They way that we cope with anxiety can lead to us to an infinite loop of avoidance and anxiety symptoms. Much like the game Whack-a-mole, you never really win, the game just gets faster and faster, it is similar with anxiety. The more we try to get rid of the symptoms, such as avoiding triggering events, the more anxiety comes back. Before we put "strategies" in place to manage anxiety, it is helpful to understand the purpose of the anxiety. Anxiety is our brain's way of trying to help warn us of danger, but often in an unsophisticated way. What is our body trying to tell us? Maybe we are misinterpreting the information from our body. Our body is reacting in a way to prevent us from being hurt by something "dangerous", which might not be dangerous at all. Our body might be giving us information that this upcoming event is important to us, and we want to try our best, so we are feeling anxious in anticipation. Once we start to shift our awareness to understanding that we are a person who is having anxious thoughts, and that this is our brain's way of trying to help us, we can start to make different choices on how to manage the anxiety.

When we make important changes in our lives, we often experience uncertainty about the outcome and naturally feelings of anxiety. Those anxious feelings can come from a combination of our brain trying to problem solve all the possible outcomes without all of the information, seeing uncertainty as frightening or dangerous, or not feeling confident in our ability to cope with the change. When we are faced with uncertainty, we can feel out of control, and sometimes to try and get rid of these uncomfortable thoughts and feelings, we look to gain control, often by making impulsive decisions. In this video, Clinical Psychologist Michael discusses some of the reasons behind this discomfort with uncertainty, and offers some tips on how to manage our feelings without making impulsive decisions that may cause more problems in the long run.

Paralysis by Analysis occurs in times when we are feeling uncertain, and we are trying to gain more information in order to make a decision. Because of our anxiety about the unknown, we end up being overwhelmed by too much information and effectively become paralysed by indecision. In this video, Clinical Psychologist Michael discusses Paralysis by Analysis and offers some ways of managing feelings of uncertainty and anxiety in order to move forward with our decisions.

By focusing on the process (the journey) rather than the outcome (the destination), we are more likely to achieve success and improve performance. This is particularly useful when we have core beliefs that activate feelings of shame. If we only focus on the outcome, we tend to avoid or overcompensate and burnout, in order to prevent the feelings of shame arising. This goes for all aspects of our lives and here, Clinical Psychologist Michael talks about creating an 8/10 day in order to bring our attention to the process, and that leads to more long-term success

Humans are geared to be pessimistic and avoid danger. It's good for our survival as a species. However, modern humans now interpret anxiety, with deep internal messages of shame (not being good enough/not worthwhile), as being fearful, and naturally we want to run away from these 'dangers'. In this video, Clinical Psychologist Michael Philp explains some of the processes involved and ways in which you can overcome avoidance to embrace challenge and accept the anxiety that comes with that challenge

In chapter 4, we delve into the "Encouragement Approach" where the philosopher states that there is a need to find the courage to do the tasks that one is avoiding. This approach dovetails neatly with Acceptance Commitment Therapy and here Clinical Psychologist Michael talks about the choice point, which is derived from ACT, and helps us to understand how to make "towards" moves - towards the life we want to live - while making room for the inevitable discomfort. He also offers a technique that can be helpful in managing that discomfort.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F... by Mark Manson is essentially a book about learning to stop comparing yourself to others and develop meaning in your life. It looks at how we get trapped in searching for happiness, and suggests that happiness is found in developing meaning and purpose in life. While it is a self-help book written by a non-expert, it channels theories related to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy as well as Logotherapy by Viktor Frankl (finding meaning and purpose). Here, Clinical Psychologist Michael has taken an excerpt from Chapter 4 The Value of Suffering. In that chapter, Manson recounts stories from famous people in terms of their experience of comparing themselves to others and the psychological torment that they experienced in the process. Michael discusses how we do this in our lives, the reasons why, and ways to overcome this need to compare to others in order to experience contentment.

The Courage To Be Disliked by Kishimi and Koga is a Japanese book about Western psychology. It is written as a dialogue between a philosopher and a student. The book aims to help people to manage anxiety and depression, by focusing on the moment, identifying what tasks are our own and what are others, and creating horizontal relationships instead of vertical ones. Here, Clinical Psychologist Michael has taken an excerpt from The Third Night, How to Separate Tasks which focuses on not worrying about what others may think of you and how we can apply this in our life in order to have freedom from worrying about fitting in, and as a result, more deep and meaningful connections with others.

