3 Ways To Stop Feeling Anxious

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How often do you wish that you felt less anxious?

If you’re anything like me, you want mental clarity and the freedom to live each day with a sense of gratitude for the present moment. But despite trying to control your emotions, the unfortunate reality is that they’re often in control of you.

They plunge your mental health into a perpetual cycle of uncertainty from which you cannot escape and make you question if you’ll ever overcome your anxiety.

It sucks.

I’ve found myself in the same position as you many times. But I’ve discovered that a better solution is understanding your fear so you can overcome whatever’s holding you back from living a happier life. In the words of Seneca:

“If you really want to escape the things that harass you, what you’re needing is not to be in a different place but to be a different person.”

So if you want to start healing your anxiety, below are several lessons from Seneca that will help you to begin the process of living a better life. Each one of these insights helped me to change my life in ways that I never imagined. I’m sure they will do the same for you, too.

Overthinking Has No Benefits.

If you’re regularly worrying about everything that may go wrong, you’re not allowing yourself to focus on the incredible things that are going well in your life.

Seneca once said, “We suffer more often in imagination than in reality.” Because all too often, we tend to worry about circumstances that we can’t control, and often end up overthinking every situation to a point where we become paralyzed by fear.

For example, I used to have social anxiety, which prevented me from generating meaningful relationships with anyone I met. After all, I was scared that other people would judge me for the insecurities that I saw in myself.

But more often than not, everyone I spoke to ended up being incredibly friendly and genuinely understood my reasoning for being shy during a conversation.

Although it wasn’t easy, I realized that letting go of external judgment was the first step to conquering the anxiety that had previously held me back from having great relationships.

Whenever you find yourself suffering from anxiety, take a moment to remember that we often overthink events to a point where we perceive them to be much worse than they actually are.

So when you’re not worrying about everything that could go wrong, you can focus on how to beat your anxiety and bring tangible benefits to every aspect of your life.

Fear Is The Path To Everything You’ve Ever Wanted.

One of the biggest mistakes I made was letting fear control each of my decisions. After all, I was afraid of rejection, humiliation, and anything else that could confirm the negative biases I held about myself.

But I’ve since learned that fear is merely an opportunity to overcome your anxiety so you can fulfill your potential. Because when you no longer have anything holding you back, it’s easy to stop letting anxiety get in the way of your happiness. Seneca said it best:

“It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that things are difficult.”

For the longest time, my anxiety prevented me from dating or doing anything that involved talking to people. But instead of allowing myself to be consumed by fear, I started taking several steps which improved my confidence.

For example, I began learning confident body language, how to respond to people during a conversation, and many other things that helped to ease the horrific effects of social anxiety.

You don’t need to pretend that you’re fearless, or anything else that’s unrealistic. But when you begin acknowledging that it’s possible to overcome your anxiety, you’ll slowly develop the necessary confidence to start doing so.

Strive For Continuous Improvement.

If you’re currently dealing with severe levels of anxiety, it’ll probably take a while to overcome your fear & become the type of person that you desire to be. After all, a great truth of life is that meaningful change rarely happens overnight.

But if you can become 1% less anxious each day, compound interest will result in an increased sense of confidence that will improve your life in ways that you never imagined.

I’m not going to tell you that overcoming anxiety is easy — it’s not. But when you take continual steps towards becoming less anxious each day, the changes in every aspect of your life will undoubtedly be profound.

So each evening before you go to bed, consider taking a moment to reflect on your emotions, and the steps you can take to rid yourself of any feelings of anxiety. In the words of Seneca:

“We must ask ourselves: what weakness did I overcome today? What virtue did I acquire?”

That’s all you need to do.