Anxiety Recovery ... What Am I Supposed To Think About? (Ep 57)

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Good afternoon to you both. I've done a lot of personal development, um, but I think it's it's made me focus inwards. So my question is, which I think is gonna help a lot of people, I'm hoping it does, is when you're in bed, driving, go to the gym, what do you think about? What can I do to keep my mind busy? And sometimes when I work as well, because my attention goes inwards, and what what happens is I my thoughts are in pictures, so I just like stare at a picture, then it's like a conveyor bed, then another picture, and I just ponder. I don't say anything, I don't do anything. What is that about? What is going on there? I really want to get over this because anxiety can make you feel quite um selfish in a way, and it's the last thing you want to do because all of your attention is inwards, and I'm desperately trying to keep it outwards. Thanks, guys. Thanks, take care.

SPEAKER_03 1:04

Welcome to Disordered. This is episode 57 entitled What Am I Supposed to Think About? My name is Joshua Fletcher, also known as Anxiety Josh, and I'm a psychotherapist based in the UK who specializes in working with anxiety disorders, more so a previous sufferer of several anxiety disorders. I'm the co-host of this podcast and author of the book. And how does that make you feel?

SPEAKER_02 1:29

And I am Drew Linsolata. I am a therapist in training in the US, in New York, also specializing in anxiety and anxiety disorders, also an author, clearly a podcaster, because I'm co-hosting this podcast. I guess a psychoeducator, an advocate in this community, and also a former sufferer of anxiety and depression, and probably diagnosable OCD for a good portion of my life. Here we are at episode 57. What are we talking about today?

SPEAKER_03 1:52

What a question. Love the question. Thank you, question, Sandorina. Yeah. Um, what am I supposed to think about? Really good one. We've not really covered this. Uh obviously, there was a reference to the inward stuff, the inward compulsion, which um the person who sent the question is probably aware of. Sounds like your awareness is great. So well done. Like, I'm really aware of everything, but what am I supposed to do now? What am I supposed to think? What are you supposed to think, Drew?

SPEAKER_02 2:18

What am I supposed to think about? Well, I mean, the short answer the short answer to that is you're supposed to think about whatever thought your brain produces. Like the question, I think, is so great because there was a moment in the question when she says, Well, the thoughts are like a like a pictures that are come by in a conveyor belt, and they just watch them go by. And I'm thinking, that is literally what people like John Kabazin spend a lifetime trying to teach people to do. Right. So, yeah, like I am a hundred percent, I am just watching my thoughts go by. Yes, correct. Because your brain will just produce them, and it's okay to just watch them go by. So that's not a problem. This sounds like a thought stopping or thought control question.

SPEAKER_03 3:00

Yeah, and I was thinking more, it's a more threat monitoring question, where so you're doing the afterwards. I'm observing my thoughts, but it sounds like you're observing them for threat. Yes, and that's the difference.

SPEAKER_02 3:12

And you know it's funny because when we talk about things like mindfulness, mindfulness is you get rid of the judgment. So I'm not trying to find meaning in my thoughts or judge them or evaluate them, they just are. So the threat monument monitoring here to me is like, am I thinking correctly to recover to get over my anxiety? The threat is I'm not thinking right and I won't get better, I'm never gonna get past this. So, but and and I'm gonna try and control or stop the thoughts. So, what are you supposed to think about? Whatever your brain comes up with, and then pick from the menu.

SPEAKER_03 3:39

Yeah, I yeah, I love that. You know, it's a huge menu of thoughts. What are you picking from the menu? It's a huge menu of thoughts, so yeah, and they're all a lot. Yeah, yeah, no, that's good. What am I supposed to do here? Um, this there's nothing rigid. Let your brain and mind go where it needs to go. Now, think about that. Like Drew said, there's a menu, and at the top of the menu, written in comic sans font 32, underlined, emboldened, and and italized. Italicized. Yeah, leave it in, let everyone know how to do it.

SPEAKER_02 4:14

Welcome to Drew Corrects Josh, episode 57.

SPEAKER_03 4:17

Please mute it. Um, at the top of the menu, you've got anxiety going, hey, what if you freak out and you're never the same and you're gonna lose control and lose your mind and you're gonna have a palpitation and you're gonna your heart's gonna explode and you're gonna go crazy. All right, well, that doesn't sound as good as cheese and bacon croquettes. So I'm gonna keep going down the menu because your brain will keep giving you thoughts. That thought will be loudest at the top of the menu in big writing, but keep going, just let the brain go through. You will observe them. That's okay. That's okay. That's literally thinking when you feel like you need you well, when you're observing them through the lens of threats, like I'm not thinking right. I need I need to overcome anxiety now, so I need to think correctly. Oh no, no, no, no, no, no, don't don't be doing that.

