How to cope with anxiety | Olivia Remes | TEDxUHasselt

Summary

This script delves into the common yet often misunderstood experience of anxiety disorders, affecting one in 14 people globally. It distinguishes between normal anxiety and disorders, highlighting the latter's severe impacts on life. The speaker emphasizes the importance of coping resources like feeling in control, self-forgiveness, and having a life purpose to mitigate anxiety. The script encourages self-empowerment and sharing knowledge to improve mental health, particularly for those unable to afford therapy.

Takeaways

• 🎉 Anxiety is a common mental health issue affecting 1 in 14 people worldwide and costing over 42 billion dollars annually in treatment.
• 😨 Social situations can trigger anxiety, leading to feelings of dissociation and panic, which can result in avoidance behaviors and isolation.
• 🤔 Anxiety disorders are often misunderstood and can be mistaken for nerves or a weakness, rather than a serious condition.
• 👀 The distinction between normal anxiety and an anxiety disorder is important, with the latter being excessive and occurring in non-threatening situations.
• 🛑 Generalized anxiety disorder is characterized by excessive and uncontrollable worry, restlessness, fear, and difficulty with sleep and concentration.
• 💊 Medication for mental disorders may not always provide long-term relief, and symptoms can recur, necessitating alternative coping strategies.
• 🔄 Coping mechanisms can significantly impact the level of anxiety experienced, and by adjusting these, one can reduce anxiety.
• 🌱 Developing coping resources or skills can be empowering and can help individuals take charge of their anxiety levels.
• 🏆 Feeling in control of one's life is associated with better mental health, and engaging in activities that increase control can help combat anxiety.
• 💭 'Doing it badly' can speed up decision-making and encourage action, reducing the anxiety associated with indecision and perfectionism.
• 🙏 Forgiving oneself for past mistakes and perceived failures can alleviate self-criticism and promote self-compassion.
• 🌟 Having a purpose and meaning in life, and doing things with others in mind, can be a powerful coping mechanism against anxiety.

Q & A

What is the initial feeling described when getting ready for a party in the script?

The initial feeling described is a mix of excitement and nervousness, with a sensation in the stomach like an additional heartbeat, and a cautionary voice holding one back from being too happy.

What are some common social fears mentioned in the script?

Common social fears mentioned include worrying about who to talk to at a party, the possibility of being rejected or thought of as weird, and experiencing an out-of-body sensation during conversations.

How does the script describe the physical sensations of anxiety in crowded places?

The script describes physical sensations such as feeling hot, nauseous, and uneasy in crowded places like on a bus, which can lead to avoidance behaviors and feelings of loneliness and isolation.

What is the prevalence of anxiety disorders worldwide according to the script?

The script states that one in 14 people around the world have an anxiety disorder.

What are some of the serious consequences of anxiety disorders mentioned in the script?

The script mentions that anxiety can lead to depression, school dropout, suicide, difficulty focusing, job instability, and relationship breakdowns.

How does the script differentiate between normal anxiety and an anxiety disorder?

Normal anxiety is described as a protective emotion that arises in stressful situations, like facing a bear in the woods. An anxiety disorder is characterized by excessive worry in non-threatening situations and difficulty controlling this worry.

What is the role of coping resources in managing anxiety according to the script?

Coping resources are described as factors that can directly impact the level of anxiety experienced. They can help individuals lower their anxiety and remain healthy even in the face of adversity.

What is the first coping strategy mentioned in the script for dealing with anxiety?

The first coping strategy is feeling in control of one's life, which can be achieved by engaging in experiences that provide a sense of control and by adopting the motto 'do it badly' to overcome indecision.

How does the script suggest one can overcome the fear of starting something new?

The script suggests overcoming the fear of starting something new by adopting the motto 'do it badly,' which encourages taking action without the pressure of perfection.

What is the second coping strategy discussed in the script for reducing anxiety?

The second coping strategy is forgiving oneself for past mistakes and being kinder to oneself, which can lead to greater self-compassion and healing.

Why is having a purpose and meaning in life considered an important coping mechanism for anxiety?

Having a purpose and meaning in life is considered important because it provides a sense of being needed and valued by others, which can improve mental health and help individuals bear difficult times.

Outlines

00:00

😨 Understanding Anxiety Disorders

This paragraph introduces the commonality and impact of anxiety disorders, affecting one in 14 people worldwide and costing over 42 billion dollars annually for treatment. It describes the symptoms and experiences of individuals with anxiety, such as nervousness before social events, fear of rejection, and panic in crowded places. The paragraph emphasizes the serious consequences of untreated anxiety, including depression, school dropout, and even suicide, and the importance of distinguishing between normal anxiety and a disorder.

