How Anger Can Lead To Anxiety, Panic, and Depression, and How To Stop It From Happening

So all day today I’ve been waiting in for a new fridge to be delivered. I was given a delivery time of between 8 a.m. and 12 p.m. (why do these delivery companies always give such big windows of time? My agoraphobia used to keep me stuck in the house, and now these delivery companies do!).

Anyway, I start waiting this morning just before 8, hoping the fridge will come soon so my whole morning isn’t lost (I normally walk my dog Millie as soon as I get up, but today I couldn’t).

A couple of hours pass, no delivery. My frustration increases.

Another couple of hours pass, and now it’s gone 12 p.m. and the time they told me it would be delivered has come and gone. So I call the delivery company, only to be told that there is no scheduled delivery to my address today, or any other day.

So I’ve been waiting for 4 hours for something that was never even on its way to me. Now the frustration is getting worse.

After about 10 minutes of hassling them on the phone, they finally agree to get the fridge sent out to me today. Sometime before 5 p.m. they say. Great. Another long wait for ne.

So all afternoon I’ve been watching the clock tick away. I can’t go out and walk my dog (or do anything else, for that matter) and I can’t even go out into the back yard in case I miss the delivery truck. All I can do is watch the clock.

You guessed it - 5 o’clock came and went, and no delivery.

I call them again and now there’s no answer because they’ve all gone home. I felt like I was gonna go nuts with anger!

So, you might be wondering why I’m telling you this long, boring story about a fridge delivery? (You’re right, by the way. It’s boring, I know. But I’m about to tell you why I’ve made you sit through it.)

All day my frustration has been growing. And by the time I’d realised I’d waited in all day for nothing, my frustration turned into genuine anger. And the moment I realised how angry I was it reminded me of something I read a few weeks ago.

I’d read a report on how damaging anger is to the human body.

There are very few things worse for your body than anger. Most people think that stress is the single biggest cause of heart attacks (sorry to get so grim on you), but anger is actually a bigger risk-factor than stress. It also causes a huge chunk of the anxiety and panic we experience. And that’s the part that I remembered from that report I’d read.

Once I’d been reminded of how damaging anger is for your health, and for your anxiety, it was suddenly very obvious to be that my general anxiety was much higher than it normally is these days.

For most people, this isn’t really a problem. In fact, I’m sure it’s completely normal to have periods of every day where your anxiety increases slightly. But for people with anxiety problems, or even for people like me who once had anxiety problems, I think we need to take extra care not to expose ourselves to any unnecessary anger, stress, or any negativity, period.

Why take the chance?

All day I’d been stewing, sitting around waiting in, being messed around by the delivery company, only to find out that it was all for nothing. My anger in that time had crept up on me, so slowly I almost didn’t notice that it was there.

It was a good reminder for me, and it’s one I’ll make good use of. I won’t let anger creep up on me again. I hope you won’t either.

And if ever you do notice that anger or stress has gotten the better of you, immediately do something about it - don’t let it sit in you, growing into something harmful. Today, as soon as I realised the delivery wasn’t being made, I took my dog on an hour-long walk, which is one of my best de-stressors!

And another thing I did was sit here and write this blog post.

Venting your anger, getting it out of your system, is a great way to lessen its impact on you. So if you keep a journal or a blog, make use of it when you’re experiencing any stress, or anger, or depression. Getting it out is one of the best ways to get rid of it.

The Power of Your Imagination

A long time ago I heard someone quoting Albert Einstein, and the quote stayed with me. I just happened to hear the quote again today, and it inspired me to write this post.

So, here’s the quote: “Imagination is more important than intelligence.”

Not that exciting, I hear you say!

But stay with me. This lead me to some of the ideas that are most responsible for me finally winning my battle with panic and anxiety a couple of years ago, and I’m hoping it can help you in just the same way.

When Einstein said that imagination is more important than intelligence he meant that nothing is possible, no matter how much intelligence and determination you have, if you haven’t first imagined the outcome that you want to achieve.

That really struck a chord with me.