SPEAKER_02 5:07

Yeah, I'm not allowed to have certain thoughts, or I shouldn't. If if I'm getting better, then I shouldn't be having these particular kinds of thoughts anymore. So, like, I if I have them, it indicates that maybe I'm not getting better. But if you can have them and watch them go past like they're on a conveyor belt and notice them, observe them, that is like literally a skill. I know I've said literally like 18 times today already, and we're like four. I've literally said it so many times. I will stop saying it, but it's a a skill that would be that's a diffusion skill, dbt. I notice that I notice that I'm thinking about, I notice that, you know. Oh, I see I see these thoughts in my head. Okay, and there they go, and they come in that guy. It's okay.

SPEAKER_03 5:50

As well, when you're anxious, this helped me. When you're anxious, you're gonna see things through the lens of threat, so your brain will be suggesting what the threat is, threat monitoring. So you could just be sat there and I'm just observing my thoughts and pondering. I think uh that you said okay. Well, you can give it your attention if you want, and this is what I also heard in the question is that you're threat monitoring because maybe you're already anxious, chicken or the egg situation. So you're scanning your thoughts for any kind of threat or context. No, yeah, your thoughts do that all day anyway. It just feels urgent when you uh when your threat response is kicked in. You know, you there's nothing you have to particularly think here, it doesn't matter, let anything go into your head. Um, what did you used to think about when you're doing exposures, Drew? And uh probably a multitude of things, but does any stand out?

SPEAKER_02 6:42

Well, this is where memory starts to be an issue because the exposures were a while ago now. But uh generally speaking, I can tell you that at first I was thinking about how I felt. That's all I could think about. Uh, how I felt when I was doing the exposure was at the front and center, it was the loudest thing. And I'm like, well, I feel terrible. I'm I feel like I'm about to lose my shit. Um my heart is pounding, I'm terrified. I really need to go home. I'm just gonna have to take the next 30 seconds as I go here, and that's all I could think about. And I think over time that started to just loosen up, but I didn't try to don't think that. Like, oh, think let me think a happy thought. I I mean, well, everybody tries that at some point, but it does not work. It doesn't work.

SPEAKER_03 7:24

I was thinking as well, like someone who's had a history of GAD. Uh I used to sit at home and then meta think, think about my thinking. Like like I know worry is really the uh you know, it's keeping me in the cycle of being anxious with GAD, so I'm gonna make sure that I think positive thoughts or don't ruminate. Okay, now I'm ruminating about if I'm ruminating or not. And now I'm just and I always bring the attention to the it's an attention issue. It's like I'm just sat there in my head, the inwards compulsion, yeah. And actually, you know, Colombo's on the TV, and I love Colombo, so I could have been watching that. You know, I know it doesn't feel safe to engage with those things, and I didn't, so that's the cycle of God or anything, the the cycle of anxiety. Right. It was just like you're trying to apply perfectionism to your thoughts, you know. If I think and visualize myself in a field with my friend Drew, and we're skipping through fields of wheat, and there's a rainbow, and deer, then I'll feel better. Oh no, I'm not thinking about that. Now I'm thinking about work, and now I'm ruminating again. Now I'm not getting the thinking right. That is meta thinking. And I I'm getting that from the question. I'm not doing the thinking right.

SPEAKER_02 8:37

Yeah, yeah, exactly. I'm thinking about my thinking, and metacognition is wonderful and also nasty. Like the fact that we can think about thinking, that's that whole language framework thing. Like the worst thing that ever happened to us was symbolic thinking and making meaning of our thoughts and language came out of that, and it's awesome, but it also stinks because it means we can pick apart thoughts that our brains just make and then try to interpret them. Is this the right thought? Should I be thinking this? What I should be thinking something else. So I I would give you this. Here's something, write this down. You can take this with you. And by the way, I was skipping through a field of wheat like 10 minutes ago. Amazing that you said that. But uh really, no, it's not. Well, I wanted to be though. Um we have no wheat here. I actually believed you then. I know. We have no we grow no wheat here. So there are no wheat fields for probably a thousand miles from where I live, I'm gonna say. Oh, really? Yeah, it's a shame, isn't it? But anyway, here's a thing that you can write down. Take this with you. You can choose to have a thought. You can never choose to not have a thought. We can choose to have a thought. Like I can decide I really want to think about an ice cream cone, and I just did because I wanted to, but I cannot choose to not have a thought. And the analog to that, or the corollary there is I can choose to have a thought, but the thoughts I choose can never drown out or block the thoughts I don't choose. It won't, it doesn't work that way.

