I missed posting this for Mental Health Awareness Month back in May, but I figure that the purpose of my blog is to generate awareness around mental health year-round.
Last month I gave some of my followers an opportunity to ask questions anonymously about going to therapy using a Google form I had created. My hope was that if anyone out there felt hesitant about going to therapy, they could ask a question and I (a frequent therapy goer) or my husband, Dean (a licensed therapist) could answer it.
We answered the same question separately from each other, so you may see a little overlap in our advice below.
The question I want to focus on in this post is:
How do you “try out” a therapist to see if they are a good fit without having to retell your trauma every time?
If you don’t follow me on Instagram, I’m offering a chance to win a free premium subscription (worth $39.99) for one year to the positive affirmation app ThinkUp! The contest ends 4/11 at midnight, so head over to Instagram and find my account (@threadsofanxiety) to see the details on how to enter!
ThinkUp is one of the apps listed on my Top Picks page, and I describe it more in detail in this post. The quick summary of ThinkUp is that it’s an app that allows you to record yourself saying positive affirmations to create tracks you can listen to daily. You can even add background music to make it more enjoyable! The app has suggestions of affirmations to say, or you also have the freedom to create your own.
I hope you’ll check it out and share with others who might be interested!
I recently purchased the book The Power of Nowby Eckhart Tolle because I was intrigued by this idea:
Depression is dwelling on the past, anxiety is dwelling on the future, and peace is dwelling on the present.
Maybe you’ve heard something like that before. There is a very similar quote attributed to Lao Tzu, although I’ve heard that it may be questionable who really said it.
But this idea that living in the present moment is the key to peace and happiness has been something I have been pondering for a while.
The premise of Tolle’s book is that depression is experienced because we are dwelling on negative feelings about the past, like regret, guilt, or self-loathing. Anxiety is experienced when we negatively dwell on the future, causing feelings of fear, worry, or dissatisfaction with life in general. True peace and happiness, according to Tolle, comes when we stop living so much in our heads, and take time to be present in the here and now.
There are examples in the Bible that would seem to echo this idea. The Lord’s prayer (Matthew 6:9-13) uses the phrase “give us today our daily bread” (NIV), which could imply that we only need to ask God for things concerning today (we don’t need to ask him for tomorrow’s bread, we just need today’s.) A little later in chapter 6, it says “therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.”
In the book of Exodus, when the Israelites are wandering in the desert, God provides daily food for them – manna and quail (ch. 16). The people are instructed to “go out each day and gather enough for that day.” Anyone who gathered more than a day’s worth found it to be rotting and “full of maggots” by the next morning.
Mindfulness, the practice of being fully present with where we are and what we’re doing, has been gaining popularity in Western culture over the past decade or so, and it also heavily utilizes the present moment, the NOW, to decrease stress and anxiety. Mindfulness meditations typically have you focus on sensations in your body and view your body and thoughts in a non-judgmental way. Headspace, one of my top picks, is a great app to check out for guided mindfulness meditations.
Obviously the idea of there being power in the now is not new or uniquely attributed to one person.
So what does it look like practically to live in the present moment?
Threads of Anxiety 