: Whether it’s ‘Perfectionism,’ ‘Catastrophic Thinking,’ ‘Worry’ or another category, ANXIETY narrows our experience and takes us out of our senses. It does so in order to help us quickly and effectively address what we perceive to be near and present danger. The word 'anxiety' is derived from the Latin word, 'angustia' which means, 'narrowness'. Anxiety moves us into instinct-based reflexes of fight, flight or freeze which are the fastest and 'narrowest' we have. We experience a narrowing of focus, a flood of adrenaline, the nervous system speeds up, and we react.
❤️The problem is that when we don't RECOVER from the patterns of 'narrowness' and the feelings, thoughts, and beliefs that danger is impending, our anxiety can become more of a chronic state. It can become self-perpetuating, a tape-loop that feeds itself, hijacks us, andkeeps us locked away.❤️
Anxiety exacerbates and repeats the same mental and emotional experiences again and again. Often without notice, anxiety propels us into the future, the past, into scattered, muddled, heroic or constricted thinking, even into conspiracy theories. Anxiety rejects our genuine pain, our fatigue, our sorrow, our full range of human emotion. Yes, it can 'lock away' and 'over-ride' the hurt, but along with that, we lose our genuine human experience and connection. 'Locking away', 'narrowing', 'over-riding' may be all we can do at times, the absolute best we could do in our given circumstances.
💕It is important though that when safety returns, we address and subdue the ‘locking away’, 'narrowing', 'over-riding' patterns because when we lock away our emotions and our physical sensations, even our pain, we also lock away our resources for rejuvenation and connection.💕
There is something to be said for that old adage, "come back to your senses." Our body process is where we sense through direct experience. It is meant to work in conjunction with our intelligence and our nervous system rather than be chronically over-ridden. Neuro-science now recognizes that body (somatic) process is premier in the treatment of anxiety.
-Please schedule a session for further information and support.-
Here's something to try at home. These 3 STEPS can help nudge us back to our body process, our sensing and feeling in the present moment, which in turn can help subdue the anxious feelings.Give it a try it whether feeling anxious or not.(Remember to have fun)
1) SLOW DOWN --- example --- Take your shoes off and rub your feet on something soft and furry, a rug, a teddybear, or the fur-lining of a coat, for example. "Maybe in this moment, I don't need to change or fight, push or prove. Maybe in this moment, it is safe to slow down."
2) SIMPLIFY --- example--- There are 100,000 problems to solve but for now I will only address one... and that is: "What is my favorite color?"...and then, "What does it remind me of?" ..."Do I remember how to whistle?" ..."What tune comes to mind when I whistle?"
-Tell me the color or tune that came up for you, and I will send you a special prize!-
3) GET SPECIFIC ---example--- Let a detailed picture unfold from that favorite sight, sound, smell, taste, or touch. What is the scene exactly: quality by quality? Can you put your toe into thatturquoise water anddescribe its temperature, the sensation, the air you're breathing?
Let yourself receive your unique experience. This brings a return to body process that in turn can help refuel and even re-align the nervous system. Simple as that. -Share your experience with me! I'd love to hear it!-
Also, here are 2 quick examples of the beauty we stumbled upon at Cypress Treehouse by using these 3 steps:
-Call to schedule, inquire, give it a try.-
i) An after-the-election anxiety poem
As if Night and Day Were Fighting
After everything
pieces lost
pieces and pebbles
blue
forming into, violet
into, cool
our, our
burning, finds rhythm
peaceful, brokenness holding
hands
Peaceful, bump
and hum, into blue. Into
street, into
our, our human
welcome, burning
into
window above street, Aria burning into
our our damp welcome
street, into our
human waiting
ii) A collage of righteous indignation and its many gifts:
By moving into the weight, breath, and realness of our bodies, we put a personal DIFFICULTY into the weaving hands of motion, rhythm, metaphor, and tracking which allows our nervous systems to more fully process the many layers of our experience. This process in turn brings deeper understanding, insight, and acceptance.
“Take a breath, let it go. What is different about your experience now? On a scale of 0 to 10, how is it now?"
At CypressTreehouseCounseling.com,
you'll receive heart-centered counseling that will help you move through all you're facing with -more joy, -more clarity!
Peaceful Holiday Tidings! Remember to take special time foryourself!🌳
Much warmth and grace to you,
-Katherine Champlin Rice, MA LPC
CypressTreehouseCounseling.com
720-706-4235
I'd love to hear from you! Write back to schedule, inquire, or to be removed from this list. 🙏Thank you!