When we just go after something, like a goal for example, and we haven’t used the power of our imagination to vividly imagine that outcome first, we’re short-changing ourselves. We’re decreasing the chances of being successful in getting the thing we’re going after.

The reason I called this post “The Power of Your Imagination” is because I don’t think most of us appreciate just how powerful our imaginations are, or how much our imaginations can help us to achieve.

Here are a couple of things to think about:

• We have the power to imagine things that don’t exist yet
• We have the power to imagine improved and better versions of ourselves that aren’t here yet

We take these abilities for granted, but they’re incredible, and with their help we can achieve almost anything. To demonstrate this, here’s another thought for you to consider:

• Every single person who dramatically improved the quality of their life imagined that better quality of life before they achieved it

And despite that, so many of us go after our goals blindly, not really knowing where we want to end up, and not really knowing if we’ll even like it there when we get there. But it doesn’t have to be that way. We have this incredible ability of imagination. We can picture future versions of ourselves and use those images as inspiration and as a compass to lead us there.

If you’re anything like I used to be, stop robbing yourself of this ability. Start using it. Too often I see “experts” advising people with anxiety to live in the moment so they don’t become “overwhelmed” with unpleasant thoughts from the past or unknown events in the future.

I couldn’t disagree with this any more strongly.

None of us should live in the past, whether it was terrible or wonderful. But imagining a better future for yourself is one of the most beneficial things you can start doing right now, today.

Decide on where you want to be - your dream life. Your dreams can be big or small. It doesn’t matter. It just matters that it’s what you want. And when you get it clear what you want, start imagining it. And make your imaginations vivid, like you already have what you want, like you’re already there.

The moment you start doing this your subconscious will begin looking for ways to get you there. You’ll start asking yourself different questions. Positive, results-getting questions.

Letting my imagination loose was one of the best things I ever did in all my efforts to stop my panic and anxiety-related problems. You can probably tell how passionate I am about this idea. And I hope some of my enthusiasm rubs off on you and you give this a try.

Here’s a final thought on this, and this one idea was as big a breakthrough as I made in all my time battling my anxiety:

• Nothing happens that hasn’t been imagined first

Everything that becomes real started with a thought, an imagination. If you aren’t imagining a better future for yourself, one that’s happy and peaceful and calm and anxiety-free, it can’t come true.

All you have to do to fix that is to start imagining the future you dream of. It’s the first and most important step in that future coming true.

How To Stop Anxiety and Panic From Clouding Your Judgement

The last couple of days I haven’t felt so great. For some reason, I’ve not had much sleep the last couple of nights, and what sleep I’ve had hasn’t been restful, peaceful sleep. That used to be very normal for me, but I’ve been doing very well the last year or two, so it’s all a bit unfamiliar to me again.

I also have a nagging headache that won’t shift.

So, why am I moaning about how I feel?

Well, I guess it’s because I’m okay with it. I’ve had two bad nights of sleep, I’ve got a horrible headache, I feel generally unwell, and I’m okay with it. And that’s what I thought was worth sharing with you.

If I’d felt like this a couple of years ago, I’d have been terrified the headache was a symptom of a terrible illness, I’d have been sure that I’d never have another good night’s sleep again, and I’d have been sure I was in for a severe and long-lasting bout of anxiety and depression.

But not now.

Now I’m fine with how I feel. I accept how I feel right now for what it is: just a couple of bad days where I don’t feel so great. We all have periods like this, even people who’ve never had any problems with anxiety or panic or depression.

The trouble is, when you’ve got a history of anxiety and panic, it’s easy to let periods like this overwhelm you and turn into much more than they ever needed to be.

Now that I’ve been anxiety-free for long enough to clear my system of all its toxins and mind-altering effects, I ‘m lucky enough to be able to look at myself with much more clarity. So I can look back and see how days when I felt like this would spiral out of control into a nightmare that would last weeks or months. And I can look at myself now and see how I’m able to shrug these “low” periods off as just that - just low periods that’ll pass.

