Sometimes, good ideas and techniques can’t work together.
Sometimes you have to choose which is more important at the moment – where is the priority for you right now?
For example, if there’s a personal development course or item, but it’s expensive and you are also trying to get a handle on your finances, you can’t do both because one will deny the possibility of the other.
As you know from my previous posts, I’ve been trying to establish and keep to a morning and night routine.
But for the last couple of weeks, my night-routine has been impossible to stick to most nights.
That is because a couple of weeks ago I had my first appointment with a mental health specialist about my anxiety and depression.
We decided that we would try and tackle my anxiety first, as I believe the two are linked.
(Also, depression for me is a much scarier thing to confront, although I am starting to think that maybe I should have started there instead)
Basically, I’ve been told that the best way to overcome anxiety is to put yourself in the situation that makes you anxious, feel it, but don’t try and escape. Stay in the situation until the anxiety starts to fade, and recognise that there is no substance behind the feeling.
Rinse and repeat as many times as possible as soon as possible.
Firstly, this is obviously a lot easier said than done.
I have already made great improvements to my anxiety myself over time and I know a lot about how I am supposed to combat it.
This is a strategy that I’ve done before to a degree, so the suggestion was nothing new to me.
However, the volume of which I’ve been told to do this is much higher than I’ve done before.
I seem to have a low level of anxiety most of the time, but doing anything new and in a strange place/ situation, anything social, or anything where I don’t feel trapped ramp it up to levels where I feel (and sometimes am) physically ill.
Previously I would force myself to attend things, ride through the anxiety and then give myself plenty of time to recover afterwards.
Part of the reason why I would need to recover is because the anxiety would leave me unable to eat or drink much, and leave me exhausted from the stress.
I’ve also gotten so tense on occasions, that I remember throwing my back out while at a work meal.
So I’ve been told to do tasks that make me anxious, in baby steps of severity, a few times a week to try and work through it.
This, of course, has meant doing social things, or going out to eat, and other things that are generally done in the evening and take time.
So there’s been a number of nights where I’ve been out doing that instead of sticking to my new night-routine.
And that’s ok.
Because I can’t begin to start building a better me until I start properly addressing my mental health.
It’s a massive foundation block and it needs to take priority.
These exercises are currently throwing aside the time that I had for learning and self-development, and by the nature of my anxiety, my healthy diet and finances are also taking a bit of a hit.
But I won’t have to do these forever, and the sooner I can get more comfortable in social situations and new places, the easier my career and social development will become.
It’s important to recognise these clashes, weigh up the impacts and prioritise.
I’m hoping that soon the idea of a business meal in a strange place doesn’t scare the life out of me to the point where I can’t physically make myself do it.
Fingers crossed this particular journey is a straight line.
I’ll let you know how it goes but for now, I hope that you all have a happy and productive week.
Building A Better Me 