SYSK TRENDING - A Practical Way to Approach Anxiety

0:00Anxiety seems to be everywhere right now. More people are talking about it and feeling it. And yet the way most of us try to deal with anxiety often makes it worse. We ignore it, try to power through it, distract ourselves, or hope it'll just fade away. But anxiety isn't something you simply must endure. What if there was a more practical way to approach it? A way to understand what your brain is actually doing, and then use that knowledge to calm anxiety when it shows up. That's why today's SYSK trending topic is a practical way to approach anxiety. In my conversation with mental health and wellness expert Dr. John Deloney, we explore what anxiety really is, why your brain produces it in the first place, and a few surprisingly simple techniques grounded in psychology and neuroscience that you can use in the moment. And we'll get to that right after this.

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3:01He is a mental health and wellness expert and host of his own podcast called The John Deloney Show. And he's author of a book called Building a Non-Anxious Life. Hi John, welcome to something you should know. Excellent. So first, tell me what anxiety is exactly. I think in the simplest terms, anxiety is just an alarm system. And outside of the bell curve medical issues, it's really all it is. And we've got a culture that tells us if you feel bad or if you feel uncomfortable, then that in and of itself is a problem and should be fixed. Everybody should be comfortable all the time. And so when our bodies feel anxious, when it sounds those alarms, we immediately try to fix the anxiety or stop the anxiety. And really, it's like taking a magic marker and coloring over your gas gauge on your dashboard. I don't want to see that light. Like, okay, but your car is going to run out of gas. Right? So I think we have over-pathologized to sound like a nerd.

4:07I think we've made anxiety the enemy and it's really not. We've created a very, very anxious life for ourselves. And so I think the question we should all be asking is not why is everybody so anxious and how do we stop? I think the question is, what are, what if our bodies are right? What are things that are right? What kind of world have we built and what do we need to do now? Well, don't you find that a lot of people who get anxious about stuff, that there's this sense that by being anxious about something that's going to happen, or might happen, or you imagine might happen, that that's somehow working on the problem, that that that anxiety is somehow, even though you know really that that doesn't help the problem, that that's your way of preparing for it. Not to parse it out, I think we ruminate. I think we spin up and spend a lot of energy on a particular problem,

5:09that we have no way to solve. And by doing that, then our bodies sound the alarms. And so I don't know that anybody chooses anxiousness as though it's helping, but I do, I personally will spend a ton of time having imaginary conversations with world leaders. If I just had 20 minutes with so and so, I would tell my body doesn't know the difference. It's off to the races. It's as though we're having that conversation and it's getting very heated. And so then it sounds the alarms. It raises my heart rate. It dumps cortisol into adrenaline into my body. It goes to fight or fight. It's go time, baby. That's the anxiety alarms. And so yeah, when you start ruminating, when you start worrying about these huge issues, or when you create a light, like I'm just going to start buying stuff. I'm going to start buying stuff. I'm going to start buying stuff. I'm going to have another drink, another drink. I'm going to text this person. I'm not married to because she makes me feel alive. All of those behaviors then sound the alarms, right?

6:09But if anxious is what you do, then how do you do something different? And what do you do different? I think it's important to live in reality and ask yourself the one scary question is what you're doing working? Is this ever worked? Is being anxious ever solved a problem? Has leaving a party and spending the next two hours worrying about what you said at the party? Has that ever helped in taking back anything you said? Has it ever helped you the following week when you see those people again? No, it doesn't, it doesn't solve the problem. And so I think owning the life I'm leading is setting these alarms off or in a more straightforward analogy. The alarm in my kitchen is not the problem. The fire is the problem. And so I'm going to begin to look not to shut off the alarms, but begin looking for the things in my life that are setting the alarms off in the first place. If you in your kitchen and you climb up and take the batteries out of the smoke detector,

7:10your house is going to still burn down. You're just not going to hear the alarm system. You haven't solved the problem, right? Okay, but what is it you do instead? Hey, you decide or number one, you decide I'm going to stop going to war with my body. I am not the enemy of me. I'm going to, I'm going to start assuming my body's right when it gets my attention. And then I'm going to begin working through a series of daily choices, not to deal with the anxiety, but to deal with the life part, to make a life that my body isn't constantly feeling unsafe. And that can be as simple as choosing connection. Like I'm going to choose to not do my life by myself. It's going to be awkward and weird and uncomfortable. But I have to have people in my life. Or if my body knows I'm alone, it's going to sell the alarms. Okay, I can do that. I may need to go see a counselor for some historical stuff that I need to deal with. Or I'm going to go see a doctor and finally deal with that weight because my body's been selling the alarms that we're not safe.

