By Christina Haverkort (March 2021/updated 11/22)
Anxiety & Depression & Fear
Feeling empty, feeling a void, lost inside or vulnerable are trademark feelings for anyone who is struggling with anxiety, depression, or hormonal imbalance or feeling at a loss.
Anxiety does not just stem from the emotions, but it can birth from the body’s autonomic nervous system. It could emanate from fear based thinking but also, from some system overload due to stress, trauma, toxicity, grief, or injury, therefore the body’s systems are scrambling to find balance. The body’s system shifts into a fear mode because tasks from the autonomic nervous system are unable to be carried out smoothly, so you may feel an inability to breathe normally; or your heart rate is spiking and out of balance; or your digestion is inadequate because the diaphragm muscle is locking up, there’s a fear response. You may feel your blood pressure is too high, and you sit in your own discomfort, what kind of thoughts and rapid thinking takes place that may bring you farther away from the source of the issue. The fear paradigm is swimming throughout the subconscious mind, instilling this teeter totter of fear vs. anxiety.
When you take the time to tune into your autonomic nervous system where functions of the body happen involuntary- such as breathing, heart rate, blood pressure, sweating, mouth-watering (salivating), and the movement of food through the intestines (peristalsis). Take the time to relax and tune into these functions, go into your heart, lungs, bring attention to your breathing, attention to the salivary glands in your mouth, the first stage of digestion, recognize the intelligence of your body and its ability to carry out these functions. By bringing your attention, energy and focus to these body functions it is the first step to helping your systems find a coherence.
Allow yourself the time and patience it takes to step-into-yourself. Whether it be emotional, mental or physical, bring your awareness to the area of your body where you feel the anxiety or fear is stemming from. Fill the area with your attention, your focus thought and energy, be still within. When you do this, you are making your first powerful shift to healing.
We live in an ungrounded society. The more attention brought to our body, brings wholeness and understanding that you are more than your mind, and more than your physical body.