SPEAKER_03 9:56

No, that's really important.

SPEAKER_02 9:57

Yeah. So, like, okay, I can choose to have a thought, but I can't choose to not have a thought. So if you're laying in bed and you have thoughts going across your conveyor conveyor belt, which I love that analogy, you have to let them be there. It's okay. Like, maybe it's like, oh, I see them. Like, what do I feel like thinking about? Maybe I'll try to think about something else. But if the other thoughts show up, I have to let them. I can't, I'm doing it wrong.

SPEAKER_03 10:20

It's it's similar to your breathing, though. It's the mechanism that you can partially get involved in, yeah, but you're not in control of it all. Think about your breathing. Yeah. And for the people with somatic OCD, like, please don't, right? No, I don't want to think about somatic OCD and air hunger, don't think about your breathing. Right. Uh, or you can, it doesn't matter, you're safe, it's fine. Um, but like you can concentrate on your breath and take deep breaths or shallow breaths or whim hoff it in an ice bath, whatever. But also, you're not in control of your breathing because it does it for you. Yeah, and it's the same with your thinking. You can choose to activate the thinking mechanism. And I'm gonna go inwards and think now, but also, what are you thinking about when you're mindlessly doing tasks and stuff like that? Your brain will just carry on in the background, your breathing will carry on in the background, your digestion will carry on in the background, stuff like that. You can have limited intervention with operations of your body, but we misinterpret our role sometimes as no, I have to be be in charge and monitor this constantly. No, you don't. It's like staring at a river all day, making sure it doesn't flow properly. Yeah, it's like the ri the river's gonna flow or whatever, you know, and you can try and stand in it and try and usher it along and make it go faster. And you can, it's limited intervention. You could probably stand in the river with your mates and you know, carry on, keep going, keep going, river. And you probably you know affect it a tiny bit, yeah. But no, the river's gonna flow, and it's the same with your thoughts. You're staring at your thoughts, and you have 5,000 different thoughts a day, you know, mostly nonsense. Uh, because the brain does just produce mostly nonsense. Uh some of the stuff I think about is just ridiculous. I kind of laugh about it, but it's the one, the emotional ones that stand out.

SPEAKER_02 12:11

The daydreaming about, like, I the one time and I cracked me up, and it sticks with me. Like the cat, the cab the cab company. If I had a cab company, what would I name it? What color are my cabs? I'm like, this is what you dream about daydream about, dude. And like that was a thing that Josh brought up in another episode. Your your brain will produce such random stuff. I think the breathing, connecting it to breathing is great. And the river, because yeah, can you change the behavior of the river a little bit, but only for a limited amount of time? Can you control your breathing? You can, but sooner or later you disengage from the active breathing and your body takes over and it just does what it does.

SPEAKER_03 12:55

So you're not breathing when you sleep, are you? Well, you are breathing when you sleep.

SPEAKER_02 12:57

I mean, you are, but you're not thinking about it. So, like, okay, I can choose to think right now and do that, and sometimes it's fun, but then sooner or later, my brain is going to take over. That's that default mode network. In the absence of something else to do, it'll think about you. I love that. It's just what we do, and it lights up in the functional RMI studies. Like, this here you go, there's a default mode network.

SPEAKER_03 13:17

I love it when you're talking about the default mode network. It's I was thinking about a lot. And yeah, it me for this person who's asked this question, and I'm sure many people relate to this. Your default mode network is what do I do?

SPEAKER_02 13:28

Yeah. What do I have? I have nothing to pay attention to at the moment, especially if at night you're going to sleep, right? You're quieting down, you don't have a lot going on. Your default mode network kicks in. It's like I'm gonna think about me. It's not always me, but it's things that are related. What did I do? What have I felt? What am I feeling? Was that okay? It's always like sort of you centered. That's the default mode network. Always goes there. It's our it is the default for an idle brain, but that's not broken, that's not a problem. One of the issues that I think people in our community and I had, I guess you would probably agree you had it too, was it's that at that the CAS, right? In in MCT, like the cognitive attentional syndrome. We pay very close attention to the thoughts that we have, whereas other non-anxious people have a zillion thoughts, some cool, some crappy, some scary, and they don't, they just let them go, they don't engage with them. We evaluate them. So was that a good thought? Is that the right thought? Should I be doing it? Am I doing it right? Am I thinking right?

