So many of the people who come to see me are living with anxiety, depression, or both, often for years before they ever say the words out loud. They tell me they feel like something is wrong with them, that they should be coping better, that everyone else seems to manage just fine. I want to say something today that I say often in my clinic: there is nothing wrong with you. Your mind and body are doing exactly what they were designed to do.
Anxiety is not a personality flaw. It is your nervous system trying to protect you, often based on messages laid down a long time ago, sometimes so far back that you don’t consciously remember them. Depression isn’t weakness either. It can be the mind and body’s way of shutting things down when we’ve been carrying too much for too long, or when old beliefs about not being safe, not being good enough, or not being loveable have been running quietly in the background for years.
In my hypnotherapy work, and in the Mind-Body-Magic Method, we don’t just look at the anxious thought or the low mood sitting on the surface. We go looking for where it began. Anxiety and depression can have many different threads feeding into them, but very often, when we trace an issue back with a client under hypnosis, we find an earlier moment, sometimes in childhood, where a belief was formed to keep that person safe at the time. The trouble is, the mind can keep running that old program long after the danger has passed, and it shows up now as a racing heart in the supermarket, a tight chest before a meeting, or a heaviness getting out of bed in the morning. When we do find a belief like that and update it at the level of the subconscious mind, rather than just talking about it, real and lasting change becomes possible.
That said, you don’t need to be in my chair to start feeling better today. There are things you can do for yourself, right now, that make a genuine difference.
The psychologist Abraham Maslow spent his career studying what people need in order to feel truly well, and it’s worth asking yourself which of these are missing in your life right now, because anxiety and depression often show up exactly where a need isn’t being met. Are you getting enough sleep, food and movement? These sound basic, but they’re the foundation everything else sits on, and they’re often the first things to slip when we’re struggling. Do you feel safe, physically and financially, or is there something in your life that genuinely needs addressing rather than just managing? Do you have people around you who you can be honest with, who you belong with, rather than just people you perform for? Do you feel any sense of respect, for yourself and from others, or has that been worn away over time? And are you doing anything, however small, that lets you feel like yourself, that uses your particular gifts or gives you a sense of purpose?
You don’t have to fix all of this at once. Pick the one that feels most true for you today, the one that would make the biggest difference if it improved even slightly, and start there.
A few other things genuinely help. Name what you’re feeling, out loud or on paper, rather than letting it stay a vague cloud, because anxiety and depression both lose some of their power the moment they’re named. Notice your breath and slow it right down for a minute or two; your nervous system takes its cues from your breathing more than almost anything else. Get outside if you can, even for five minutes, because sunlight and movement genuinely change your brain chemistry. And be honest with someone about how you’re really doing, because both anxiety and depression thrive in secrecy and silence.
YOU ARE NOT BROKEN, AND YOU ARE NOT ALONE IN THIS.
In my clinical experience, what’s underneath anxiety or low mood is very often there for a reason, an old attempt to protect a younger version of you. Where that’s true for you, that reason no longer has to run the rest of your life.
If you’d like some free support with this, I run online Mini-Blitz Workshops covering topics including anxiety, stress, panic and depression, and you’re welcome to explore those at carolmacrae.com/mini-blitz-workshops. And if you’d rather talk it through with me directly, I offer a free 30 minute consultation to see how I can help.
Carol xo
