Anxious as Anything: Returning to work.

The dreaded day has come. Festivities are complete, celebratory drinks are drunk and the calendar day has arrived: returning to work.

We absolutely love what we do. But this year it seems that the anxiety of anything is high. Having a few days of freedom, even in lockdown was bliss. As a nation and as a society, things are different. Different is tough and really hard to adjust to. We’ve done it for nearly a year (yikes) but it seems like our resilience has taken a beating.

So what can we do? Watch RuPaul and ignore? Well that’s what we’re doing but there’s a few extras we can do to calm our overthinkin’ noggins and try relax a little.

Turn off the news for 48 hours.

BBC, we love you but we need to pause your notifications.
Anyone else feeling quite tense everytime they get an alert from BBC or the NHS. You’re not alone. Pause it. Airplane it. Delete it.

The Independant found ‘One study that around 33% of people reported a negative effect on their well-being from all the uncertainty surrounding Brexit, and Covid…’ 33% way too much for our liking.

Scribble it down.

We’re not going to show you our handwriting because it’s a complete mess. We will however want to show you an exercise you can do right now… NOW!

• Write down 3 things you’re anxious about.
• Write down 3 things that was good about today. (Maybe you changed out of your pjs at 3pm, go you!)
• Reflect on those 6 things. You have 50% of points being positive and 50% of the points you can turn around. We believe you.
• Write down 3 things you can do to improve for tomorrow. Even if it’s to change out of your pjs a few hours earlier… that is a small and achievable step.

Message a buddy.

We truly believe in this system. Friends, loved ones, neighbours… you name it, we have them on speed dial.

If you’re finding it really hard to switch off and to stop with that damn overthinkin’, message a friend with a gif.

Drop in that you’re feeling a bit down in the dumps. It’s better out than in. You might feel embarrassed, or a burden, or even just silly. You’re not. We repeat, you are not any of those. You’re human.

These aren’t good enough!

If these 3 points aren’t good enough (it’s ok, we won’t be offended)
Check out the following resources.

Woebot

A chat-based tool which helps with step-by-step guidance using tools from Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT). App can be found here.

Calm.

Sleep, meditation and Relaxation. Yes please!
Try for free! App can be found here.

Want more? Find us over at www.anxiousasanything.co.uk