Break Free from Anxiety with THIS skill!

00:00 - Dr. Andrea Moore (Host)
Anxiety and chronic pain tend to go together like peas in a pod. It is really tough to treat chronic pain when there is anxiety present and often that anxiety is exacerbating that chronic pain and more and more anxiety without chronic pain is becoming an increasing problem that I am seeing and really wanted to take the time to address today. Welcome, welcome, welcome to the Unweaving Chronic Pain Podcast. I am your host, dr Andrea Moore, founder of the Whole Self Integration Method, and I am all about taking people who feel like their lives are shrinking due to chronic pain, whether that is emotional or physical pain. It is shrinking their lives, getting in the way of living a life that they imagined for themselves. And even if you don't know what life could look like without pain, if you know that life was meant to be more than just managing your symptoms and getting by, was meant to be more than just managing your symptoms and getting by, then this is for you. If you want more out of life, if you want to fully live and experience life, then I am here to help guide you through. And today we're really going to be focusing specifically on anxiety and anxiety in that sense of I'm using it as a very broad term, that anxiety that you feel of like oh my goodness, like I can't do that thing that you know. Some people might label their anxiety more of like a fear, of an imposter syndrome, of a social anxiety, of a getting in the way of doing the thing they want to do, and so even notice. If you call it something different, I'm going to just going to use the blanket term anxiety, because I feel like I hear that a lot, and what I will say is since the pandemic, my goodness, have anxiety rates skyrocketed. We see this in all walks of life, whether it is students in jobs, people with social anxiety. The rates of anxiety actually went up by 25% globally after COVID or during COVID, and some of the rates since then are really staggering. I mean six times as high anxiety and depression. There was a study from Tulane University that said 92% of incoming students described themselves as anxious. We're seeing massive decreases in students actually socializing in one another. You're seeing rates of just dating and sex go, go down, and not in a good way. At colleges, kids are less likely to be involved in, you know, activities that with other people, and you know I noticed this in my clients as well. There was just a general like decline in the amount of getting out into the world that was happening and a lot was because a lot of it was anxiety producing. And it was so interesting. 

03:08
I came across a therapist who was helping clients with anxiety pre-pandemic and he was talking about how in his clients, there was very little anxiety that people were struggling with, or there was no uptick because they already had the tools and they knew what to do. And I will say in myself, because anxiety was something that I had worked with, a ton pre-pandemic I also experienced. Honestly, I really did not have anxiety during COVID or because of COVID, and in talking to different clients, different people, friends, family, things like that, I will say those who are already a little anxious just experienced a massive uptick. Right, it was like this giant mirror was being shown on what was already true, just bringing up and like triggering everything that was inside of them, and others who already knew how to cope really well, generally seemed to get by okay and really didn't feel like a huge uptick because of it. So it's been really interesting to talk to people who experienced such a wide range of reaction to a very similar situation and so, anyways, I know this is like we're like way past COVID and whatnot, but what I will say is I am very much still seeing the impact, and the impact needs to be addressed, and this is something that I've been getting a lot more passionate about lately because I've been seeing it more and more with clients who are coming to me with chronic pain. 

04:46
A lot of them recognize now that the pain itself is not the big issue. They really recognize the mind-body piece, and I'm actually having more and more people come to me not about pain but about anxiety itself, and what I will say is that it is so common that with pain, we end up managing and working through and expressing the anxiety piece, and that is the very thing that is the solution to chronic pain. And so you might notice, you know, I kind of see where this goes, but I really think I might be shifting a lot of my messaging. I mean, it already has been so clearly focused around like anxiety and emotional pain and things like that. But I think you might see that even more from me because it is just becoming so obvious that it is affecting us at a massive scale and it is affecting the younger generation, like the kids who are going to be our future leaders. It is affecting our country as a whole on such a massive scale. 

