Psychologists state that people who suffer with anxiety and panic disorder are perfectionists and typically think unrealistically about their lives, their reactions and their abilities.
We are even prone to think unrealistically about other people's lives, reactions and abilities and the world as a whole.
Have you ever made dinner for guests and burned the rolls? Have you ever bought a new pair of shoes and scuffed or stained them in the first week? Have you ever tried to make friends with someone, but they ignore you? Have you ever gone to the hardware store, got the tool you needed, come back home to work on the project and realized you need another tool? So yet another trip to the hardware store! Have you ever wanted something / yourself to be or do something perfectly but it didn't turn out that way? Even if you haven't experienced one of the above small upsets, I bet you have experienced something similar.
How did this make you feel? It makes me feel bad, disappointed, angry, or depressed.
Sometimes, it's hard to move on.
I keep going back over things that happened and I get disappointed in myself and I beat myself up.
For instance, here's a true story that everyone finds hilarious.
But I still find a way to beat myself up over: When I was in college I worked 3rd shift at a convenience store.
One night, I wasn't busy and I decided I would help the milk man unload the milk from his truck.
So I jumped on the truck and said, "Slide 'em to me, I'll stack them!"There was a lift at the rear of the truck that went up and down and made it easy to load and unload the milk.
The driver slid them to me and I stacked them.
It was a big order that night.
70 gallons of milk, if I recall correctly.
When the driver had pulled all of the milk, he came to the back and said, "Ready?" I said, "yep!" What I did not know was that I had stacked the milk, but one stack was sitting half on the lift and half on the truck.
When the driver lowered the lift, the stack toppled and knocked the other stacks over as well.
70 gallons of milk fell about 4 feet, exploded and covered the parking lot and me in white liquid.
The driver looked at me horrified! He lost his job over that.
I just wanted to help.
Now days, when I'm in traffic and see a similar truck, I think about it.
When I drink milk, I usually think about it.
It's been 20 years and I still think about it at least once a week.
Why am I telling you this? Because, I now realize it's unrealistic to think that nothing bad or embarrassing will ever happen in your life.
I bet everyone has a story like this.
Maybe worse, maybe not.
It doesn't matter.
We will all face embarrassment and shame, fear and uncertainty, setbacks and failures.
That's OK! That is how it is supposed to be! If you are like me, it's hard to accept that.
I believe it's supposed to be perfect.
But I have to accept that it seldom is.
When I demand that everything must be perfect, it creates friction and stress in me because "perfect" is unattainable.
So now, I focus on realistic.
When I schedule my day, I only schedule 5 hours of work instead of 8, because I can't ever finish 8.
I can always finish 5.
Besides, this leaves room for fires that pop up.
When I have to do a house project, I expect multiple trips to the hardware store.
When I go grocery shopping, I expect someone to be in the checkout line and decide they need something else and force me to wait a good 3- 5 minutes while they run across the store and back.
What I'm suggesting is that we need to have a more realistic view of our world and ourselves because our attitudes, beliefs and mis-beliefs are the reason for most of our stress, anxiety and panic.
Watch out for"should" Lucinda Basset, author of "Attacking Anxiety and Depression" states that we should watch our inner dialog and feelings.
We need to stop when we get to a should.
- I should be a better parent.
- I should be happy - People should be more nice to me - Things should be fair The word should signifies a potentially unrealistic expectation.
Let's break it down, let me be blunt.
There are only 5 reasons your beliefs lead to anxiety and panic: - Perfectionism - Unrealistic expectations - Lack of assertiveness - Victim mentality - Uncertainty The way you change these beliefs is by changing your attitude about yourself.
When you develop realistic expectations about yourself and your world, you have conquered perfectionism and unrealistic expectations.
We will talk about lack of assertiveness and victim mentality next.
What if it's not beliefs? Truthfully, there is another way you could create anxiety and panic attacks in your body that has nothing to do with your beliefs about yourself and your place in the world.
I think the best way to drive this point home is to go back a little and overview what a panic attack is.
When you have a panic attack, your mind reacts to some feeling in your body and suddenly realizes your body feels out of control.
Your brain then creates the chemicals that initiate a panic attack, while your mind becomes concerned with what is happening.
Now, what would happen if we were somehow able to make our body feel out of control before we had an odd body sensation? We would go deeper and faster into panic wouldn't we? We would also set up a behavioral response for panic as well.
Think Pavlov's dogs.
So what am I referring to? Drugs and Alcohol.
Several of my worst panic attacks occurred after a few beers.
I actually never had extremely severe panic attacks until after I had the ones where I was a little tipsy.
I know it doesn't happen to everyone and I'm not saying you MUST quit now! I personally think you would be better off, but that's only my opinion.
I do know that the chemicals in coffee, cigarettes,marijuana and alcohol are tricky because, for instance, cigarettes calm some people down even though medically everyone knows they are a stimulant.
How it affects your body is really an unknown, but I do know it changes with time.
The older you are, the more it affects you.
As to all the hard drugs like cocaine, heroine, ecstasy and the like.
Do I really need to say quit? Isn't it obvious? If it takes chemicals like benzene and ether to make the drug, it's probably not good to take into your body.
Isn't carpet and plastic made from benzene too? Final thoughts Just realize that it's OK to wait until tomorrow to finish things sometimes.
It's OK to oversleep or miss the train.
It's OK if you burn the rolls or scuff your shoes.
Your life isn't ruined! If you don't remember anything else I've said, remember just these 2 things: 1.
We are all learning! 2.
Keep smiling! To your health and success! You are on track!