Exercises To Calm Your Anxious Thoughts

Talk yourself down.

With so many problems swirling around in the world now, negativity can permeate the air. How you manage those overwhelming thoughts that drain your energy is vitally important to your sense of well-being today.

A few ideas that have proven useful to me are:

Deep breathing, feel my feelings, talk, really talk, with a trusted friend or my personal coach.

Take a walk around, stand up and stretch, decide to get outside to soak in some fresh air and sunshine. Do some gentle yoga.

Even thinking about calling a good friend can help me relax since I know that if I am talking to another person who cares about me enough to listen and be understanding. Hopefully I'll have an opportunity to chat with this person within a few days.

People like to help. When we call someone, we are giving them an opportunity to help us. Be sure to start the conversation with the sincere question: Do you have a few minutes for a conversation now? Be sure to respect a short time frame and use words of gratitude in closing. And reciprocate if the opportunity arises.

If my full calendar is causing me anxiety, I remind myself that those things on my to-do list are of my choosing. If that list gets longer than 1-3 items in a day I ask myself which of those items I can delegate to someone else and I make the decision to ask for their help. What works best then is for me to put in writing what they’ve agreed to handle, and I can take those things off of my own list.

Time for another deep breath. Breathing in compassion for self, breathing out compas.