05:45
So I just really wanted to take a little time today to go over what I feel like is so essential in understanding anxiety and how to work with it and where I see a lot of people going wrong and it's because they're missing this essential piece and without it, even interventions that are that do have benefit, that do have evidence to support them that that could be useful, they will not work unless you address this one big piece that I want to share and you know it's so funny because I think there's such a massive range of where people go in their brains when they realize that they are experiencing anxiety afterwards is applicable to all of them. Just how you apply it might look a little bit differently, and if you need help in getting that kind of individualized how to apply it, that is what I'm here for. But I wanted to make sure that you can kind of identify like oh, what is my go-to around anxiety? Where does, where's my bias, where does my head go, where do I focus? And then you can make sure that you are applying it in the way that is right for you, because individualizing this is always, always crucial. So if you're listening to this, you probably want less anxiety. 

07:20
Anxiety gets in the way of making decisions. Anxiety gets in the way in going decisions. Anxiety gets in the way in going out and experiencing life. Maybe you want to travel, but the thought of going away from home makes you anxious. The thought of having to book a hotel. Is the hotel gonna be okay? Is where it's located gonna be okay? Right? Maybe you actually need to make a doctor's appointment, but the act of calling the doctor is almost too much for you to handle and you get anxious and how that phone call is gonna go. Maybe you want to go out and you have a dinner with your friends or meet up with a friend for drinks, but you're scared to text them because you're scared. What if they don't want to meet up with me? Right? This is all ways anxiety can get in the way. 

08:03
Maybe you just need to buy your kid a new pair of pants and you just have absolute anxiety. That is getting in the way. And now the simple task, because you know drama club needs black pants for your kid and you don't have any. It's been consuming your mind for the past two weeks because, oh my gosh, I have to go to the store and, oh, that's like a whole ordeal. Or even ordering it online brings up all this like reviews and am I gonna get the right size and all this good stuff. 

08:30
Maybe there's a job that you want to apply for and you're just too anxious about applying because you don't know what the answer is going to be. Maybe you're scared of the rejection, right. Maybe you are dealing with chronic pain and you know going to a. Maybe you're scared of the rejection, right. Maybe you are dealing with chronic pain and you know going to a physical therapist would be helpful, but the act of doing so is just too much. Right. Like um, I see this um pelvic floor physical therapy a lot. Right. The act of like going to pelvic floor therapy and having someone do an internal exam can be really anxiety provoking for people, so they don't go and do one. So these are all just examples of where anxiety can just impact your entire life, right? Sometimes it's so sneaky that people don't even realize it. 

09:17
So, with clients, a lot of times there'll be maybe a decision that needs to be made in the family, and this could be a small decision or a really big decision, but either way, it maybe a decision that needs to be made in the family, and this could be a small decision or a really big decision, but either way, it is a decision that requires, like their husband's input or their child's input. Right, it's like a family decision and they're they're racking their brains about it. And when I ask you know, like why haven't you made this decision? Or like what's getting in the way, it'll be like, well, I don't know what my husband wants. Let's just use husbands, for example. I don't know what he wants and I'm just like well, have you asked him? And they're like well, no, because I'm scared of how he's going to respond. And I'm scared of this. 

09:54
And I'll say, in these situations, in my clients who I'm talking about this with, they have really kind, compassionate, like loving partners, like this is not any abuse situation, this is not a situation where there is like any type of of of risk to asking it might be an uncomfortable conversation they might have to have that right, like might be bringing up and they know it might be bringing up some tension and they're so scared of that tension. Right, that's anxiety, that's I'm. I'm anxious about what will happen and I don't want to feel an uncomfortable feeling and I will say in like, literally I can't even think of an example where we've talked through of you know how to approach it. Here's what you can say Sometimes, just getting the wording right and having people see the big picture. They go and have a conversation and it literally has always gone well. It's never been a problem and doesn't even you know it might bring up some discomfort, but it always ends up being really really good because they work out something and then they get to clear their heads of it. 

10:56
So there are a million and a half situations where I'm using this anxiety term on a very global, blanket statement. And the other thing I want to mention about it, because we can see in all these situations how much it's impacting us. Right, like think about how much you have not done or how many things take longer to do because of anxiousness, and I would say procrastination is often also a symptom here too. So it's like they just go hand in hand, and the thing that we often don't take into account is how exhausting it is and how much energy it sucks to be in this state. We don't have a good way to measure this Not that I know of, at least. 