I’m writing this in case you’re where I was for so many years until 2 years ago. If, like me, your anxiety and panic stop you from seeing clearly how things really are, then take it from someone who’s been there: you’ll have bad days, and maybe even bad weeks. But they will pass, if you let them.

Focus on how you’ll feel when they pass, not how they make you feel today.

This might sound simple, but a couple of years ago I’d have been very grateful if someone had given me a shake and told me this. Sometimes the most obvious things can be so hard to see when your mind is tangled in a web of panic.

So do your best to just accept those bad periods. Don’t fight them, or linger on them. Let them pass, and they will.

Dealing With Anxiety - Sharing and Learning With Others

I’m not sure why, but I get really inspired when I come across people who are living with panic and anxiety and are fighting their way through it. Obviously I feel a connection with anyone like this, because until a couple of years ago that was me, so I know what it’s like to be battling against this horrible stuff every day of my life.

I watch a lot of YouTube videos from people who have some form of panic disorder, and although their stories are often sad, in most of these people I see a fighting spirit that I know will see them overcome their problems eventually.

I also bet that making those videos is great therapy for people, because not only do you get lots of stuff off your chest, but you also get lots of comments and personal replies from people who are fighting the same battle, or who fought the same battle in the past.

Surrounding yourself with people who have beaten the problems you’re facing right now, or even people who are fighting the same battle as you right now, can really make some incredible things happen. This goes back to my “surrounding yourself with recovery” idea that you might have heard me talk about before. And it’s an idea I really firmly believe in.

Anyway, what started all this off for me this afternoon was a couple of videos I watched from a girl who’s trying to overcome agoraphobia. I’ll put one of her videos below so you can take a look and maybe find some common ground with her, which may spark some new angles and new concepts in your own mind and have some positive effects on you.

A quick warning: there is some pretty strong language in this girl’s videos as she explains her situation and her past, so if you would rather not hear those kinds of words, this might be one to avoid.

End Panic Attacks By Understanding Your Mind

I believe one of the best ways to end panic attacks is to find a way to understand your own mind better. But learning about your mind and how it works can be pretty boring stuff, and who even knows where to start?

If you want to go deeper on a subject like this, you’re usually forced to study thick, boring books, which you’ll spend weeks going through only to find you’ve learned nothing valuable at all.

But I found a solution to this problem a couple of years back.

Imagine if you could have all the information, all the knowledge, all the guidance from 50 of the best books ever written on the human mind and the way it works, and imagine if you could have it all in a single book.

Yep, just one book.

I found a book just like that a couple of years back. It’s called “50 Psychology Classics,” and it’s written by Tom Butler-Bowdon. What this author has done is read hundreds of books on the human mind and select the best 50. Then he’s written a quick chapter on each of the 50 books, summarising what there is to learn in them.

He’s done the hard work so you don’t have to.

I love this book for two reasons: 1, because you’ll learn lots from getting summaries of the best 50 books ever written on the human mind and how it works. And 2, because somewhere amongst those 50 books you’ll find 1 or 2 that really resonate with you, and you’ll be able to hunt them down and read them in full.

So if you’re someone who likes to read (and even if you normally don’t then this is still worth your time), check out “50 Psychology Classics” by Tom Butler-Bowdon, and I’m sure you’ll come across lots of stuff that helps you understand your mind better, which can’t fail to also help with your panic and anxiety.

How To Stop Anxiety By Occupying Your Mind

I’ve had a few conversations lately, all with people who are living with severe panic and anxiety, and each of these people said the same thing to me: that they spend hours and hours of their day just worrying, beyond their control.

This wasn’t really surprising to me, because I used to do it too.

It got so bad for me at one point that it was almost as if I would schedule parts of the day where I would just sit or lie down and worry over just about anything I could think of. There’s something compelling out worrying.

It’s addictive.

I think it used to give me the feeling that I was trying to solve my problems, which gave me what I thought was a good reason to keep doing it. It made me feel like I was doing something, taking action, when in fact I wasn’t doing anything at all.

Aimless worrying achieves nothing. It just leads to more worry, more anxiety, more panic attacks.

