Anxiety can be a complex picture. At least it feels that way. Anxiety is not a simple emotion. In fact, it is a basket full of fears, and fear can be wrapped up with all kinds of storylines and patterns.
Anxiety is not exactly a health catalyst. It can erode our lives not all at once, but gradually through time if unattended.
I want to share my simple view of how to transform anxiety. There is a short-form answer and a long-form of course. If you want to know the short-form it is this: feel and attend to it, and it will naturally dissipate itself.
“What?!” you say! “How can it be this easy?! I’ve lived with it for years!”
Actually this is exactly the thinking that can prevent unraveling it. You’ll see why in a minute. And you’ll see why you may have it because you’ll see that it has much to do with our relationship to it more than anything.
For all of the big thinkers and anti-reductionist thinking proponents, I’ll provide the long-form answer next and hopefully by the end of reading this, you’ll have a strong sense of how to manage it so that you can get back to thriving and living a joy-filled life.
First, let me share with you a recent experience I had overcoming it. I think this will shed some light on how it all works from my perspective as a person who has spent almost 10 years unraveling the deeper layers of it as I’ve explored many modalities in holistic healing and pscyho-spiritual processes in bringing people back to their genius path.
Today, I had the opportunity to use one of my most favorite tools for freeing myself and clients from emotions I/they feel stuck in: The Rapid Rewire Method.
Near the end of using this method, I was able to access my higher intuition and innate wisdom. I decided to work on feeling at a loss from a perceived excommunication from past community members. This is what I was able to see:
The anxiety I felt was perpetuated by my story of it. And for awhile, I felt the anxiety regarding being in group dynamics was because there was something wrong with me. I started to create a story around having this anxiety. I had to recognize the places I was judging myself and shift them, then allow myself the time to touch in with the fears underneath the surface.
The anxiety I felt simply needed the time, space, and attention (and an impeccable transformative container didn’t hurt either) to tend to the true fears that were there, set up from past experiences, and allow them to have a voice and be felt.
It can be tough transforming these shadow parts, but the truth of the Law of Reciprocity and Reflection is real: What we perceive in others is a reflection of our own view of self.
In essence, as I dug deeper, I saw that I feared rejection from others for who I am. In some ways I felt rejected even though it was actually a fear of this.
I was seeing the power of opening my heart to let whatever is there to be seen. I could see that a perceived rejection as a theme was showing up in my perception to show me where to open back to love again–within myself for myself–and have the opportunity to choose a new experience.
Even though I feared rejection on the outside, it was actually the rejection of self playing out inside of my that was afraid to be seen and wanting to be integrated. Like any life experience, it is truly how we perceive that determines our experience. It’s amazing how we may tend to project out this inward experience on external events to “compensate” or to feel better.
It’s important to take a look at the point of view itself. From the perspective of the pattern of self-rejection and self-criticism, it was a goal of protection: “I’ll perceive rejection on the outside (projection) by in effect rejecting myself first, then be so perfect that rejection will never happen to me from others because there’ll be nothing someone can reject.”
As this pattern was given a voice, the deeper sense of anxiety released and I naturally moved into a deep peace, acceptance, and respect that I longed for from these people but was able to give to myself by honoring my true feelings. I began to see that releasing this anxiety, like many other stuck emotions, is about 80% awareness alone.
This is what came through:
“I only have to soften into surrendering to the experience and emotion informing my life’s journey. Following and attuning to the wisdom of the genuine is vital for knowing how to navigate life. We can gather truth and direction from anywhere and any sources, but truly our own inner daemon guides us to the deepest wonders of life’s beauty.”
Now that’s not something I wake up to saying. Sometimes, I can be stuck in something, but because I was willing to face my inner shadow and hidden aspect I could find a new pathway into joy. Not only were fears ready to be integrated but a deeper wisdom wanted to emerge from me also.
Regarding why anxiety happens, there is always a gift wanting to emerge from our experience. But for it to emerge, we must go through the shadow. We must allow it, accept it, and embrace it in order for it to shift. Without the shadow, we would not have a gift. So the anxiety is there as a seed to sprout the flower or blossoming of a higher consciousness.
If left unchecked, stuck emotions like anxiety can snowball and get much more complicated and harder to unroot. You have anxiety, ultimately, because there is an identity (that always has a goal) that is at odds with another identity or aspect of self and its goals. And you have anxiety because underneath of the surface, there is a quality of consciousness that wants to emerge as a gift in your life.
It’s possible to just lean in, feel our stuck emotions and allow them to dissipate, but it’s a hell of a lot easier when it can be facilitated because clarifying and unraveling these conflicting identities requires some skill.
If you resonate with all of this, please leave some comments, or reach out for a phone call and we can talk it through. I offer free consultations that do exactly this, help to see what subconscious aspects are wanting a voice and mapping a plan for deeper integration for a more embodied, joy-filled experience in life.
Happy shadow work soul family. To embody your light, you need your darkness. Darkness only gets dark when left unattended. It’s really just the light wanting to pour forth through us and take us into our next-level soul freedom and evolutionary breakthroughs.
