Change can be difficult for many individuals due to the uncertainty about the future. To change often means that the things one was once used to are going to be different. This can push people out of their comfort zones. The thing with change is that it cannot be avoided no matter how much someone wants to have things stay the same. We, unfortunately, live in a world in which change is constantly happening. We’re having to adapt and be flexible with our time, lives, and routines.
Tips to Ease Anxiety During Change
Here are a few tips to help to manage the stress and anxiety that can come up when going through life changes. These tips can help to ease your anxiety symptoms as well as give you a new perspective when going through the difficulty of accepting the change.
1. Recognize: Acknowledge that you are going through the change. Recognize that it is happening, rather than avoiding or denying change is occurring.
2. Change can be good: Recognize that change does not always mean something bad is about to happen. It can mean the opportunity for new experiences. Sometimes changing the way, you think about change can help to build a more positive perspective.
3. Continue with your routine: Do the best you can keep some of the things you do in your daily routine the same. It could be showering in the morning, praying before getting out a bed, or making yourself a cup of coffee. Maintaining this daily routine can help to make change feel less dramatic.
4. Stay healthy: eat healthily and try to maintain good sleep hygiene. Lack of sleep and a high sugar or fat diet can weigh your system down and often make you feel less rested, irritable, and even anxious.
5. Exercise: Try to go for a brisk walk for at least 20-30 minutes a day to help ease your tension and anxiety symptoms. Reflect on nature and listen to some upbeat music to boost your mood and get those endorphins flowing.
6. Stay social: Get out with friends, make that phone call to that loved one you haven’t had time for. Staying in touch with friends and loved ones can act as a support system. This helps you feel less alone in the change you are going through.
7. Balance your time: Stick to a schedule or consider writing things down in a planner or putting your schedule into your phone. It will help you to feel more in control over your schedule, as well as manage your time more wisely.
8. Take a break from social media: Try to limit your time on social media. Sometimes viewing others’ lives on Facebook or other media can create a comparison bias that can hinder your mood. It can cause you to constantly compare and feel as if you must measure up to everyone else’s lives.
9. Creative positive experiences: Throughout the change try to write down or verbally acknowledge positive experiences. Maybe you have found a new coffee shop to go to, met a new friend, explored a new park. You may have learned something new about yourself or the world you hadn’t known before.
10. Let yourself be sad but not for too long: Allow yourself to mourn the old but embrace the new. Allow yourself only ten minutes a day to have a pity party. Then pick yourself up and do something to embrace your day. Treat yourself to lunch out, or take a walk. Get your nails done. Get that expensive Starbucks drink you have always wanted to try. Try to find small things to enjoy in your days.
Change Does Not Have to be Scary
Before you know it, the change will become your new regular and normal routine. You will find with the above tips change does not have to feel so scary. You will discover that you are in control of how you react to every change that can come your way. Embrace the new and consider traveling the path less traveled. You never know what adventures you will discover if you give yourself the encouragement to get out there and try!
