Training Your Brain: Two Key Ways To Cope with Anxiety

What are confusion and fear stress storms? You know you’re in a stress storm when you can’t rationally talk yourself through a situation that you know is irrational. For example, you know (in reality) that your family will be perfectly fine on a trip or excursion, but your mind nevertheless keeps swirling into images of fear and feelings of desperation and panic. You can’t stop thinking that the plane is going to crash. Or perhaps you often find yourself falling into the trap of feeling isolated and afraid, yet there’s no logical reason as to why you’re feeling that way. These are signs and symptoms that your brain is deadlocked into a cycle you feel you have no control over—these are stress storms and caused by homeorhesis of brain patterns.

I. Listen to Music

The best way to stop my brain from getting stuck in anxiety is to turn on some music, preferably selected songs in my iPod^®, but in a pinch, the radio will do (it just requires some station surfing). The tempo and melody of my favorite songs can dial my stress levels down to manageable emotions in about 15 minutes.

Some of my personal favorites (if you’re curious) are Mozart, Cher and Simon & Garfunkel. What types of music will help you relax is a personal one. Whatever your musical preference, research clearly shows that self-selected relaxing music significantly reduces anxiety and nervous system arousal. Also, if you can play an instrument in a way that you find soothing, research shows that’s also a great stress/anxiety reducer.

II. Move to the Beat

The body literally likes rhythmic, soothing movement. Yoga and Tai’Chi are particularly effective in getting your brain’s motor neurons “hooked up” with feeling soothed. And of course, dancing is great (…if you have rhythm).

As a required part of therapy, I have my anxious patients dance with my drumming CD, which I call “Life Rhythms,” as part of their homework. This requirement has also been especially effective for medical students who are so anxious that they start failing their classes, even when they totally understood the topics being evaluated. Without exception, they report that moving to the beat helps them to feel “different and better” and clearly not as fearful the first week; by the second week, they turn the corner and find new directions for their lives. Incidentally, this CD is a basic homemade recording of some continuous conga drums and a few other acoustical instruments I have around the house, but unsophisticated as it is, it works. If you’re so inclined, try making your own tape!