8:12We're not safe. We're not safe. Those are, those are some of the easy ones. Some of the harder ones are I'm going to choose freedom. I am going to choose to not let a banker or a mortgage company tell me what I'm going to do. And that means I'm going to start on a 10. It took me and my wife 15 years to pay off our student loans, to pay off our car notes, to pay off the credit cards, and to get into a place where Visa does not tell our family what we do every day. I do. My wife does. And if your body knows that, hey man, if you get fired, they're going to take your house. They're going to take your food. They're going to take your cars. If your body knows that, it would be failing you if it wasn't anxious. Because you're not safe. And so I'm going to begin working through, I'm going to get rid of clutter in my house. I'm going to clear my calendar and stop letting nine year old soccer coach tell our family what we're going to do for the next 14 years with the Saturdays and Sundays. Because they're not going to run my life.

9:12I'm going to choose to be free. I'm going to choose reality. I'm going to choose to have hard conversations with my wife, with my kids, with my neighborhood, with my school, my kid's school. I am going to live in the present and not be distracted all the time. I'm going to choose to believe in something bigger than myself, because my body can't hold up everything. It would never was designed to. And so I'm going to start working on these parts of my life. I'm going to make these choices on a regular basis. I'm going to choose exercise. I'm going to choose to stop mainlining candy, which is one of my great challenges. I'm going to choose to deal with my alcohol. I'm going to choose to deal with my marriage. I'm going to do these things so that my body doesn't constantly go, hey, we're not safe, we're not safe, we're not safe. And in so doing, I'm going to give myself peace. So that when your cousin dies, when your mom gets cancer, when the economy collapses, you can head right into those issues. You can go be sad.

10:13You can go mourn your job. And it's going to be annoying and heartbreaking, not catastrophic. So that's what I'm going to solve for. And so I think sometimes when people start to think the way you just described what sounds great as soon as there's a setback, as soon as they fail, it's anxiety time again, because now they're anxious because they can't do it. They failed. The worst part about the last 25 years of work for me, sitting with people who have lost everything, they've lost a child, they've lost their home, they've lost everything, is watching them on the back end, come back. And our culture talks a lot about post-traumatic stress, but it does a very poor job of talking about the other side of that teeter totter, which is post-traumatic growth. People who go through hell and continue to chase that tiny little pen light that turns into a candle light that turns into a spotlight that turns into the sun. They keep walking forward and they gather people and they gather resources and they change

11:18their behavior and they change their family tree. So instead of saying, when I feel anxiousness, it's just, it's my body telling me, once again, you failed. That's not your body. That's culture. Your body's just saying, we're not safe. You can smile and go, you're right. I got knocked down again. Oh man, this sucks. I'm going to get back up. And I'm going to get back up. And on those days, I can't get back up. I've got a couple of people in my corner that can reach down and pull me up. And it's about getting back up and about getting back up. But anxiety will never tell you that it's over. Don't you find that there are people, though, who just anxiety is their fuel and it always has been that that's kind of, that if you were to take that away from them, if they were to change their life, so there was no anxiety, like they wouldn't almost wouldn't know what to do because that's always been their fuel. Yeah, it's, I mean, you nailed it. It's not only a fuel, it's an identity.

12:19I can't go to that party because I have social anxiety. As though it's like a cancer, it's something that is upon you, like a blanket or a jacket. I have this. I can't, I just do. I've got five toes and I have anxiety. Um, instead of looking at it through a lens of, I mean, other people sounds my body's alarms. Hey, I wonder why that is. Oh, maybe it's because of some childhood abuse or maybe it's because I got made fun of as a kid or I got left out as a kid. Who knows why? But for some reason, my body's identified groups of people as unsafe. Oh, so when I head in, I'm going to put my hand in my chest and say, I know you feel unsafe, but I'm good here. I'm good here. Or maybe I need to not tell that joke because it's not that funny, right? So, um, but yes, countless millions of people have taken anxiety as an identity. It's a way to operate through the world. And yes, when you go deal with it, I remember my therapist asked me an amazing question. She said, uh, how are you feeling? This is after we've done some really intense work

