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If you have ever been in a situation where you were anticipating giving a speech or running a meeting for the first time, you probably know what anxiety is all about. Characterized by unexplained feelings of tension, worry, and restlessness, anxiety is a common emotion that sometimes develops into a mental disorder. You can manage light levels of anxiety pretty easily without the need for in-depth medical attention. In fact, only about 36% of people who live with anxiety as a mental disorder receive medical intervention. Here are a few activities you can do to help you overcome anxiety from home.

5 Activities That will help you Overcome Anxiety at Home — *This is a guest post and all opinions are those of the author. This post may also contain affiliate and/or paid links. Rest assured that we only work with companies and individuals that we trust. While some of those companies and individuals may work in the medical field, this post is not intended to be a substitution for medical advice. Always speak to your doctor if you have concerns about your mental or physical health.

Take Control of Your Breathing

Yoga as an industry has grown tremendously over the past decades due to its healing properties. As far as anxiety goes, specific easy yoga techniques provide a sense of relaxation and soothing. Particularly taking charge of your breathing and being lost in the moment will connect you to your subconscious and facilitate a self-awareness that will calm you down, helping you to overcome anxiety. Try to use the following bulleted guidelines when attempting to command your breathing:

- Assume a comfortable position and inhale through your nose.
- Involve your abdomen as you inhale.
- Exhale through your mouth with lips angled like you are whistling.
- Your exhalation should be longer than inhalation.

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Consider Using Supplements

Modern supplements can help beat anxiety without causing unwanted side effects. They achieve this by offering a sense of relaxation and boosting energy levels that will enable you to perform beneficial physical activities. There are many over-the-counter supplements such as kava, chamomile, lavender, kratom concentrates, and lemon balm. They are consumable in all kinds of forms, such as:

- Powders
- Pills
- Liquid extracts
- Additives for your tea

The use of CBD oil and medical marijuana in general to treat various medical conditions, including anxiety, has been on a constant rise in recent years. Individuals often testify to its healing properties, so be sure to check a cannabis dosing guide.

Some supplements are potentially invasive, so be sure to check with your doctor before using supplements, especially if you are on any prescriptions.

Essential Oils for Depression and Anxiety 1 — .

Blow Some Bubbles

This sounds like just a childish game, but surprisingly, it works! Sometimes it is the little things that make a difference. The technicality involved in blowing bubbles helps the mind focus and steer off destructive emotions, not to mention the satisfaction of watching the actual bubbles. Besides, blowing bubbles is synonymous with breathing control. The constant drawing of air from deep inside your body will open the air pipes and chest; your lungs will have more fresh air, which is beneficial for the mind.

Sing and Dance to Your Favorite Songs

Remember how they say that everyone sings like Beyonce in the bathroom? Well, it is reasonable enough to extend the talent for self-treatment. There is something about music that makes it therapeutic for a lot of us, which is why even amid the COVID-19 pandemic, artists still perform from living rooms or balconies and gather millions of viewers. The next time you feel anxious, try dancing or singing along to your favorite jam, and that could be just the healing you need.

Go for a Walk With Your Pet

Walking is one of the most underrated anxiety control methods. It reconnects you with nature, allowing you to interact with all sorts of life, from trees to wildlife. The chirping of birds, falling leaves, or butterflies flying around can help relax your mind. And what’s better than enjoying this with the company of your pet? Nature and the unconditional love that your dog has for you could be the answer to managing your stress and anxiety. If your locality is boring or makes you anxious, try a place where you are less known, and if possible, a luxurious neighborhood that will trigger a sense of amazement.

Anxiety can be detrimental to your health and productivity both at home and at work. From spending time with nature, dancing, to doing yoga, there are many ways to fight the mental condition. Even medical marijuana is an option preferred by many in the modern world. In order to overcome anxiety, take your time to discover what works best for you and practice it every time you feel anxiety setting in.

Author Bio

Tess DiNapoli is an artist, freelance writer, and content strategist. She has a passion for yoga and often writes about health and wellness, but also enjoys covering the fashion industry and world of fitness. Follow her on Instagram.

Online therapy can be a great tool for busy moms.

For the past few months, I’ve been dealing with depression, despite being on anti-depressants. I assumed it was triggered by the chronic pain I have been experiencing since developing scar tissue adhesions following my hysterectomy for endometriosis. Having suffered from depression off and on since being diagnosed with postpartum depression many years ago, I didn’t want to let it get out of control. So I thought it was time to try out cognitive behavioral therapy via Online-Therapy.com.

Here’s a look at what my experience was like with online therapy.

I tried Online Therapy for 30 Days and this is what happened — *This is NOT a sponsored post but it does contain affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of these links and buy a product, I may earn a small commission at no additional cost to you. Rest assured that I only recommend products that I love from companies that I trust. Furthermore, I am not a medical professional and nothing in this post should be taken as medical advice. I am simply a mother who has been there and lived to tell the tale.

How Does Online Cognitive Behavior Therapy Work?

I have tried online therapy before, in the form of online talk therapy. That means that I’ve video chatted with a licensed therapist to discuss my thoughts and feelings. I’ve also done talk therapy in person, so online talk therapy wasn’t much different from that, aside from the convenience of it.

But cognitive behavior therapy at online-therapy.com is a completely different world. First of all, it’s not talk therapy. It’s a series of activities that you do in order to help reprogram your brain. The idea being that if you can change your way of thinking, you can change your behaviors and ultimately, your mood.