This subject of endless worrying, and having no power to stop it, hasn’t been on my mind for a long time. Not until these conversations that I’ve had recently with the people I mentioned at the start of this post.

And now that I think about it, I realise that it’s not something I do anymore. So I’ve been trying to discover what I do differently that’s stopped the constant worrying I used to do.

And here’s what I came up with.

I don’t worry all the time like I used to because I don’t allow myself the time to do it anymore.

Back when my anxiety was at its worst I didn’t do anything with my time. I’d just sit around, worry, lie around, panic, sleep, eat, and then I’d worry and panic some more.

It’s a tough cycle to break, which you probably know first-hand.

I think what broke the cycle for me was when I started to read everything I could get my hands on - and most of the books I read were related in some way to my problems with anxiety and panic.

Suddenly, a large part of my day was spent reading, learning, and when you’re reading and learning it’s hard for your mind to multi-task and do anything else at the same time. And that includes worrying.

(Stimulating your mind is also a great anti-anxiety trick, by the way. And there’s nothing better than reading to achieve it.)

So I was reading a lot. Then, as my reading lead to the discovery of some effective ways to deal with panic disorders, I decided to start sharing what I was learning. I started putting little videos and audios together, which is kind of what lead to everything I do now with my websites/newsletter/videos/books. These videos and audios took up even more of the time I used to spend worrying.

Then I did something which took up more time than I’d ever have believed.

I got a puppy!

She’s not a puppy anymore. She’s about 16 months old now (her name’s Millie). And I walk her at least an hour a day, every day. So that’s even more time my mind is too busy on other things to worry.

So you get the idea. I now do lots of stuff with my time, and that makes it hard for my mind to wander onto worries - it’s usually preoccupied with something else.

But it produced another benefit - one that I wasn’t expecting at all.

I’ve realised that having so much of my day filled with stimulating or distracting things has completely changed the way I act and feel when I do have some free time to just relax and sit or lie about.

Now, when I have nothing to do, it’s like my whole body just sighs relief. The very thing that used to cause me to worry (free time and lazing about) is now the thing that gives me my most relaxing moments in life.

I really wanted to share these thoughts with you today, because I think it’s something you should try. I really think it can help you if you have any issues at all with anxiety, panic attacks, or just constant worrying.

So start introducing something new into your day. It can be anything you like. Try a new hobby. Put up a website on something you love (don’t know how to put up a website? Learning how has just become your new thing to do!). Start reading up on something that interests you. The possibilities are endless. And right now, all you need is one new thing.

So find that “just one thing” and start doing it today. And if this works for you, and you find yourself worrying less, find a second thing, and a third, and so on. Before you know it, you won’t be worrying anywhere near as much as you do right now.

Control Panic Attacks With The Power of Music

Have you ever heard the first few notes of a song and become suddenly sad or depressed? Or maybe you’ve heard the first few notes of a song and suddenly felt happy or even joyous?

This is one of those things that happens to us all from time to time. Somewhere deep in our subconscious we’ll have linked a certain song to a certain memory, and hearing just a few notes from that song is enough to bring the memory flooding back to us.

There are probably a hundred songs that have this affect on me.

There are songs that I can hear and immediately I’m back in my childhood, or I’m a teenager again. There are songs that remind me of times when someone close to me was sick or going through something horrible. There are songs that remind me times in my life when I’ve achieved something great. And there are songs that remind me of times when I’ve failed at something.

Actually, now that I think about it, these songs don’t remind me of those times. What they actually do is spark an emotion from those times, often strongly enough that I feel that same exact emotion as strongly as I’d felt it years before.

Like I said, we all experience this from time to time. But it’s been happening to me a lot lately, and that got me thinking that maybe this was something we could use to control how we feel.

So, based on the fact that songs can change your mood and emotions, and they can achieve this almost instantly, whatever your mood is at the time, I decided to start “training” myself to be able to do this on purpose, rather than just waiting for it to happen.

The reason that a song can affect us like this is that we hear it (maybe once, or maybe repeatedly) during a specific period in our life, and then years later when that time has passed, the song reminds our subconscious of the way we felt all that time ago. And without even having to actually think of anything, our mood and emotions change in a fraction of a second.

