Just Don’t! Mental Monday!

Ever felt Anxious? Seeing things not there, or creating fantasies that don’t exist so as to fit the mould of life we are accustomed to living.

Welcome to your weekly mental health check up, some of the things here may not apply to you in any great extent but you may notice small doses in yourself or someone dear in your life. So be sure to be your persons keeper and if you have the time, shine some light on the world around you.

According to mayo clinic Anxiety is a mental health disorder characterised by feelings of worry, anxiety or fear that are strong enough to interfere with one’s daily activities. Examples of anxiety disorders include panic attacks, obsessive-compulsive disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder.

I realise this is much to take in, so let’s work on a simplified model for us who have a vested interest in getting to the root of the problem. This does not however imply that what is about to be discussed is the root cause for everyone but the reality of a distorted truth, complimenting my own anxiety giving birth to these thoughts.

Stories are powerful influences in peoples lives, so powerful in fact that in 2019 shackles are not the only things that make one a slave. The stories we grow up believing about ourselves has a profound influence on what shapes our realities, to the point where two people encounter rains. Neither with an umbrella or raincoat, one gets excited for the blessings of rain and the other thinks “what more could go wrong”.

This is in no way to slight the hardships we face daily, because life is hard for each of us and making comparisons never helps. I have this nasty habit of living life in my head, so my anxiety tends to spike up alot throughout the day. My face may not show it but my heart recognises the strange beating, eventually catching myself midst deep breathe.

Anxiety is dangerous as a majority of the thoughts that get us anxious, are just that, thoughts. If we allow them to spiral out of hand we tend to lose our grip on our life which in extremes looks like a panic attack. Speaking from experience as I had my first panic attack this year, it wasn’t as dramatic as the movies but my mind and body were not working in tandem.

My eyes could see that I was sitting on a chair with a laptop in front of me and I was alone but my mind was under fire completely ignoring the safety I was surrounded by. My heart raced as if I was under threat, my legs couldn’t move and my voice would not work properly.

One of the longest 5 minutes I’ve lived through, I felt the seconds drag along in no obvious rush as I tried to convince myself I was safe and life was fine. I remember this day because it was my first panic attack ever. What triggered me I’m not sure, and if evidence is anything to go by until I figure out what happened, I’m likely to have a few more.

The world we create or allow to be created for us, will go through siege testing us at every opportunity. If we are found wanting we are likely to crumble as everything we attached our identity to also crumbles.

There is a saying, ‘if you stand for nothing, you will fall for anything’ so this Monday I implore you, JUST DON’T, don’t live your life based on foreign ideologies. Don’t force yourself to pick up belief systems that are not true to you. Just don’t live your life shrouded in fear of the unknown or in fear of the constant nagging thoughts occupying the chambers of your mind.

JUST DON’T forget you are precious, even if the walls in your mind try to convince you otherwise.

Although we cannot control God’s time, it is part of the human condition to want to receive the thing we are waiting for as quickly as possible. Or to drive away whatever is causing our fear. How can you tell a passionate heart to be still and contemplate the miracles of Creation in silence, free of tension, fear and unanswerable questions?
Anxiety is part of love, and should not be blamed because of that.

– Taken from Paulo Coelho