11:48
But when there is something running in the background, even if it's completely unconscious, right, like, even if it's something that feels real, let's use the pants for drama class, because I literally have to buy pants for my child for drama class. I don't actually feel anxious about it I'm just now remembering that I need to buy them, but it's a great example, right, because there's other things where I will feel like, oh gosh, oh gosh, there's this hard decision I have to make. But it's not actually a hard decision, right. It might be something very simple. It's just gonna require a little research and digging and reading through reviews, right, right, so I'll just use pants for drama class, though, even if it's not an active thought or like actively or consciously, you're not like, oh my goodness, this is gonna be so anxiety producing, right, when you're not doing it and just getting out and doing the thing and making the decision or completing the task. It is an open loop in your brain and your subconscious is twirling on it and it takes up mental space and it takes up energy. 

12:56
I'm going to tell you how often people with something like chronic fatigue or who are really even struggling with sleep or are struggling with feeling rested and are always feeling tired, how much those symptoms improve when they address anxiety or complete these loops, because they just do not realize and I say they and myself included how much these loops are taking up energy. We all all probably want more energy, like I think it's rare to meet people these days that are like I have an abundance of energy, I don't even know what to do with it. Right, we all want a little extra coffee or a little extra energy, and this is one of the fastest, most effective ways to get it back is addressing anxiety. Now, how do you address anxiety? Right, and this is exactly what this podcast is about, because so many people and this is where I was talking about people are going to go to different things in their head what addressing anxiety means. So for some, they see it as a personality trait. 

13:59
I am anxious. This is who I am. I have always been anxious, or even I even want to call some people out, because I will say there are people who have only been anxious really like it, like got triggered during COVID and they forgot that they actually weren't an anxious person before. So just throwing that out there, if that's you. But they identify as anxious and then it feels like the only solution is like medication, like well, then I have to take medication for it because it's like a brain imbalance, right, and maybe they're okay with that and maybe they're not okay with that Either way. 

14:32
Here's the thing. We could go into a whole podcast about medication. I think medication has its place. I am not anti-medication when used appropriately and with other tools. I think when there's anything that is debilitating, medication can be a beautiful bridge and for some people it might be, depending on their situation, something that they do use lifelong. 

14:55
That being said, most people that I am meeting do not need medication, and I'm saying most people that I'm meeting. I don't know who. You are listening, right, obviously, if you're listening and we've never met, that is not including you or your situation, because I don't know you. But I will say most people that I meet who are coming to me, it is much more of this generalized anxiety or specific anxiety about a situation that medication is only going to mask and suppress the issue and, again, if you're listening and you're like, actually that sounds great. Sometimes masking and suppressing an issue is a temporary thing that will allow you to then go to the next treatment and address it. So, again, that is a decision that we'd have to talk about that one-on-one, and then, of course, like with a doctor, because I do not prescribe medications, but more often than not, medications are a band-aid and they are only slapping a band-aid on a much deeper issue and, when not at least coupled with something else, are going to come back to bite you in the ass. I don't have a better way of saying that. Sorry, but I've seen it over and over. 

16:07
The other thing people go to is talk therapy. Talk therapy, again, can be a great tool for some people. There is obviously benefits to it. But if you have been going to talk therapy for quite some time and all you feel like a chance for you to just vent or rage, and then you leave and you temporarily feel better and then it comes right back, you are not addressing the issue. And in fact there's some studies that show that this type of talk therapy when all that is happening is you're kind of like looping over the same issues over and over, like maybe you had some sessions where you were going deep and you like uncovered some stuff from childhood and and this situation, and it's like, ah, yes, I guess they made these connections, but you're still now looping on them or it's constantly being brought back to this thing, but you're not actually then addressing it, you're just kind of talking about it. It's not, it's not getting to the root cause. 

17:11
You cannot rewire the nervous system with talk therapy. We know that. Or you know you can in very, very limited ways and if you do, you know it works. Then it works and it works pretty rapidly. If you're looping on the same thing, you're not rewiring the nervous system and in fact, when that happens, you are often enforcing the anxiety and habituating a pattern and it actually becomes more detrimental than helpful. And what I'll say is people tend to know that right away when I say something like that Of whether or not their talk therapy is supportive or not, often it can start out supportive and then it just becomes not supportive. 