So, back to my training.

I decided to pick a song I liked, and one that already had an uplifting effect on me, and only listen to it when I was happy, optimistic, or hopeful. If you can “accidently” develop these links between songs and emotions, I thought, then why shouldn’t I be able to do it on purpose too?

I’ll even tell you the song I chose (but no making fun if you don’t share the same taste!). It was “Don’t Leave Home,” by Dido. That song’s always had an uplifting effect on me, so it seemed like a perfect choice.

So starting a few weeks ago I made a rule that I’d never listen to that song when I was depressed, or feeling anxious, or even if my general mood was not so great. I also made a rule that if I was having a “good” moment that I would listen to that song if I was in a position to do so.

I have the song on my computer and I have it on my MP3 player, so I’m pretty much covered wherever I am.

And when I’m having a good moment, or I’m feeling upbeat, optimistic, or hopeful, I listen to that song. And I did this for about a month, which meant I’d listen to the song maybe 2 or 3 times a day, always at good moments.

Now, for the last week or so, I’ve been doing something slightly different. I still listen to the song at those good moments to keep up the “conditioning,” but now I’m also letting myself listen to the song at low points too.

But only when I really need a boost.

Because I guess if I use it too often as a boost I’d be listening to it all the time when I was down, which would condition me to associate negative emotions and moods with it (the opposite of what I want!).

And I’ve been amazed at how well this idea is working.

No matter how bad a day or moment I may be having, listening to my chosen song for a couple of minutes has the power to completely reverse my mood from negative to positive.

And it really does have the same effect on me now as those other songs - those ones that instantly make me feel the way I did years before because of some subconscious link I never knew was there.

So you can create these links between mood and music. I’ve got proof of that after just a month. And now I’m even thinking of doing it with multiple songs, and for specific emotions. Do you see the potential this has? We can actually train and condition our minds to feel however we want them to feel by simply linking them to music.

This is an idea I’m definitely going to take a lot farther, but in the meantime, why don’t you give this a try yourself? Pick a song you like (that’s already uplifting to you), and start listening to it when your mood and emotions are positive. Do this for long enough to condition your mind and allow it to “link” the song with the positive emotions and mood, and then you can start using this song to give you a boost anytime you need one.

There’s no excuse for not trying this, because how hard is listening to a song you like? And look at the results it can produce!

Give it a shot, and then report back and let me know how it’s working for you.

Stop Panic Attacks By Starting Your Day Right

Do you ever have one of those days when you have no self control and no discipline? Maybe on those days you eat lots of junk and have no nutritious food. Maybe you get up late and stay up late. Maybe you skip that trip to the gym you were planning, or conveniently forget to take that walk through the park you had planned.

You might see a pattern here. On those days when you have no self control and no discipline, you usually end up behaving in ways that damage your health and your mental health.

I used to do this all the time, and I know it was a big factor in my anxiety. It didn’t cause my anxiety, but I know it made it worse. And I know it made it harder to stop.

Do you know what the crazy thing is? I discovered that I could stop all that bad behavior, all that lack of discipline and self control, by doing one thing.

Yep, just a single thing.

And the one thing I changed was to start each day healthily - and I mean healthily in every way you can imagine: psychologically, nutritionally, and emotionally.

Let me tell you where this idea came from.

I was listening to an interview with a fitness expert a couple of years back, and he was being asked what the most important thing was for someone trying to lose weight.

His answer?

To start the day right. He was talking specifically about breakfast. His opinion was that when you begin the day with a highly nutritious and healthy breakfast you are far less likely to slip up during the rest of the day and do anything to ruin the great start you gave yourself at breakfast.

The moment I heard this it sparked something in my mind. I knew he was right. I knew from my own experience that on days when I’d slip up at breakfast and give in to something tasty and unhealthy that I almost always went on to eat a lot more crap throughout the day.

I would justify it by telling myself that I’d already slipped up, so a perfect day was now beyond me. “I’ll start again in the morning,” I’d tell myself, giving myself permission to do anything I wanted for the rest of the day, no matter how unhealthy it was for me.

