Ultimate Gateway to Anxiety You Must Avoid
Understand this to catch anxiety before it even begins..
By far the most important concept I’ve learned about anxiety is it’s easier to prepare to avoid anxious moments than it is to be directly in them and then try to escape…
If you can become aware of these two concepts I will share ahead…
You stop the domino effect from starting!
Once the ball gets rolling, it’s hard to stop. Many of us are trying to brute force fight our social anxiety in the heat of the moment. Almost always this won’t work. You’re fighting an uphill battle while being low on resources to defend yourself.
PS. Before we begin I just wanted to let you know I’m running a workshop this Thursday for those of you interested in learning how to get less stressed and deal with social anxiety better…
Here’s What to Avoid:
1. Living Cerebrally
Believe it or not, anxiety isn’t in your mind. Anxiety is multi-layered and most of it is in your body, not the mind. And yet our mind is what tracks our anxiety in our body.
While this may not work for everyone it will work for most…
A good trick is the 3-3-3 rule.
Look around and name 3 things you see.
Listen around and name 3 things you hear.
Look and move 3 parts of your body.
BONUS: Smell and name one aroma you can smell.
If you’re just reading this and you’re not facing anxiety at the moment, this may seem stupid or silly or too simple to work. It DOES work by grounding your body in the present moment.
Another great trick is to go to the bathroom and wash your hands and let yourself feel the water sensation on your hands for about 15 seconds. Next, try to imagine or think about something you are grateful for to help pull you emotionally up.
Now, for the real gateway…
2. Sugar - Gateway Drug to Anxiety…
Sugar, found in junk food and refined carbohydrates like high fructose corn syrup (found in the vast majority of processed foods in the USA).
Sugar is the biggest gateway drug in our society that continues to keep people anxious, tired, experience health issues, and not themselves. Growing up I routinely remember before or after going to school I would stop by the store and buy bags of candy or stop at a drive-thru and buy junk.
What happens inside your body?
After eating and providing my body energy with the sugar, it is quickly used up by your brain and the exact environment needed for anxiety to flourish and thrive.
It makes sense. Many people turn to sugar when they feel anxious unconsciously. That's because sugary foods weaken the body's ability to properly respond to stress, by suppressing the adrenal axis in your brain, which controls your response to stress.
Sugar temporarily lowers anxiety….
And then, it increases it subsequently right after…
Check out this great graphic from Balancing Brain Chemistry!
Also, sugar has been shown to be more physically addictive than Cocaine.
A study from Frontiers in Psychiatry explored that sugar is often used to make foods more appealing could also lead to habituation and even in some cases addiction contributing to the obesity epidemic and in my opinion the mental health epidemic as well.
The study goes on to mention - a review of the evolutionary aspects of feeding and how they have shaped the human brain to function in “survival mode” signaling to “eat as much as you can while you can.” This leads to our present understanding of how the dopaminergic system is involved in reward and its functions in hedonistic rewards, like eating highly palatable foods, and drug addiction.
What To Do Instead:
Stick to fruit or try natural low glycemic sugars like erythritol, monk fruit, etc.
Quitting cold turkey may not even be an option for some of you. When I tried to quit sugar, my body couldn’t handle it and I folded and ate more sugar.
What I began to do is seek a closer alternative to my treats.
I would go to the supermarket and buy frozen fruit like berries and either eat them straight up or blend them together with some coconut milk and make nice cream. If you haven’t heard of this, it’s a way to make a frozen dessert with the same texture of ice cream by blending frozen fruits together. I did this for 2 weeks and slowly began to wean the amount I was eating and how I eventually transitioned to eating 0 sugar.
Lucky for you, many food companies are now becoming aware of this and some are creating healthy alternatives to desserts. I personally love the KETO or Rebel Ice cream :)
Sugar is in almost every single processed food. Avoid processed foods, avoid sugar, stick to sources of fats and fiber as a fuel source.
Takeaway: If you spend your entire day focusing on NOT eating sugar, you WILL eventually fold and eat sugar.
The key is to instead focus on being properly fed and hydrated with healthy forms of food so that you eventually are not as tempted to devour a tasty devilish treat.
PS. Check out my full complete training program on how to rewire social anxiety and decrease stress & nervousness - here.
Conclusion
Enjoyed this article? Please consider sharing it with your friends, forwarding it to a co-worker, posting on an Instagram story, and tagging me or a LinkedIn post.
Have you checked out my FREE podcast yet?
Listen on Apple, Spotify, and YouTube.
Can I help?
Over the last several years I’ve devoted my life to helping introverted, shy, socially anxious creators, entrepreneurs, CEOs, and professionals move these mental health obstacles out of their life so they can get busy being their real selves in front of anyone.
If you are interested in potentially inquiring about my services for yourself or someone else, please fill out this form below.
For the next steps, fill out this form - here
Found this helpful? Please share and tag me!
Have any Questions? Just reply directly to this email and I’ll respond back :)