The words “anxiety” and “depression” can be quite scary, and it can be difficult to ask for help because of something going on in your mind. As a Mental Health Counsellor, I invite my clients to think about their depression and anxiety experiences not as labels of illness, but rather as something that they can get stuck in – and get out of, as well. This can be an over-simplification of complex issues, but I think it is still a helpful way to begin to make some sense of the experience.

While the symptoms and experiences of anxiety and depression are, in fact, quite different, both often involve being stuck in our thoughts. With depression one is likely stuck in thoughts about the past, and with anxiety, it is thoughts about the future.

These unhelpful thoughts about the past and future infect the present moment and keep us stuck.

Stuck in the Past and the Future

When someone experiences depression, they often describe their symptoms as:

feeling sad or angry most of the time,
not enjoying life, and
not wanting to do much of anything, believing things have never worked out and they won’t ever get better.

This person could be stuck remembering something in their past. These remembrances of hurts, traumas and painful moments become so overwhelming that they infect the present moment with imaginings of a never-changing future as bad as the past.

When someone experiences anxiety they often describe their symptoms as:

feeling afraid and nervous,
worried about many things in life, and
finding it hard to do anything out of their comfort zone because they imagine bad results will come.

This person is likely stuck imagining something terrible happening in the future. These projections of hurts, threats and disasters become so overwhelming that they also infect the present moment.

A Moment of Anxiety

When we are caught up in a moment of anxiety, we have projected ourselves into a time in the future where we imagine a terrible outcome.

Here’s an example I am sure many of us can relate to.

A student begins the semester, looks at his syllabus and sees that there will be an exam
at the end of the course worth 60% of the final grade. At that moment, his thoughts jump to the end of the semester, and he imagines a very hard exam, in which he isn’t able to succeed, and then he imagines failing the course, then seeing his GPA dropping, his hopes of a good job and financial stability disappearing, and suddenly he is panicking.

As you read that long last sentence, how many of you now notice that you are holding your breath, tensing up, or your heart is racing?

Stop and take a deep breath because right now at this moment, where is this imaginary student in this scenario? He is at the beginning of the semester, and he hasn’t started studying what he will be tested on. His mind took him to the end of the semester and then beyond to a frightening future.

Where are you right now? You are probably sitting at your computer or on your phone. As you read this, you are probably safe, but your body may have started reacting like you were going to be taking this exam and see your hopes of financial stability disappear.

Coming Back to the Present

By bringing your mind back to the present moment, you can notice where your thoughts have taken you.

Do you see yourself in a terrible imagined future based on events that have not even happened?

Are you finding yourself reliving a moment of hurt in the past that makes you feel hopeless today?

Right now, where are you? What do you physically see around you? What do you hear? What do you smell? Where is your body? Is something terrible happening right now?

We have all had the experience of getting stuck in one way or another. When we are stuck, we can’t get out of the position we are in.

Some of my colleagues at the Ottawa Holistic Wellness Centre can help your body be less stuck when a part of you just isn’t moving correctly. If you feel stuck in your thoughts, moods, or in your life, I would be happy to meet with you to see if working together can help you get unstuck and back to living a vital and meaningful life.

Noticing and Savouring the Positive to Help You Get Through Winter

by Sofia Lopoukhine, Mental Health Counsellor and Therapist

Most people in Ottawa seem to love summer and enjoy the natural beauty of fall, but there seems to be less enthusiasm for the next season of winter.

As the days get colder and shorter, we start the small talk of wondering how to get through dreaded winter. It can feel like life gets harder as we have more to contend with because of the weather and darker days.

As a human race, we have evolved to focus on the negative in order to problem-solve and survive, but when we can turn our attention to intentionally notice the good everything can seem more bearable. We can enhance the influence of the positive moments in our lives to build up our resilience for when the negative moments come because life contains both positive and negative moments.

Negative winter moments aren’t always so bad, maybe just more inconvenient, but an accumulation of them can really bring us down.

Noticing what didn’t go wrong

Take, for example, a winter moment like the unexpected blizzard that delays you in traffic and makes you late to meet your friends so that you lose your dinner reservation.

When something like this happens, how many of us will retell the story of how frustrating this was and end up reliving it each time we talk about it?

On the other hand, how many of us will retell or relive the experience of leaving work on time and having nothing keep us from getting where we need to go?

This may seem like a silly question because these kinds of moments don’t make very interesting stories to tell to others and that may be why we usually take them for granted. However, these moments are worth retelling ourselves because when we intentionally look for moments like this and then relive internally how nothing went wrong, it is a way to help us see life more positively.

In this example, recognising the ease with which you were able to leave work and drive to the restaurant to meet your friends will do you good, especially if you can savour the experience as well.

Savouring the positive

Savouring is an exercise where we focus our attention on fully experiencing through our senses.

It can be something we do in a mindful present moment when we notice the good or a way to bring to mind a positive moment from the past.

Savouring the positive starts with you bringing to mind the specifics of what you are experiencing or that you experienced through your senses.

If you are savouring a positive experience from the past you could ask yourself the following questions:

What did I see that I enjoyed?
What did I hear that was pleasant?
What smells and tastes did I notice and like?
How did my body feel in the moment?

As you answer each of these questions and notice or replay the scene in your mind’s eye in as much detail as you can, relish the experience and revel in it.

You can learn more about savouring at http://www.thepositivepsychologypeople.com/the-art-of-positive-savouring/.

Anytime and anywhere

Savouring is something you can do anytime including during annoying winter moments like scraping ice off your car, waiting for a bus, or trudging through the snow.

Reliving the positive moments will also help train your brain to notice the positive in the everyday.

Everyday positive moments such as a stranger’s smile, a favourite song on the radio, or a kind word in an email; and before you know it spring will come.

If you find that it is very hard for you to notice anything positive in your life or find that there is nothing you can think of that you have recently enjoyed, you may be suffering from depression. If this is you, please consider setting up a free meet and greet session with me to see if our working together could help.

Wishing you all a happy holiday season with many positive moments to notice and savour!

http://ottawaholisticwellness.ca/noticing-savouring-winter/

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Anxiety and Depression – Getting Stuck in Our Thoughts