05:06

💊 Coping with Anxiety Beyond Medication

The second paragraph discusses the limitations of medication in treating mental disorders and introduces the concept of coping resources. It highlights a study from the University of Cambridge that shows women in poor areas with certain coping resources were less likely to suffer from anxiety. The paragraph suggests that the way individuals cope with stress directly affects their anxiety levels and that by improving coping mechanisms, one can reduce anxiety. It introduces the first coping resource: feeling in control of one's life, and suggests that taking action, even imperfectly, can help overcome indecision and lack of control.

10:08

🚀 Empowering Coping Strategies for Anxiety

The final paragraph presents three coping strategies to reduce anxiety. The first strategy is to 'do it badly,' encouraging action over perfection to prevent anxiety from hindering progress. The second strategy is self-forgiveness, which involves letting go of past mistakes and self-criticism to foster self-compassion. The third strategy is having a purpose and meaning in life, which provides a sense of being needed and contributes to mental well-being. The paragraph concludes by encouraging the audience to share these strategies with others, especially those who cannot afford therapy, and to consider the impact of their actions on future generations.

Keywords

💡Anxiety

Anxiety is a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome. In the context of the video, it is portrayed as a common mental health issue that can significantly impact a person's life, leading to social withdrawal, depression, and other serious consequences. The script uses personal experiences to illustrate the debilitating effects of anxiety on daily life.

💡Anxiety Disorders

Anxiety Disorders refer to a group of mental health conditions characterized by excessive and persistent worry and fear that is out of proportion to the situation. The video emphasizes that these disorders are more than just nerves and should not be trivialized. It mentions generalized anxiety disorder as an example, where individuals worry excessively about various aspects of their lives.

💡Coping Resources

Coping Resources are strategies or skills that individuals use to manage stress or adversity. The video suggests that having these resources can prevent or reduce anxiety, especially in challenging circumstances. It highlights the importance of developing personal coping mechanisms to deal with anxiety effectively.

💡Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) is a specific type of anxiety disorder where individuals experience constant and excessive worry about various aspects of their lives, making it difficult for them to control their anxiety. The script describes the symptoms of GAD, such as restlessness and trouble concentrating, to illustrate how anxiety disorders can affect daily functioning.

💡Mental Health

Mental Health refers to a person's emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It affects how people think, feel, and act, and can influence their ability to relate to others and make choices. The video discusses the impact of anxiety on mental health, including the potential for depression, school dropout, and suicide.

💡Control

Control, in the context of the video, refers to the sense of being able to influence or direct one's life. It is presented as a coping resource that can improve mental health. The script suggests that engaging in activities that provide a sense of control can help reduce anxiety and indecision.

💡Forgiveness

Forgiveness, particularly self-forgiveness, is highlighted as a powerful coping strategy in the video. It involves letting go of self-criticism and past mistakes, which can be a source of anxiety for many people. The script encourages viewers to practice self-compassion and forgiveness to alleviate anxiety.

💡Purpose and Meaning

Purpose and Meaning refer to having a sense of direction and significance in life. The video posits that having a purpose can serve as a strong coping mechanism against anxiety. It suggests that doing things with others in mind can provide a sense of fulfillment and resilience during difficult times.

💡Perfectionism

Perfectionism is the pursuit of flawlessness and setting extremely high standards for oneself. In the video, it is discussed as a barrier to action that can lead to anxiety and indecision. The concept of doing things 'badly' at first is presented as a way to overcome perfectionism and reduce anxiety.

💡Empowering

Empowering refers to the process of giving individuals the ability or authority to do something, often increasing their confidence or sense of self-efficacy. The video describes the development of coping skills as an empowering process, allowing individuals to take charge of their anxiety.

💡Social Isolation

Social Isolation is the state of being separated from social interactions or the broader community. The script mentions that avoiding crowded places due to anxiety can lead to feelings of loneliness and isolation, further exacerbating the individual's mental health challenges.

Highlights

Anxiety disorders are very common, affecting 1 in 14 people worldwide and costing over $42 billion annually to treat.

Anxiety can lead to severe impacts on life, including depression, school dropout, suicide, difficulty focusing, job instability, and relationship breakdown.

Anxiety is often misunderstood and dismissed as a weakness or something to get over, rather than being recognized as a serious mental health issue.

Differentiating between normal anxiety, a healthy response to stress, and anxiety disorders is important for understanding and addressing the condition.

Generalized anxiety disorder is characterized by excessive, uncontrollable worry and symptoms like restlessness, fear, insomnia, and difficulty concentrating.

Coping strategies and resources can significantly impact anxiety levels, with studies showing their effectiveness in reducing anxiety even in challenging circumstances.