Daring Greatly by Brene Brown is ultimately about the courage to be vulnerable in order to live the life we want. Here, Clinical Psychologist Michael has taken an excerpt from Chapter 4, The Vulnerability Armory, around dealing with disconnection to avoid feelings of shame. He offers several solutions instead of avoidance, in order to live a more fulfilling life.

Change and personal growth can be scary. Sometimes, where we are becomes so uncomfortable that we are willing to endure the discomfort of the journey of change because staying still is worse. Often, however, staying still is not as distressing as the journey, so we put off making change, avoiding anxiety and discomfort. In this video, Michael discusses how to make room for the discomfort in order to progress towards personal growth and the life that you want to live

A lot of my clinical time is spent discussing avoidance. We spend a lot of our time trying to avoid discomfort. Avoiding doing tasks that make us feel anxious, or uncomfortable, because it triggers negative beliefs that we are not good enough or that people will judge us or laugh at us. Avoidance works in the short term to minimise anxiety, but it prolongs the problem. It holds us back from living a full and rich life, and doing the things that matter most. It stops us from making progress in our lives. In this video, Clinical Psychologist Michael talks about how to manage the desire to avoid uncomfortable feelings and thoughts, in order to live a rich and full life.

In this video, Clinical Psychologist Michael talks about how taking responsibility for your mistakes, rather than offering excuses, can help you to grow. He also talks about how to manage the unpleasant feelings and unhelpful thoughts we get when we make a mistake, using an Acceptance and Commitment approach to "thank our mind" as a way of getting some distance from theses thoughts and being able to plan a more productive way in which to move forward.

Approval seeking behaviour is another form of over-compensating behaviour that some people engage in to protect their low sense of self-worth being from activated. Although it can sometimes be a useful strategy, and being held in high regard and accepted, is often a nice feeling, for some people this sense of being worthwhile is fleeting and they constantly seek approval of others to boost their self-esteem. It is often derived from a deep seated belief of not being good enough, not worthwhile, or a belief of being defective in someway. Instead, we encourage developing a high sense of self-worth - knowing that you are worthy of being cared about, even if you don't succeed in a task.

Self-sacrificing or submissive behaviours in relationships with others, whether that be friends or partners, can lead to imbalanced relationships and resentment. It is often driven out of a fear of rejection and low self-worth - that you are not worthwhile or good enough. In order to avoid these hurtful core beliefs being activated, we end up being a "people pleaser" - going out of our way to help others, even if it is very inconvenient. It's more than being nice and helpful. It's not setting appropriate boundaries that lead to an imbalance of power in the relationship. In this video, Clinical Psychologist Michael discusses how these behaviours impact on your ability to be assertive.

Do you find it hard to get close to people on an emotional level? Have you noticed that in relationships and friendships, that you tend to push people away when they get too close to you, but immediately try to "pull" them back? Early trauma, including attachment disruptions with our primary caregivers, can lead to difficulties forming deep and meaningful relationships with others, including friends. There is a fear of abandonment - if I show my true self, people will leave me or let me down or hurt me in someway. Or a sense of not being worthy of love. In order to cope, some people engage in 'push-pull' relationships, to manage the feelings of fear or shame.

If you look back on your life, suddenly we transport you to the future, you're 80 years old, you're looking back on your life, would you be satisfied? Would you be happy with the way that you were coping with setbacks, with the choices that you made? Did you procrastinate on making decisions? Did you use drugs or alcohol, or other unhelpful ways to cope with the feelings around failure? Or alternatively, if you decided to try again to make the most of it, to try, even though you were failing, would you be looking back at your life more satisfied or happy with your effort even if it didn't work? So this is the big question when we talk about happiness, that happiness is not the success of things, but the effort to get the outcome that you want and are you satisfied with what you've done? In this video we discuss the big issues around coping with disappointment, and focusing on what you can do, to move forward,

As we enter more restrictions on movement due to the Corona Virus pandemic, Grove Psychology is pleased to announce that we are providing video conferencing for all our appointments. This makes it safe for both you and your psychologist, and we can continue to support you during this uncertain time. Michael also discusses how telehealth works and how it is a little different to face to face appointments.

If your newsfeed is anything like mine, then it is full of people posting and sharing information about the Corona virus, which with all that information bombarding our senses, can lead you to feeling overwhelmed and anxious. In this video I discuss a few simple ideas to manage your anxiety, with the big takeaway of focusing on what you can control, and taking care and consideration of your community - your friends, family, and neighbours.