What to do if you think you have postpartum depression — .

Secondly, you do it all at your own pace. I decided to be more aggressive and try to complete all the sections in 30 days. This meant that I was logging on and completing at least one worksheet every couple of days. But there is no timeline, no deadlines, no schedules, no specific hours of availability. You can complete a worksheet in the middle of the night if you want to!

And finally, while you’re doing it all on your own, you’re never actually alone. You’re assigned one therapist to work with you throughout the entire process. As you complete sections and worksheets, your therapist will leave comments about what you’ve written. You can schedule a weekly live chat and you can email your therapist whenever you need to. Over the 30 days, I really did develop a bond with my therapist and looked forward to connecting with her during the weekly chats.

The Benefits of Working Solo

I’ve always been better working at my own pace. Some days I would complete an entire section with it’s corresponding worksheets, and other days I would just do part of a section and one worksheet. And while the worksheets are designed for self-reflection, I always looked forward to getting that notification that my therapist had responded to my answers. When it was time for our live chat session, I couldn’t wait to talk to her about some of the things we had worked on. She always had great input and feedback about the things I’d written in my worksheets.

While it was reassuring that my therapist was always there for me, I also felt empowered that I was taking control of my own thoughts and emotions. The worksheets really made me think. I was responsible for examining my own negative behaviors and how I responded to certain triggers. Taking ownership of my reactions to common situations made me want to change my behaviors even more.

Towards the last few sections, I became much more efficient at recognizing my negative thoughts and behaviors and how to replace them with positive ones, or healthier negative ones. At the time, I found some of the worksheets to be repetitive, but now I see that was done on purpose. Having to recall certain thoughts and behaviors over and over meant finding out which ones affected me the most.

One Year Postpartum & Still Depressed — .

The Online Therapy Toolbox

The sections and worksheets are just one part of the cognitive behavior therapy process. In order to get the most out of therapy, I needed to make some life changes.

Yoga and meditation was something I have been wanting to incorporate into my daily life for a while now. In the online therapy toolbox, there are a series of yoga videos that I can access at any time, and they include both short workouts and longer ones.

The online journal was another great tool available 24/7. As a writer, journaling has been something I’ve started and stopped several times throughout my life. But the online therapy journal isn’t just a blank page for me to write in all my thoughts, instead there were specific questions I needed to answer each day to get me thinking about how I wanted to feel. This made it easy for me to set goals each morning and be accountable for achieving those goals each evening.

The action plan was a place where I was really accountable for making progress. As I went through the online therapy course, I scheduled specific activities to help me get better. Things like yoga, exercise, socializing events and health appointments. As I completed each activity on my action plan, I checked off that it was done and it was added to my “ta-da” list (instead of a to-do list). Seeing all the actions I had completed towards improving my mental health gave me a sense of accomplishment.

Getting a Diagnosis

As I go through and complete the worksheets, my therapist reads all of my answers. She leaves a comment within 24 hours and I can reply if I want to. She was able to divulge certain things from my answers that I didn’t immediately see. Together, we came to the conclusion that I was suffering from some trauma related to my hysterectomy. I realized that I hadn’t grieved for the loss of my uterus in the right way and therefore, every time I felt pelvic pain, I was reminded of that loss.

Following that revelation, I began to work on activities to help me grieve. I started to write about the loss and allow myself to feel the emptiness, even cry about it. I now have an answer as to why the pain causes me to be depressed, and I have an action plan in place on how to replace that depression with something more positive.

Was 30 Days of Therapy Enough?

The thing about cognitive behavior therapy is that it’s not something someone else does for you. It’s something you learn to do yourself. It’s not like getting a massage, it’s more like learning how to drive. Once you learn how to change your thinking, it’s something you need to continue to do regularly. And the more you practice, the better and more confident you will get.

Online-therapy.com offers a course in cognitive behavior therapy. How long it takes you to complete the course is up to you. I managed to complete the entire course in 30 days but that doesn’t signal the end of my therapy. I now need to take everything I’ve learned and put into practice in my every day life.

Others may need longer than 30 days to complete the course and may want additional therapist support along the way. Thankfully, sessions are billed monthly and you can stop at any time with the click of one button. And you’ll still have access to your toolbox even after the subscription ends, so you can continue with the yoga and meditation, journal entries and action plan.

In Conclusion

This was the right form of therapy for me because I find it easier to write out my emotions than to voice them. I was also in a place where I wanted to get better, and I wanted to take ownership of my own mind and moods. Those things were key to getting the most out of the online therapy experience.

If you’re not quite ready to do it on your own, consider the package that allows two live chats a week instead of one, so that you have that additional support. Online-therapy.com costs less than traditional talk therapy because you’re not paying for someone else’s time by the hour. I put off doing it for a long time because of the cost associated with it. But eventually I needed to prioritize my own mental health, no matter the cost.

So whatever your struggle is, I urge you to consider this option. You may not find a diagnosis or the root cause of your mental health issues in just 30 days, and you definitely don’t need to. For many people, mental health disorders are a lifelong battle. You may need to do multiple rounds of therapy or try a combination of treatment options to find relief. But if you’re interested in learning how to take control of your own mind and moods, then cognitive behavior therapy might be for you.

Tag: how to manage anxiety

5 Activities That Will Help You Overcome Anxiety at Home