No-fuss anxiety tips #4
Movement Matters
Welcome! You’ve made it to blog number four is this 20-article series on anxiety, focusing on simple tips and techniques for managing anxiety. Each no-fuss post draws on therapeutic thinking from a range of psychological and psychotherapy theories.
What these tips won’t do is explore the origins and purpose of anxiety for you – this type of deeper exploration is what therapy offers. That said, having strategies for managing anxiety is a great place to start. Each article is designed to be quick read, no-fuss. So, let’s get started on technique number four: movement matters.
Exercise and physical movement are a powerful antidote to anxiety. When you experience anxiety, your body’s ANS response prompts the flight, fight reaction. Useful when facing an immediate threat to our safety. However, this response in your nervous system can also be triggered by lesser threats. Some people are particularly sensitive to threat and danger, often as a result of past experiences of trauma, and their nervous system is triggered by perceived threats including seeing someone looking at us a certain way or fearing our own or even other’s reactions when we enter a crowded room. No matter what the threat, when our bodies enter fight or flight, it is primed and ready for movement.
Therefore, exercising when your anxious allows you to put the flight or fight response to some use that benefits us, to “work out” physical effects of anxiety. Your body has chance to move, act and respond. Exercise also give an increased sense of self-esteem and self-mastery as you take positive action towards your wellbeing. Research[i] shows that regular exercise is effective in managing anxiety, both as a preventative measure and in response to an anxiety attack.
Today, consider what forms of exercise are manageable for you in your current situation? What goal can you set yourself for today that includes an element of physical movement? What support or resources can help you meet that goal? Simple no-fuss ideas include:
Ask a work colleague to take a power walk with you in your lunchbreak
Take the stairs instead of the lift
When you’re stood at the hand-dryer after washing your hands, squeeze your glutes.
Try a pelvic floor tense and release when you’re stuck in traffic.
Keep a small glass of water on your desk – your eventual thirst forces you to get up and move to fill your glass when it empties, rather than staying static as you drink from a large container.
Whilst the kettle boils, challenge a family member to a plank competition.
If you’re keen to find a greater sense of ease when it comes to your anxiety, then look out for more blogs within this anxiety-themed series. And, if you’d like to talk through how counselling can help you towards a deeper exploration of your anxiety, do get in touch. We can work together through online counselling or through face-to-face counselling at my therapy room in Preston.
References:
[i] Anderson, E., & Shivakumar, G. (2013). Effects of exercise and physical activity on anxiety. Frontiers in psychiatry, 4, 27.