So, I was able to sit for a few hours and wrote a literary piece about my "Anxiety Journey". I am not going to add the piece here but I will share to you what I found out through the process of writing. I call it the Timelines of Anxiety.
If you or someone you know have experienced this phase in his life, feel free to comment any similarity or difference. Hopefully it can also help anyone going through the same to know and feel that you are not alone in this journey. Let's start.
1. The Trigger
I believe one of the most important things to battle anxiety is to know where it is coming from. Mine came from childhood trauma. I had really bad experiences at home as a child which I tried to bury DEEP while growing up. How? Through relationships, trying to excel at school, having a lot of friends, or through extreme moods. No one would believe that I experienced a horrible past by the way I presented myself to other people. For some years, I thought I was able to go through it but every once in a while something will happen that will pull me back to that dark space.
2. Sub-trigger / Stimuli
These are another set of events that happen after the major trigger that makes you remember the past occurence and the feelings associated with it. My sub-triggers were broken relationships, feeling left out, failing from something I put my most effort into, and the likes. The thing about the sub-triggers is that it puts me on a loop. It is too powerful that it makes all efforts of healing go to waste. It feels like you did not make any progress at all!
My Story
Here's probably how I dove deep into my phase of anxiety. It started with a bad break up (7 yr relationship) to another a few months later (5 mos relationship). The amount of rejection was too much that it affected my performance at work. Then came another rejection of a friend whom I had a crush on 2 years later. We were friends and I felt that it will not progress into anything beyond friendship. I focused on my career instead. I resigned from work in hopes that I will find a better one. I was a trainee but everything was new and it felt hard that I decided to quit. From being an engineer, I became an English Teacher to kids and an administrative assistant. All while I was battling with axiety.
3. Chasing Care and Affection
So, I was kinda aware already that I may be going through anxiety and thought that maybe if I confide to a friend, the burden will be lessened. It did. But for only a short period of time. Soon enough I was asking myself if I did the right thing. If I chose the right person to share it with. There comes trust issues and I wanted to hit myself for sharing it or attempting to share it to people who felt like they don't care. I had a pity party with myself!
4. Detaching to the World
Decided that I will no longer tell my story to anyone, I started shutting all the doors and windows of communications to my friends and the whole world in general. That also happened during the pandemic so my anxious self was celebrating that I don't really have to meet people. But then, I was always alone with my thoughts - what ifs, if onlys, why am I still here thoughts. I drowned.
5. Getting Back Up
You know when they say, "If you're down, there is nothing to go but up"? Perhaps it is what happened. I was too deep into my mental health problem that I just realize that "Hey, we need to help ourself!" I started reading books and online materials on how other people dealt with anxiety and depression. Sometimes it works. Other times it doesn't. I was in a sort of mini loop. Then, I questioned myself, "What do you really want in life?" I want a lot that I don't have yet. But I no longer push things.
6. Practicing Gratitude + Manifesting
Easier said than done at first. It took a time before I was able to do it because I was on mini loop remember? One thing that helped me a lot was to turn my thoughts into that things that I want to achieve in life. "What will I do if I have a billion in my bank account?" "If I can, which places would I visit?" I did not that that through those dreamy thoughts, I was actually attracting this beautiful emotion of hope that I did not know I needed to fight anxiety. Some people call it law of attraction but for me, the word, "manifesting" works better. It sets me into the mood of receiving good things. I don't know, maybe because I have been hearing 'Law of Attraction' before and have never really put an act into it or that 'Manifesting' is a shorter word.
7. Work in Progress
I cannot say that I was able to overcome the anxiety phase but right now I can say that I am a Work in Progress. And it is huge progress because I was able to overlook the things that irritates me. Besides, sometimes, it's tiring to be mad or sulking all day.
8. Acknowlegment
Acknowledgment is the perhaps the key. Acknowledge that you are going through something. Acknowledge the past experience and bid goodbye to it in order for a new - better - experience to come. You cannot receive something if yours are tied to something else. We need to let go. Not all at once but a step at a time.
I am hoping to not go back to the loop again. I wouldn't know for sure but I hope I would be able to use the things I learnt on the way to be able to close the loop sooner. It took me 4 years in anxiety and depression and would not want to spend another year into it.