Let me take you back to four years ago.
I just come back at the beginning of the pandemic, from six month volunteering in South America, volunteering meaning, I earned no money, spent all that I had left, i was broke. About to turn 30, living back at my mum's (which I had left when I was 15), no boyfriend, no job, well that's not true, I just joined a retreat company but because retreats and lockdowns were no ideal match, so yeah, no job.
At first, i loved it.
Let's be honest, lockdown
was THE best excuse ever found for me to not take any action to get back on my feet. I slowly got used to the nothing, the waiting, watching days passed by.
It also slowly escalated from 'this is awesome' to the most paralysing time of my life. I felt more and more sluggish, did less and less, taking any form of action became more and more difficult.
'the less you do, the less you want to do'
It started by having irrational thoughts,
feeling like the biggest failure in every area of my life.
Insomnia was my night routine and my chest felt tighter
and tighter as months went by.
It became hard to take a deep breath, move or even sit in meditation.
Months went by like this until it escalated to a whole different level.
I would wake up either feeling physically paralysed or utterly jittery, hands shaking from the bones, heart pounding fast.
In between tearful episode, I would just stare at blank spaces
- for hours -
thinking
"what is wrong with me and how the fuck did I end up here ?"
And that, will be my days.
My nervous system was completely out of whack.
In a more technical term, I was bouncing from fight or flight to freeze response.
Fear had completely taken over my life.
Fear of moving, fear of doing, not doing, fear of being seen,
of going out, you name it.
I had quite a collection there.
Social events became more complicated,
a simple "how are you?" became gut clenching.
The more people around me, the lonelier I felt.
All I wanted was to be alone and disappear.
This aches to write, as it is a scary thing to say, very desperate also, but truthfully, it was on repeat in mind for months.
I convinced myself and came to believe that everyone hated me
and will be better off without me.
My mind won because in the process,
I lost friendships.
During that time, I felt very very lonely even more misunderstood.
I was living in constantly state of fear and overall very lost.
I didn't know what was happening nor how did I got there
but it had to stop.
I knew I had to get out of this s*** hole
or it will just keep spiralling down.
I knew i needed to move my body again, somehow
Also,
I knew I had to start small.
After months of despair,
I started what I like to call 'the one song therapy'.
Which happened to be the most powerful-healing thing
I have ever done for myself.
My goal was to stand up and move / dance on ONE song a day.
Just one song.
Anyway I liked, any pace or form, I just had to move.
That was the non negotiable commitment I made to myself.
☝️ ONE SONG.
I will play the music really loud,
loud enough to not hear my thoughts,
stand up and move.
Sometimes I would just stand there,
barely move a finger but most time,
it will shift something in me
and i would carry on for one, two, three and more songs.
It was the tiny magical moment of my day
where life could be felt again,
the sign of hope that healing was on the way.
Little by little, I was able to do enjoy doing yoga again, i was able to sit in meditation without feeling that my heart will come out of my chest
and more importantly, i fell in love with life again.
It was a long process but i can confidently say that
this practice has saved me and transform me in so many ways.
It brought me back to life, built confidence and trust in me
so i could feel like a human being again.
Now that I have more clarity about this all situation and time,
I can see and understand that I have lived with anxiety
for the majority of my life,
I'm talking age 4-5 when it all started.
Almost 30 years ... and the funny thing is that all this time I didn't even think I was not concerned by 'anxiety'.
The denial was real.
Anxiety is a smart, sneaky feeling
that can be (real) dangerous if we don't take care about it.
Now that i know how bad it can get
I remind myself daily those very simple principles :
maybe you need to hear this too
move and take deep breaths daily (-ish)
I can shift my energy at any given moment
my wellbeing is my numero uno priority
I am the only one that can make a change for myself
I am not alone
help and solutions are available to me at any time
I'm responsable for the state I'm in right now.
I might not be responsable for what happens to me or around me but I am responsable for how I deal with it.
I can ignore the signs of anxiety flaring up, listen and feed irrational thoughts until it rules my mind, my body and .. my life
or
I can choose to take control back of my life, reach for help
and reset my nervous system.
It hurts me to know that so many of us are dealing with anxiety, on a daily basis.
It hurts me even more to think that many , too many,
don't know what to do about it, feel alone and
are exhausted to live that way.
I have created a mini studio for you.
A video library filled with simple, efficient practices to find instant relief
and prevent anxiety to 'level up'.
'Tame your anxiety' was born with the desire to add more calm and peace into your life, like it did in mine.
.because it is too important.
You matter, your wellbeing matters,
take back the control of life
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