Feeling in control of one's life is associated with better mental health; taking action and making decisions, even if imperfectly, can increase this sense of control.

The concept of 'doing it badly' can help overcome indecision and lack of control by promoting action and reducing the pressure of perfectionism.

Forgiving oneself for mistakes and perceived failures is a powerful way to cultivate self-compassion and reduce anxiety.

Having a purpose and meaning in life, where one's actions benefit others, is a crucial coping mechanism for mental health.

Developing coping resources and skills can empower individuals to take charge of their anxiety and improve their mental well-being.

The importance of recognizing that life expects something from us and doing things with others in mind can provide a strong motivation for mental health resilience.

Volunteering and sharing knowledge with those who need it most can improve not only their mental health but also our own by creating a sense of purpose.

Finishing work that benefits future generations, even if unrecognized, can provide a deep sense of fulfillment and importance in life.

The speaker emphasizes the empowerment that comes from understanding and managing anxiety through personal development of coping skills.

Anxiety disorders are not just about nerves or weakness, but a complex mental health issue that deserves recognition and proper management.

Transcripts

Transcriber: Denise R Quivu Reviewer: Robert Deliman

Imagine that you're getting ready to go to a party.

You feel excited, but also nervous,

and you've got this feeling in your stomach

almost like another heartbeat.

There's something holding you back, holding you back from getting too happy.

"No, you mustn't get too happy.

Better to be cautious, otherwise, something bad might happen."

You start wondering, "Who should I talk to when I get there?

What if no one wants to talk to me? What if they'll think I'm weird?"

When you arrive at the party,

someone comes up to you and starts talking with you,

and as this is happening,

your mind starts racing, your heart begins pounding,

you start sweating,

and it feels almost like you're dissociating from yourself,

like it's an out-of-body experience, and you're just watching yourself talk.

"Keep it together," you say to yourself, but you can't.

And it's just getting worse:

after a few minutes of conversation,

the person you've been speaking to leaves,

and you feel utterly defeated.

This has been happening to you in social situations for a long time.

Or imagine every time you go out, and you're in crowded places,

you feel this panic starting to arise.

When you're surrounded by lots of people,

like on a bus, you start to feel hot, nauseous, uneasy,

and to prevent this from happening,

you start avoiding a lot of places which makes you feel lonely and isolated.

You or the person in both of these scenarios

have anxiety disorders,

and what I can tell you is that anxiety is very common,

much more than people think.

Right now, one in 14 people around the world

have an anxiety disorder,

and each year, it costs over 42 billion dollars

to treat this mental health problem.

To show you the impact that anxiety has on someone's life,

I will just mention

that anxiety can lead to depression, school dropout, suicide.

It makes it harder to focus, and to hold down a job,

and it can lead to relationship breakdown.

But a lot of people don't know this,

that's why, a lot of times, people sweep anxiety under the rug

as just nerves that you need to get over, as a weakness,

but anxiety is so much more than that.

A reason why so many people don't think it's important

is that they don't know what it is.

Is it your personality? Is it an illness? Is it a normal sensation? What is?

That's why it's important to differentiate

what is normal anxiety from what is an anxiety disorder.

Normal anxiety is an emotion that we all get

when we're in stressful situations.

For example, let's say, you're out in the woods,

and you come face-to-face with a bear.

This will probably make you feel a little bit anxious,

and you'll probably want to start running like crazy.

This anxious feeling that you get is good because it protects you, it saves you,

and it makes you on a hightail it out of there,

although maybe it's not such a good idea to start running when you see a bear.

I really don't think you can outrun a bear.

Anxiety helps us meet our deadlines at work

and deal with emergencies in life,

but when this anxiety emotion is taken to the extreme

and arises in situations which don't pose a real threat,

then that's when you might have an anxiety disorder.

For example, people with generalized anxiety disorder

worry excessively and constantly about everything going on in their lives,

and they find it very difficult to control this worry.

They also have symptoms like restlessness, fear,

they find it hard to fall asleep at night, and they can't concentrate on tasks.

In spite of whatever kind of anxiety you might be suffering from,

there is something that you can do to lower it.

It works, and it's simpler than you may think.

All too often, we're given medication for mental disorders,

but it doesn't always work in the long run.

Symptoms often come back, and you're back to where you started.

So here's something else to consider:

the way you cope or handle things has a direct impact

on how much anxiety you're experiencing,

and if you tweak the way you're coping, then you can lower your anxiety.

In our study at the University of Cambridge,

we showed that women living in poor areas

have a higher risk for anxiety than women living in richer areas.

These results didn't surprise us, but when we looked closer,

we found that women living in poor areas,

if they had a particular set of coping resources,

they didn't have anxiety,

while women living in poor areas without these coping resources

had anxiety.