13:21over a long period of time. And I said, I don't know how to describe what I'm feeling. The only word that keeps coming to mind is depressed, but I'm not depressed. Things are great. I feel fine. I just feel low. And she smiled really big. And she said, this John is what normal feels like. And I had just been spun up for so long. It became quote unquote who I was. I was the energy guy. I was the always the, oh yeah, but it could all come down and end the, oh yeah, what about that? I was always that guy. And so what I've had to do is practice not being that guy because that guy has heart attacks and strokes and dies young and eventually burns out all the people around him. I don't want to be that guy. We're talking about anxiety and my guest is John Deloney. He is author of a book called Building a Non-Anxious Life. I think we tend to over complicate our wardrobe. Too many options. Not enough things you actually wear. You don't need more clothes. You need a few pieces that

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15:26Go to q-i-n-c-e.com slash sysk. You know something that is oddly difficult. Finding a therapist. Not the idea of therapy. I think most of us agree that's a good thing. We've all had times when talking to someone could have really helped. But actually finding a therapist who's available, who's taking new patients, who takes your insurance and is someone you'd really like to talk to, yeah that's a little trickier. And that's where Rula comes in. Rula is a healthcare company that makes it a lot easier to connect with licensed therapists and mental health professionals who actually take your insurance. You see they work with over 100 insurance plans and the average copay for a Rula patient is about $15 a session, sometimes less depending on your benefits. Which makes therapy a lot more realistic for people who've thought about it but never quite pulled the trigger. And Rula doesn't just match you with whoever's next on the list. They actually help you find therapists

16:30based on your goals and preferences and what you're going through right now. Plus many appointments are available as soon as tomorrow. Thousands of people are already using Rula to get a affordable high quality therapy that is covered by insurance. Visit Rula.com slash sysk to get started. And after you sign up you'll be asked how you heard about them. So please support our show and let them know we sent you. That's r-u-l-a.com slash sysk because mental health care should work with you not against your budget. So John would you agree that that may be part of the problem. So many people are dealing with anxiety related issues is because you know kids aren't really taught to handle anxiety when they're kids they they're protected from it. Without meaning to when my son got a hit in Little League. I cheered really loud. And when he struck out I just didn't say anything.

17:34I don't want to be like oh we hit the ball in our fill. I'm just going to I'm just going to be cool. I also don't want to be one of those dads who when their kids strikes out they're like that's all right you get because it's not all right you struck out it stinks without realizing it over time. I was teaching my son's nervous system the way to dad's heart you will score this run you will get this grade you will cross this finish line anxiety is if you don't get this we're done you're a loser dad doesn't call mom he gets him bear it right those are things that a body can't handle so my son went to take some tests we're going to move some schools and he had to go take some tests on Saturday the other day and I literally held his face and he's like dad he's he's almost 14 he's like dad and he's humongous or eye to eye and I said listen these tests are really important and if you fail them you're probably not going to this school and I laughed like that

18:38and I said and there's not a test you can take where I won't hug you when you walk out the door period do I love you yes sir am I going to love you regardless of the scores yes sir do I believe in you yes sir am I going to laugh at you if you fail this and he cracked up and he goes yes sir right but it was me just reiterating this is huge and it's got big implications it's got big real world implications and you ain't going to lose me over it and so now he can focus just on the task part does that make sense does that ring ring true with you yeah I think so I get I get it and I understand your advice about dealing with the things in life that cause the anxiety rather than dealing with the anxiety but you can't deal with everything that causes anxiety because things happen things come up in life that you can't plan for things happen always it's always

19:39yeah but it always happens and if you're not ready for it we just got hit with oh you need a new roof oh man you know how expensive a new roof is oh I just got one yeah I just got one so I grew up in a home where money was my dad was a policeman and there was some harrowing years financially three kids and we didn't have a lot we shared a family car he had a police cruiser and we all wore hand me down it was tough sled I remember when I was married in the first five or 10 years of my life when I'd racked up so much freaking student loan debt and the house debt and all that walking around the house at night with my hands in my hair my wife was dead asleep she didn't know how bad it was financially the roof repairs coming I can prepare for it so it's annoying or I can not prepare for it and it costs me everything but but yeah life's always going to be through a bunch of man that's just that's the state of things here's the example I wrote in the book it was I don't

