Four ways to ease anxiety

Do you ever feel anxious? Oh ME too. Running a business is quite anxiety-making! Here are four things that help ease my worries. They might work for you too.

1. Go for a walk

Years ago I was grumbling to my boss about how much work I had to do. He told me to go for a walk. A walk! Like I had time to go for a walk! But he was my boss and I was obedient so I did what I was told.

You know what? It WORKED!

I went for a walk and thirty minutes later I was calm, energised and ready to tackle my work mountain.

I still find it hard to make myself go for a walk if I’m stressed about having too much to do. It feels kinda wrong to use up precious work time walking. But I know it works so I do it.

Sceptical?! Here are two brain scan pictures  – see the red stuff on the right hand side that’s ‘happy’.

2. Write it down

Another very easy way to manage anxiety is to write down your worries. Have you ever tried this? It really works!

When you’re worried about stuff the ‘worries’ take up a lot of room in your brain. So much room in fact that your brain loses power. The action of writing down your worry moves the worry out of your brain and frees up space for useful stuff.

3. Pick ONE thing to do

The trouble with anxiety is that it actually stops us doing stuff. It’s a totally nuts reaction. But there we are, worried about how we are going to make more sales and we are so bloomin’ anxious that we don’t do anything!

Here’s a good tip. If you’re anxious about something just start on ONE little thing to help towards it. The fact that you’ve actually taken a step in the right direction will help ease your overall anxiety.

4. Schedule ‘worry’ time

If you are often anxious set aside some “worry” time. Worrying stops us getting on with stuff now but if you schedule an hour of “worry” time for, say, 7pm you’ll free up your mind to get on with useful stuff now!

*Running a little business can make for anxious times. How do YOU manage it?!*

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