Other studies showed

that people who had faced extreme circumstances,

who had faced adversity, been through wars and natural disasters,

if they had coping resources,

they remained healthy and free of mental disorders,

while others, facing the same hardships but without coping skills

went on a downward spiral and developed mental disorders.

So what are some of these coping resources,

and how can we use them to lower our anxiety?

And before I dive into what they are,

I'd like to point out - and I think this is so interesting -

you can develop these coping resources or coping skills on your own

through the things that you do;

you can take charge of your anxiety and lower it,

which I think is so empowering.

Today I'll be talking about three coping resources,

and the first one is feeling like you're in control of your life.

People who feel like they're more in control of their life

have better mental health.

If you feel like you're lacking in control in life,

then research shows

that you should engage in experiences that give you greater control.

I'll show you what I mean:

do you sometimes find that you put off starting something

because you just don't feel ready enough?

Do you find it hard to make decisions

like what to wear, what to eat who to date, which job to take up?

Do you tend to waste a lot of time

deciding what you might do while nothing gets done?

A way to overcome indecision and this lack of control in life,

is to do it badly.

There's a quote by writer and poet GK Chesterton

that says, "Anything worth doing is worth doing badly the first time."

The reason why this works so well

is that it speeds up your decision-making and catapults you straight into action,

otherwise, you can spend hours

deciding how you should go about doing something

or what you should do.

This can be paralyzing and can make you afraid to even begin.

All too often, we aim for perfection, but never end up doing anything

because the standards that we set for ourselves

are too high, they're intimidating,

which stresses us out so we delay starting something,

or we might even abandon the whole thing altogether.

Do it badly frees you up to take action.

I mean you know how it is:

so often, we want to do something perfectly we can't start

until it's the perfect time, until we've got all the skills,

but this can be daunting and stressful

so why not just jump into it just do it however,

without worrying if it's good or bad?

This will make it that much easier to start something

and as you're doing it badly to finish it,

and when you look back,

you'll realize, more often than not, that actually it's not that bad.

A close friend of mine who has anxiety

started using this motto, and this is what she said,

"When I started using this motto, my life transformed.

I found I could complete tasks in much shorter time periods than before.

Do it badly gave me wings to take risks, to try something differently,

and to have way more fun during the whole process.

It took the anxiety out of everything and replaced it with excitement."

So do it badly, and you can improve as you go along.

I'd like to ask you to think about this:

if you start using this motto today, how would your life change?

The second coping strategy is to forgive yourself,

and this is very powerful if you use it.

People with anxiety think a lot about

what they're doing wrong, their worries, and how bad they're feeling.

Imagine if you had a friend who constantly pointed out

everything you're doing wrong,

and everything that was wrong with your life.

You would probably want

to get rid of this person right away, wouldn't you?

Well, people with anxiety do this to themselves all day long.

They're not kind to themselves.

So maybe it's time to start being kinder with ourselves,

time to start supporting ourselves,

and a way to do this is to forgive yourself

for any mistakes you think

you might have made just a few moments ago

to mistakes made in the past.

If you had a panic attack and are embarrassed about it,

forgive yourself;

if you wanted to talk to someone,

but couldn't muster up the courage to do so,

don't worry about it, let it go;

forgive yourself for anything and everything

and this will give you greater compassion towards yourself.

You can't begin to heal until you do this.

And last but not least,

having a purpose and meaning in life

is a very important coping mechanism.

Whatever we do in life, whatever work we produce,

however much money we make,

we cannot be fully happy until we know that someone else needs us,

that someone else depends on our accomplishments,

or on the love that we have to share.

It's not that we need

other people's good words to keep going in life,

but if we don't do something with someone else in mind,

then we're at much higher risk for poor mental health.

The famous neurologist Dr. Victor Frankel said,

"For people who think there's nothing to live for

and nothing more to expect from life,

the question is getting these people to realize

that life is still expecting something from them."

Doing something with someone else in mind can carry you through the toughest times.

You'll know the why for your existence

and will be able to bear almost any how; almost any how.

So the question is

do you do at least one thing with someone else in mind?

This could be volunteering,

or it could be sharing this knowledge that you gained today with other people,

especially those who need it most,

and these are often the people who don't have money for therapy,

and they're usually the ones

with the highest rates of anxiety disorders.

Give it to them, share with others,

because it can really improve your mental health.

So I would like to conclude with this:

another way you can do something with someone else in mind

is finishing work that might benefit future generations.

Even if these people will never realize what you've done for them,

it doesn't matter,

because you will know, and this will make you realize

the uniqueness and importance of your life.

Thank you.

(Applause)