I also knew from experience that on days when I started out right, when I actually ate a healthy breakfast, I would usually turn down junk food for the rest of the day because I didn’t want to spoil the good start that I’d made.

So how does all this stuff affect anxiety and panic?

Well, just like I knew that I sometimes started the day badly nutritionally and caused myself to misbehave with food all day, I also knew that I often slipped up emotionally and psychologically in the mornings. And on those occasions, I’d often go on to have terrible days, with many panic attacks, massive depression, and a generally lousy mood.

Suddenly I realised that those terrible days all began with a terrible start to my day. And more importantly, I realised that those terrible starts were within my control.

As soon as this dawned on me, I began making a conscious effort each morning to avoid anything negative: no unhealthy food; no contact with negative people; no arguments with friends and family members, no matter how bad a mood I found myself in; no depressing TV news; no lying in bed for 30 minutes or longer dreading the day.

Nothing negative. Period.

If there were things I considered negative that I had to deal with, then I would make sure to tackle them later in the day, preferably in the afternoon.

The crazy thing is, this started to work miracles after just a few days. Those terrible days I used to have so often? They vanished. And this got addictive. The better I started my days in the mornings, the better the day I would go on to have. So I would suddenly find myself trying to improve the quality of the first hour of my day after I woke up.

In the beginning I was just trying to avoid negativity, but after a few weeks I was eating healthy foods I’d never even tried before. I started getting up earlier than I’d ever got up before. I started walking a mile or more. Then I started jogging. Then I started running, and all this in those first 60 minutes after I’d wake up.

These simple changes that I made to the first hour of my day have made as big an impact in my life as anything else ever has. And that’s why I’ve written about it tonight. I wanted to share with you the amazing things that can happen to you and your anxiety by simply starting your day right.

And I hope I’ve written about it in a way that excites you, the same way the idea excited me when I first heard about it.

Why not give it a try yourself?

Tomorrow, do one small thing that improves the quality of the first hour of your day. And stick with it for a week. See what happens. Then add another improvement to your first hour, and then another, and another.

Baby steps get you there too, eventually.

Do me a favour and let me know what you think about this idea. And better still, come back in a few weeks and tell me the results you’ve been getting. I would love to hear how it’s changed your life!

Can Gratitude Decrease Anxiety and Improve Your Mood?

Someone emailed me a link to an article that explains how to do a 2 minute exercise that can single-handedly improve your mood, your emotions, and manage your stress levels. For the sake of 2 minutes, I think it’s worth a shot, right?

I’m gonna try it out once a day and see what it does for me.

In a nutshell, it’s all about gratitude, and how finding 3 things a day to be grateful for can lead to more optimism, better moods, improved emotions - lots of positive stuff! Like the article says: it’s easy to write this stuff off as nonsense because it seems to simple. But sometimes the simple things work, so give this a shot and see if it works for you.

You can check out the article here.

If you make any breakthroughs or you come across anything else worth sharing, make sure you come back and post a comment!

A Christmas Gift For You

One of the best ways there is to overcome anxiety and panic-related problems is to get inspired, optimistic. But that’s not an easy thing to do when things aren’t going so well.

I know, from personal experience.

But I recently came across a book that really did inspire me. It’s the autobiography of Helen Keller, who was the first deafblind person to graduate college in the United States. She was a remarkable person, and I find it impossible that her book won’t inspire you.

As a thank you for being my subscriber, I’ve put together a special edition of this book, and got permission to republish it so that I can give it to you. I also wrote a little introduction to this new edition, so I hope you enjoy that intro too!

Right-click on the link below and select “save as” or “save target as.”

Right-Click Here To Download The Book

Download your copy now, even if you won’t have time to check it out over the holidays. I wouldn’t want you to miss out.

And please leave me your comments right here on the blog. I’d really love to hear from you - to hear how you are, how you’re doing, how this book helped. Anything! It’s just great to get feedback.

So download the book now while it’s fresh in your mind.

Download The Book Here

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