17:52
Sometimes it's like a crutch in a way, or a cast and I don't mean crutch in like the typical sense of people. Let's use the word cast instead, because it's a better word Like a cast is necessary and an essential part of a treatment of, let's say, a broken bone that needs a cast right, but you eventually take off the cast and then you need to go into like strengthening exercises and things like that. So sometimes talk therapy would be better when it's used as that, like it's a temporary thing or it helps for a small piece, but it's just not. It's never addressing the whole picture. Maybe you've even tried things like nervous system regulation techniques, which can include a lot of things. Maybe it's meditation, mindfulness, vagal nerve stimulation, deep breathing, journaling, attempting to think different thoughts. Now, all of these things can be beautiful tools. 

18:42
The question is is are they working for you? Are they creating the intended results? And this is like such a great example with your results will vary depending on what stage your system is in and where your system is, and if you are missing this piece that I'm going to be telling you about, when it comes to anxiety, chances are you have been trying these things, or maybe you tried it a couple times and it just upticked your anxiety. You got scared because there was too much an intensity of emotion that came in. You felt like your nervous system was flooded and kind of freaked you out, made you more anxious, all these things and then, you know, didn't feel like it helped. Well, it makes sense that then, if this thing that I'm gonna tell you about in a minute is missing, you'll understand why. And it's not again that these tools are wrong. But it almost be similar to strengthening using the cast analogy, but in this case, cast is no longer talk therapy, but it's like it'd be like trying to strengthen a broken bone when what you need is actually for it to set first right. It's like wrong tool at the wrong time or right tool at the wrong time, sorry. So here's the thing If you have been trying all of these different things for anxiety or maybe you haven't been trying a lot of things, because it gives you anxiety to even think about, oh my goodness, what do I do for anxiety. Think about, oh my goodness, what do I do for anxiety Then, don't worry, I got you, because you're missing a big thing and I see it missed so often. 

20:17
Today I was actually just in a conversation with someone who attends a lot of like mental health workshops through her university and she was telling me how they really. What she really appreciates about my approach because she had already worked with me at this point and we had worked together is that at these mental health workshops where they're teaching people how to deal with anxiety, imposter syndrome, burnout, things like that. So many of them were bringing in these beautiful tools of like where is it in the body? And identifying it right, these like what they were calling somatic based tools. But then that was it. They were just like, okay, you've identified it. Yay, it's almost like name it to tame it, but we need to do more than just naming something. 

21:07
And so if you've tried things like that or it felt like, oh my gosh, I've tried this somatic stuff and this doesn't work either, you're not alone because, again, it's missing such a huge piece. That is not somatic work, or that's not how I look at somatic work. It's like such a tiny, tiny piece of it and ultimately, if just naming something worked, then I mean all I'd have to do is name that I'm dehydrated and that would hydrate me. Like it doesn't actually make sense, right? Not if our body is looking for something else or needs more support in an area. We cannot just name things and expect that to be enough for some emotions. Is that all they need is some validation? Yeah, but then it, then it works right, like if all something needed was the validation and the naming and the acknowledgement then that naming it to tame it does work. But if that's not all it needed, then naming it was the first step. 

22:06
So the piece that I see missing over and over and over is the capacity to be with the anxiety, just being able to be like there is anxiety here and I can be with it Full stop. Now you might be like why on earth would I want to just be with my anxiety? I want it gone. And or how didn't you cure all those problems it was causing me? Right, like? I just list them all off. Obviously I know what they are, but look, if trying to get rid of it and lessen it hasn't been working, then we need another solution and this is part of the solution. This is an essential, essential, essential piece to the solution. When this is missing, even the best of solutions will fall flat, not work and worse, usually will make the anxiety worse. Because now you're like, oh my goodness, I've tried all the things and nothing's working. I must truly be broken. You're like, oh my goodness, I've tried all the things and nothing's working. I must truly be broken. 

