Hang on to your hats. The “no days off in recovery” guy is about to talk about taking breaks and how that can be helpful.
Yes, Hell may be freezing over. Get your mittens.
One of the things I learned in the process of recovery was that the simple act of taking a short break - even a minute or two - can be very impactful. So I’m not talking about taking two weeks off to soak in the tub and eat chocolates. I’m talking more about what we can call “micro breaks” designed to create an air gap between us, and our thoughts and anxiety symptoms.
I used this technique to help me better tolerate and move through anxiety and fear while I was doing my exposures or meeting those challenges that life threw at me along the path to recovery. It worked quite well, so now I use it all the time as a general stress management and quality of life tool.
My encapsulated review of the “micro break” habit would be … “9.5 out of 10. Would repeat.”
What do micro breaks look like?
As that feeling of overwhelm begins to build to a peak and you are sure that the fear, anxiety, or stress is going to completely break you … stop. A micro break is simply the act of backing away for a minute or two, relaxing your body, adjusting your posture, and allowing yourself to just be. I tend to spend that minute or so breathing mindfully, but you can bring your attention to almost anything you choose. The point of the micro break is shift into neutral, disengage from the overwhelm and its source, and be mindful of something else for a minute or two.
Imagine yourself standing on a beach, watching a big wave build in the water. The wave gets larger and larger by the second as it rushes toward you. The roar of the ocean fills your ears. It’s deafening. The water is coming at you, faster and faster as it builds to greater heights. You are afraid. You are holding your breath and tensing as your brain works overtime to try to imagine a scenario in which you won’t be destroyed by the unimaginable and uncontrollable power of the ocean. You move from afraid to terrified as the wave looms over you and disaster is imminent.
Now just imagine taking a few steps backward, away from the wave. It crashes onto the shore a few feet in front of you, its awesome power dissipating as the water swirls around your ankles and knees, then washes back out, leaving you intact and unharmed.
That is the micro break. Those few calculated steps backward that put space between you and the breaking wave. The micro break doesn’t stop the wave, nor does it place a shield between you and its force. The micro break only creates space, and in that space we find both shelter and power. What seemed like certain doom has passed in a relatively uneventful way, allowing us to go back to the business of interacting with the ocean in a more pleasurable, productive way.
When I was struggling with anxiety and panic, I would use micro breaks to re-set during my exposures, allowing the current wave to break in front of me rather than engaging in my usual escape rituals. It worked quite well. I sometimes had to take many micro breaks in a 20 minute exposure, but that was perfectly fine.
Now on a particularly busy day where I’m going from call to call and task to task, I use micro breaks throughout the day to step away from the roar of the ocean and re-set. It releases the tension and reminds me to slow down and be more mindful about what I am doing rather than getting caught up in the moment.
So today’s post anxiety recovery tip is to learn to take micro breaks. Use them during recovery, then hang on to that habit for the rest of your life. You’ll be happy you did.
I’m currently reading The Accidental President by A.J. Baime. I’m not generally a big history buff, but this one is part of the Kindle Unlimited program and it seemed worth a try just as something different. So far I’m really enjoying it. Harry S. Truman may have been the most unlikely President in modern US history, and I had no idea. This book looks Truman’s path to the first four months of his Presidency which culminated in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Every Tuesday I’ll let you know what I’m currently reading. I read quite a bit on psychology and philosophy, but really you never know what I’ll have in my Kindle or Audible libraries! If you’re on Goodreads and into books, you can follow/friend me over there. Here’s a link to my “currently reading” shelf. I’d love to see what you’re reading and what you recommend.
62. Post-Recovery Anxiety Tips: Taking Breaks