Your anxiety is not attacking you.
It's responding.
To what doesn't feel safe.
And that unsafe thing can be outside you or inside.
Your autonomic nervous system,
Which works for you without any conscious thought,
Does not differentiate between the charging bear.
And the belief you'll be rejected.
The same stress hormones are sent into the bloodstream.
To help you get to safety.
Usually though,
Anxiety needs you to look inside.
To find his cause.
But how do you do that?
It helps to think of yourself as a whole person with many parts.
Each a distinct character or entity.
These are aspects of your subconscious or brain wise.
Specific neural networks.
Some parts carry wounds.
Painful emotional experiences and beliefs.
Other parts do jobs.
Prevent pain or put it out when it's already burning.
Those bad symptoms.
Make good sense.
When you understand them as parts.
They live in an invisible inner world.
That is yours.
You can go there.
And find a part.
You might see it.
Or feel it as a sensation somewhere in your body.
Here it is a voice.
Or maybe just sense it there.
Once you find a part,
You can relate to it.
The space opens up between you.
.
.
And this part.
It's not your entire reality.
Or all of you.
When you get curious toward it.
Respect it.
Feel for it.
A very real healing begins.
More profound than self-improvement,
Willpower,
Or problem solving.
This anxiety that's making life hard for you.
Can you turn toward it?
You don't even have to close your eyes.
The inner world is right there.
It's okay to let everything outside.
Drop away.
Just for a minute.
Stay inside.
Breathe slowly.
And wait.
For the anxiety to reveal itself to you.
Notice it.
Notice.
That you're noticing.
There's a you that's not the anxiety.
A soul at home that can witness it.
Say to it,
I know you're here for a reason.
Sometimes an anxious part is protective.
Like a soothsayer.
Predicting bad outcomes to help you prepare for them,
Not get hit so hard.
More often than not though,
Coming from the past.
Is it familiar?
How long has it been with you?
It may be a part of you from childhood.
When something in life felt unsafe or overwhelming.
Your mom's drinking,
Your dad's unpredictable anger,
All the times you had to move.
You know what it was like.
The inner world is atemporal.
There's no time in here.
So something in your life right now.
Job,
Relationship,
School,
Family.
Can activate a child part.
In his or her or their exact.
Felt experience back then.
And now here you are.
With this tender Anxious part of you trying to get safe.
Both in the past and the present.
If you'd like me to guide you through some inner work to interact with and help this child part,
Use the meditation that's just my voice.
So close your eyes through it if that moves you in deeper.
Inner work like this can do a lot.
To ease anxiety at its origin.
Try this.
Next time you feel your anxiety.
Breathe slowly in.
Exhale into it saying,
There you are.
Notice it.
Don't jump to fix it.
Gently.
As you would a little child.
Ask.
What doesn't feel safe?
It will tell you.
If you listen with kindness.
And when it does,
Say,
Oh.
I understand.
Just that.
See what happens.
