A lot of the time when people give advice intended to relieve anxiety, they suggest doing “relaxing” things like drawing, painting, knitting, taking a bubble bath, coloring in one of those zen coloring books, or watching glitter settle to the bottom of a jar.
This advice is always well-intentioned, and I’m not here to diss people who either give it or who benefit from it. But it has never, ever done shit for me, and this is because it goes about resolving anxiety in the completely wrong way.
THE WORST THING YOU CAN DO when suffering from anxiety is to do a “relaxing” thing that just enables your mind to dwell and obsess more on the thing that’s bothering you. You need to ESCAPE from the dwelling and the obsession in order to experience relief.
You can drive to a quiet farm, drive to the beach, drive to a park, or anywhere else, but as someone who has tried it all many, many times, trust me–it’s a waste of gas. You will just end up still sad and stressed, only with sand on your butt. You can’t physically escape your sadness. Your sadness is inside of you. To escape, you need to give your brain something to play with for a while until you can approach the issue with a healthier frame of mind.
People who have anxiety do not need more time to contemplate, because we will use it to contemplate how much we suck.
In fact, you could say that’s what anxiety is–hyper-contemplating. When we let our minds run free, they run straight into the thorn bushes. Our minds are already running, and they need to be controlled. They need to be given something to do, or they’ll destroy everything, just like an overactive husky dog ripping up all the furniture.
Therefore, I present to you:
THINGS YOU SHOULD NOT DO WHEN ANXIOUS
–Go on a walk
–Watch a sunset, watch fish in an aquarium, watch glitter, etc.
–Go anywhere where the main activity is sitting and watching
–Draw, color, do anything that occupies the hands and not the mind
–Do yoga, jog, go fishing, or anything that lets you mentally drift
–Do literally ANYTHING that gives you great amounts of mental space to obsess and dwell on things.
THINGS YOU SHOULD DO WHEN ANXIOUS:
–Do a crossword puzzle, Sudoku, or any other mind teaser game. Crosswords are the best.
–Write something. It doesn’t have to be a masterpiece. Write the Top 10 Best Restaurants in My City. Rank celebrities according to Best Smile. Write some dumb Legolas fanfiction and rip it up when you’re done. It’s not for publication, it’s a relief exercise that only you will see.
–Read something, watch TV, or watch a movie–as long as it’s engrossing. Don’t watch anything which you can run as background noise (like, off the top of my head, Say Yes to The Dress.) As weird as it seems, American Horror Story actually helps me a lot, because it sucks me in.
–Masturbate. Yes, I’m serious. Your mind has to concentrate on the mini-movie it’s running. It can’t run Sexy Titillating Things and All The Things That are Bothering Me at the same time. (…I hope. If it can, then…ignore this one.)
–Do math problems—literally, google “algebra problems worksheet” and solve them. If you haven’t done math since 7th grade this will really help you. I don’t mean with math, I mean with the anxiety.
–Play a game or a sport with someone that requires great mental concentration. Working with 5 people to get a ball over a net is a challenge which will require your brain to turn off the Sadness Channel.
–Play a video game, as long as it’s not something like candy crush or Tetris that’s mindless.
THINGS YOU SHOULD DO DURING PANIC ATTACKS ESPECIALLY:
–List the capitals of all the U.S. states
–List the capitals of all the European countries
–List all the shapes you can see. Or all the colors.
–List all the blonde celebrities you can think of.
–Pull up a random block of text and count all the As in it, or Es or whatever.
Now obviously, I am not a doctor. I am just an anxious person who has tried almost everything to help myself. I’ve finally realized that the stuff people recommend never works because this is a disorder that thrives on free time and free mental space. When I do the stuff I listed above, I can breathe again. And I hope it helps someone here too.
(Now this shouldn’t have to be said but if the “do nots” work for you then by all means do them. They’ve just never worked for me.)
This would’ve been great an hour ago
This is good advice for anxious peeps and peeps with anxious friends. Seems obvious now but I hadn’t thought about it this way before.
Getting stabbed is an experience that no one in their right mind would want to have. But, what if you do get stabbed? What would that feel like?
It usually feels like you’re being punched.
The description of being punched really hard comes up a lot when people describe the experience. One woman said she didn’t even realize she was being stabbed, she just thought her attacker was punching her as hard as he could. Many people don’t feel the actual puncturing, just the force of the knife hitting them.
You might feel nothing at all.
This wasn’t as common as the feeling of being hit, but some people said they literally felt nothing. One person said they felt nothing, but their brain started racing and their fight or flight kicked in. Another didn’t realize someone stabbed them until they saw that they were bleeding profusely.
Occasionally, it feels like you got shocked.
A few stab wound survivors described it as a very quick, but powerful, electric shock. One person described it as static electricity, while another said it was like lightening hitting them. The pain of the initial shock goes away as quickly as it occurred.
Eventually, over time, it’s probably going to hurt.
Of course the location of the stab wound effects how much it would hurt. Getting stabbed in the arm isn’t going to hurt as badly as a stab that punctured a lung. But after a while, you will most likely feel some pain. If the person wiggles the knife while it’s still in you, the pain may be more intense.
Reblogging for future reference. Most Rychillan weapons are daggers or bows/crossbows.
Remember you have until August 4th, 2018 to register as a writer!
ALL SHIPS WELCOME
This is not a ship specific bang! The only specifics we have is that the monster is the focus and a canon monster (Got Witch!Sam falling for his brother? How about Demon!Dean taking Abbadon up on her offer? Maybe a fluffy little day in the life of Were!Garth and his pups!)
What is an Eldritch Bang? It’s a new SPN bang that focuses on the eerie, creepy and unnatural. Give us all your horror tropes, Lovecraftian monsters, and Gothic scenes.
Whatever scares you, this is the place to write (and art) about it.
Writers must produce a fic of at least 5k words that revolve around any topics that tie back to any related horror themes. Artists will then claim stories and produce one piece of art (or more if you want) for that story.
Challenge will be run simultaneously on tumblr and LJ.
Posting begins on Halloween. Fast, quick and fun. And did we mention scary?
Karate, SPN Demonic Octopus Guardian 