20:39know where my cousin died he's about 10 years older than me and man it was devastating for the whole family I don't know where because 15 years ago my wife when I put a stake in the ground and said no more we had money to go to the funeral and to get some flights in the grab a hotel room and so here's what that non anxious life here's what it bought us it bought us the ability to be really really sad and to grieve without other worries and that's the gift we're looking for here not that people aren't going to pass away the thing is is that when life comes can you exhale and go here we go because you're good to go it sounds though like as wonderful as it is to be where you are that getting there is a monumental task and where would you even suggest I begin I think for 99.9% of us the place you start is choosing reality what is the state of your marriage

21:41what is the state of your relationship with your kids since kids absorb tension in the home and in their environments what is our environment saying to our kids what how are kids doing what's the state of our finances who do we owe money to like this is right I'm all down on a piece of paper all of them what's the state of my relationship with my mom and my dad in their elderly year like it's choosing reality and for some of us like me it was I owed hundreds of thousands of dollars I'd created a world I guaranteed that my family was going to be in a mess guaranteed it for some people it's putting their face in their hands and realizing your marriage has been over for a long time some of it is I've got to be honest with my kids I've got to be honest about my job is killing me and others is man we're actually doing really really well right now let's start having people over right and so I think for everybody starting with choosing reality

22:42what is the state of things for you is a great place to start what do you recommend for someone who is prone to anxiety and something unexpected happens and you go into your anxiety mode what do you recommend people do one of the things that I was trained for when I was doing crisis response stuff is whenever ever possible walk from your place of notification to the actual place where there's a scenario going on meaning if I'm in my dean of students office and somebody comes sprinting into the room and goes I need you now somebody's about to kill themselves which happened more than once if I get up and go oh my gosh and I flip my desk over and sprint out of the room running as fast as I can down the hall my tie flying behind me right I bring a whole world of my chaos to

23:45an already chaotic situation but if I can walk or at very at least sort of trot down there and I exhale upon entering the room the worst case outcome here is that they're no longer with us and we're going to have to sit in that it's going to be a tragedy but most of us believe that if this thing happens all of our life is over it's not it's not and you can only experience that after you've sat in those rooms time and time again and so the greatest gift I can give I'm going to bring peace to the situation and if it happens most of us are still going to be here and the sun's going to come up and is it going to be hard and and awful and we have to grieve no doubt about it but the sun's going to come up and it's hard to see that on this side of a tragedy or this side of a thing that we're worrying about if I turn in this report and the boss hates it I'm going to get fired in your body responses though the end of time is now but it's not going to be you're going to get

24:49fired things might get tough you might have to move back home you might have to have a really hard conversation with your wife or your kids or your husband and then we're going to go get another job and it's going to be different our life's going to look different but we're going to head that way right so a lot of the worry is this build up that we're about to fall off a cliff and very very rarely does that cliff actually exist well I like your analogy that you used in the beginning that when people who are anxious have have problems the anxiety isn't the problem it's the alarm system it's the fire alarm but the problem is the fire and that we need to look at the fire and not so much of the alarm let's just look at the data man more people than ever before in human history are in under the care of a mental health professional right now right now more people are taking psychotropic medications drugs for anxiety fresh OCD ADHD than ever before in human history and the numbers are going through the roof when they discovered penicillin

25:56in short order death from infection fell off a map it solved that problem for the time being and so we have to be honest me as a mental health guy this is my world these are my gang have to look and say what if what we're doing is not working what what what now and maybe it's these people were never quote-unquote broken or pathological or malfunctioning to begin with maybe their bodies are working perfectly and the real question we have to ask is what kind of world has we have we created that the human body can't live it that to me seems like a much more instructive question than continually telling people well you're broken well something wrong with you I'll fix it I'll fix it I'll fix it just give me $175 plus $50 co-pay just keep taking this pill the rest of your life and we'll manage it right and we'll keep having to increase the dose it like at some point we have to say whoa this isn't solving the issue we need to take a 30,000 foot view of this thing

27:01and that to me is a scarier question it's a harder question and man it's a way more empowering question well you certainly have a different take on anxiety and and what to do about it that I think everybody needs to hear I've been speaking with John Deloney he is a mental health and wellness expert he's the host of his own podcast called the John Deloney Show and he's author of a book called Building a Non-Anxious Life and there's a link to his book at Amazon in the show notes thanks John thanks for coming on and talking about this and that wraps up this sysk trending episode I'm my co-rothers thanks for listening