23:13
Look, here's the thing Anxiety, ultimately, is a normal human emotion. We have got to stop pathologizing it. Are there pathological levels of anxiety? Sure, but even seeing them as pathological, as dysfunctional, as this horrible thing that has gone wrong and as you're broken because of it, will only make the anxiety worse. That doesn't mean you don't treat it, that you don't address it. It's just noting this. Anxiety is a crucial human experience. You might be feeling it at times where it doesn't feel appropriate, but the anxiety itself, it doesn't mean anything's gone wrong. Right, there's like a mismatch of where the anxiety is. It's not that anxiety is abnormal in the first place, is? It's not that anxiety is abnormal in the first place? 

24:17
One of the examples I love to use to demonstrate this is using like a wild animal, like you can take a rat, a bunny, something like that, like a prey animal, and if you imagine that they were taken and rats are a good one, because there's literally studies that show this, because they've done this right, let's say you know where they'll have those. Maybe you don't know because you don't sit here and read studies about rats, but they build these, um, enriched environments for the rats, meaning they have, like it's, a super safe environment, they have all these toys for them to play, with places for them to exercise, ample food, whatever, like. It's this beautiful environment. They're super safe in it. There's nothing that can come eat them right Now. 

24:52
Imagine they're taking a rat from whatever situation it's in and they are dropping it into this new environment. Do you think this rat is going to immediately feel safe or do you think they're going to feel anxious? If you've answered anxious, you are correct. The rat is going to be anxious as fuck. Okay, because it has just been dropped into a new environment. 

25:15
It does not trust it yet. It doesn't matter how much you sat there and told the rat how safe it was going to be. It cannot comprehend that, and neither can our nervous systems. Just because we can talk to our nervous systems, it can get through a little bit, but often it's not going to get through to that like animalistic, like prehistoric part of our brain that needs it the most. We can't. We can sit here and talk about it analytically, all we want, but that part of our brain has to experience the safety, just like the rat. So that rat's going to start feel super anxious and then it's going to start exploring and over time and depending on the rat's going to start feel super anxious and then it's going to start exploring and over time and depending on the rat's previous experiences, it will move into safety. 

26:00
A rat that has been abused, a rat that has been through traumatic experiences, that has had bad experience in new places, is probably going to take a hell of a lot longer and need a whole lot more like some type of I don't know how you treat a rat anxiety. Okay, but right, they're gonna need like extra, extra care and safety there. But uh, but a rat that you know hasn't had anything too much and can has a lot of positive experiences I can call from, will be able to come to safety a whole lot quicker, can call from, will be able to come to safety a whole lot quicker. Same for humans. Okay, the advantages in humans, even ones who have had not so good experiences or very traumatic experiences, we have the benefit of talk and being able to talk through and apply a whole lot more interventions that we can do to rats. But the point is, is anxious as like a go-to response is actually really really normal for the brain? When it's like feeling unsafe and when the nervous system is hyper vigilant, it's normal and then moving into a relaxed, full of safety ventral vagal if you are familiar with the vagus nerve response one where you feel safe, you can explore, you can, you know, you can thrive in. 

27:12
But often the anxiety is going to come first. The problem is not the anxiety. The problem is our ability to cope with and be with and move through the anxiety to get to the state that we want to get. Here's the problem. The more we ram on the anxiety as the problem, the more we will stay stuck there. The more we feel anxiety and be like something is wrong, the more anxious we are about the fact that we have anxiety. And then we will stay in anxiety because all we're doing is telling our nervous system and our brains that, holy shit, something is wrong. You're right to be anxious. Right, there is a threat here. The thing is, is what the threat is is the anxiety itself, which only just makes the body and the brain more anxious, and so we will stay stuck there endlessly? The anxiety is not the problem. It is our capacity to be with the anxiety and then know how to move through it and get to the place where we feel safe, when we switch our focus from trying to reduce and get rid of anxiety as if it is wrong to be there, and instead move through, move into a capacity to fully be with the anxiety and then move through it. 

28:28
A natural byproduct will be to feel more safe and less anxious more often. There will never be an absence of anxiety in our lives. It's impossible. If you want to live a life that is full of experiences, of meeting new people, of going to new places, of doing fun things, anxiety is going to have to be something that you want to learn how to be with more and more often. Even if you stayed in a perfectly safe, small world, all that happens because of how small your world becomes, it actually will still uptick your anxiety and you will feel more and more anxious, even in these small areas, and your world will just continue to shrink. 

29:12
The whole irony is, when we are okay with feeling anxious, we move out of it faster because it gets full expression and then we learn how to move through. So we experience it less as a byproduct, but not because we're making the anxiety go away. It's because we're making the anxiety go away. It's because we're allowing it to move through. When we resist the anxiety being there, we're circling in it, we stay stuck in it. So the big thing here is, if you want to experience less anxiety, learning to embrace it fully is one of the skills that you will want to learn. It is a skill you might be like I have no freaking clue how to do that. That is okay. 

29:53
Most of us have not been taught so much out there has been taught on. Here's how you reduce it. Here's the breath you do Breathe through this nostril and this nostril and then you'll have less anxiety. And look, some of those can be actually great tools. I'm actually not shitting on those tools at all. I maybe I am a little bit when used appropriately and when they work like they do work like they are working with the nervous system and all these things. However, if you have been trying to use those tools and either they don't work or they only work really temporarily and you're finding yourself almost like feeling like codependent on them, it's because this piece needs to be looked at first. I love breath work. I love, you know, making sure I'm bringing in my breath and and all these kinds of things. However, it's never for the intention to get rid of anxiety. It's actually to breathe with the anxiety and to allow it to move through, which is what many of these techniques are actually doing. I just don't feel like they're often being taught that way. 

30:54
Anxiety, ultimately, too, cannot be solved by analytically trying to figure it out, because most anxiety is caused by analytically trying to figure things out. Your brain is like trying to logically figure out something that's living in the unconscious and that will never work. You have to go to the unconscious and solve it there. Now here's the thing Anxiety is ultimately a symptom, and the levels and intensity of anxiety and how people experience anxiety like, let's say, we could go in and we could like right, it's like it's impossible to know how someone else is experiencing it. But let's let's say we knew, let's say we knew how we, how people, were experiencing it. You could just take 10 people and they are all experiencing the exact same levels of anxiety. Their underlying reason of why and what needs to be addressed, may look completely different for every single one of those people. 

31:47
Your experience of anxiety is not a good indication for what's underneath. It's just an indication there is something underneath. One person might just be fine with some nostril breathing and that's all they needed and they're good to go. Another person might need some deep diving into rewiring the nervous system. Another person might need some deep trauma work, right Like what is underneath needs to be identified. To identify that and to get what is needed for that individual person requires being fully with the anxiety that is there. It's impossible to get to what's really underneath and what is needed if we can't first have some capacity to be with what is present. 

32:39
Just like if a surgeon needed to fix a broken bone. Let's say there's an 80 year old who breaks their hip and that 80 year old was unfortunately already wheelchair bound versus there's a 20 year old athlete that breaks their hip and they are hoping to get back into their sport. This surgery that's required is going to be very different. Both are a broken hip, though you don't want that surgeon to rush into a surgery and to immediately fix it without that surgeon spending time with the patient to understand their goals and then fully examining what needs to be done. Hips can be broken in different ways, right Like different surgeries still might be required, even if it's the same break. They might choose different surgeries based on what the patient's trying to get back to and what's going to be best for them. 

33:28
You don't want the surgeon jumping in and literally being like we must fix this, I'm wrong, because that could be quite the detriment to the patients. Nor would you expect the pain to be instantly gone after the surgery or to not need like more Rehab and follow-up, right. But we do this with anxiety all the time and like anxiety interventions, I will see and not everyone is, not, everyone is this way, I was this way and I still have to catch myself, and I know a lot of my clients are this way. So there's again no judgment of this. But those of us with a more like perfectionistic or a more like quick fix type of mentality, we just want something to just be fixed and go away and be perfectly and work perfectly. 

34:11
The first time we are often expecting a single intervention to cure something that is a much bigger, complex issue, and so then we get frustrated. For example, if that meditation we tried, or the breathwork we tried, or maybe even your I introduced tools within my pain to power program of how to increase the capacity to be with discomfort and with anxiety, for instance, and you're expecting that to make the anxiety go away and it's actually not. In fact it's going to increase it at first because the anxiety has got to move through. And so when you're expecting something to make the anxiety go away instantaneously, or like with one session, and there's because, because you are trying to decrease, you're having to feel the anxiety, right, your tolerance of it is very low, and so therefore, you want that quick fix, which is super understandable. Anxiety is really fucking uncomfortable. 

35:15
It only makes the anxiety worse and prolongs the treatment of it. Because often then, what people do is they jump from thing to thing. You know, maybe they find some program that's some here, this you know 30 day meditation thing that's going to make your anxiety go away. They get to day 10 and they're still feeling anxious. So they're like that's it, that doesn't work. So then they go to some here's some, you know journaling prompt that this is going to get to the root of your anxiety, and they do that for a few days, but their anxiety is still present. So they go to something else, right. And then they try some therapy, and then they try some somatic work and they're jumping from treatment to treatment without ever getting into the deep stuff, because often getting into the deep stuff requires an increased intensity of sensation that we have to experience and feel, and so if we try to do that without first increasing our capacity to be with it and normalizing that, hey, we're gonna feel this intensity and that's part of how we move through things then all people are doing is jumping from thing to thing, and each thing that they jump to, each thing that feels like another failed treatment, only adds to the layers that they're to. Each thing that feels like another failed treatment only adds to the layers that they're going to have to move through. 

36:32
So to sum this all up because I feel like I could talk about this for another five hours is that it is crucial to learn how to increase the skill of being with the anxiety, not so you have to keep experiencing it, but because that is the very thing that will set you free. And in that understanding that some level of anxiety in a well-lived life is normal, the anxiety is not the problem. It is our ability to move out of it, because we aren't letting ourselves ever fully be with it and move into a state of safety or thriving, or curiosity or, you know, whatever the state is you want to be with. It's that you're labeling that state of being anxious as wrong which creates all this, which only is going to lead to more anxiety and will keep you stuck in this cycle. Sometimes the cycle can be super sneaky, by the way. So if you want to learn how to do that because it's a process, like I said, it is a process we first have to develop some level of safety, to even touch into our bodies, to feel into the anxiety, and then we really are learning how to fully be with it without being flooded by it. 

38:00
This piece is so crucial. This work should never be this, like a lot of people want. The big, like cathartic thing of like you know, grief is a great example of like oh, if I just have this massive crying session for three hours, then I'll fully move through it, and usually things like that, especially with anxiety, will only flood your system and send you right back into like fight, flight or freeze. So I actually don't recommend that and it has nothing to do with the and it has nothing to do with the intensity. It has everything to do with the capacity to be with an intensity, and so you have to both start with what capacity can I fully be with without going into a fight, flight or free state? And if you don't know what those are. Then again, in the Pain to Power program those things are all laid out, so you learn what they are, you learn how to identify them in your body and then it also does this mindset shift that I've really helped give you today and I hope it's super helpful in. 

38:58
Hey, of course this is here. 

39:01
I'm a human. It's normal to have anxiety. Oh, I was about to call the doctor's office and that felt scary. Of course, I feel anxious and I can make the call anyway and I'm just going to do it, even with the anxiety. Right, I go, uh, text my friend and even if she says she can't, I'm going to do that with the anxiety and we can look at. You know, of course, why does that feel personal if your friend just really can't go out for drinks? Right, there's always layers to it, but it's like just starting by like doing the thing even with anxiety, because you've increased your capacity to be with it, is a massive step. 

39:48
And when there are things where you're like I literally can't do the thing because I'm so paralyzed by this anxiety, that's where we do this deeper work. That is something that you know. Let's talk about what's going on for you specifically, let's get crystal clear on what your body needs, what's behind your anxiety, and that's something we can start uncovering in an energy up level session Because, like I said, when you address your anxiety, you get more energy. So if you want to learn more about how to increase the skill for yourself, book an energy up level session and we can dive in and figure out how to get you back to living a life that feels amazing for you, and not just one where you are getting by. Can't wait to see you there. Bye.