SPEAKER_03 14:23

Is there threat in this thought? Am I doing it right? Yeah, and we're always looking at the perfectionism as well. Yeah, we want to fix. But each time you try to fix and do stuff, uh, one, you're listening to an internal critic called Craig, and two, is the you're actually feeding back a message to your brain saying that you are broken in some way. Because if you keep doing repairing behaviors, your brain's gonna think, Well, I must be broken because this person keeps trying to repair me even though I ain't broken.

SPEAKER_02 14:55

Yeah, every time I do this normal natural thing, we launch into this like evasive action and fixing. So, oh, this normal natural thing isn't right. Yeah, more threat.

SPEAKER_03 15:07

Just think about, yeah. Honestly, your brain would just think about anything. Like, don't get me wrong, like if you want to reflect on your values and enjoy things, I do that as well. I think of family members, yeah, loved ones, think about work, things that are passionate to me. And that's me stepping in the river for a little bit.

SPEAKER_04 15:23

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 15:23

But then sometimes when I'm just walking down the road, the other day I was thinking, like, what if I just jumped in the back of that guy's pickup truck and he didn't notice it? And then I was fantasizing about like, what if I hid under that little blanket and see how far he could drive? And then I was thinking about what if like every time he stopped for for gas or petrol, I'd go in and just like steal one of his packets of crisps and then sort of feed myself and just see how far I could live in the back of his truck for until he found me. I was walking home for a call. That was just what I was thinking about because that's how stupid my brain is, but I loved it, it's fine. I wasn't trying to fix myself, wasn't trying to be like, oh, I need to cause anxiety, I need to fix anxiety or whatever. It's just where my brain went. Whereas yesterday, when I walked um to the shop, I was thinking about actually, yeah, you know, I need to do those emails, I need to, you know, do that PR stuff, whatever. The brain will just go wherever it wants to go. Oh. So trying to maul with the conveyor belt.

SPEAKER_02 16:20

Right. And I think, you know what, if we ever do develop technology that lets us get into each other's brains, first brain I'm picking is yours.

SPEAKER_03 16:27

Oh, don't.

SPEAKER_02 16:28

I'm gonna hang out in your brain, maybe just for an afternoon, like the truck story, really? That's awesome.

SPEAKER_03 16:32

It it'll be my brain? You've been sent to Askaban. But on the on the high, high security ward of Askaban, and and you've and you've just been jumped by four dementors at the same time. Cool.

SPEAKER_02 16:47

Sounds like a good time.

SPEAKER_03 16:48

Yeah, yeah. It's my brain is like the deleted scene from Event Horizon. Just screaming in peril.

SPEAKER_02 16:58

Uh you know who's really annoyed right now, by the way, he because he didn't get enough billing. It's Craig the Critic. You mentioned it.

SPEAKER_03 17:06

We weren't giving him attention.

SPEAKER_02 17:07

He was like, me, pick me. Pick me, I'm here. Pay attention to me.

SPEAKER_03 17:11

I'm right. It's like, no, you're not. You're not even getting your thinking right. This is where Craig the Critic comes in. Yeah. Yeah, it's true. For the question sender inner, what do you what would you speculate that Craig the Critic is suggesting to this person?

SPEAKER_02 17:24

You're not thinking the right things. These thoughts aren't acceptable thoughts. Like, how do I you should not be having these thoughts? So, like, how do I see these thoughts mean you're selfish? See, yes, you meant also mentioned in the question, like, anxiety makes you selfish. So, like, if I keep thinking this way, I'm thinking this is selfish thinking. I shouldn't be selfish thinking. Like, well, remember the default network will default to thinking about yourself. Like every human being has that. Sorry, we can't turn it off. So it's that harsh judgment and evaluation of your thoughts and thinking that you should be able to control them. This morning I I had a really good thing, I meditate every day, right? It's a thing I do. It doesn't make me better than anyone else, it's just a thing that I do.

SPEAKER_03 18:05

That's why you're wearing that toga thing.

SPEAKER_02 18:08

That's why I'm dressed like the Dalai Lama for those of us who can't see the video. Um, the interestingly, this morning I decided, well, I might try to mix it up. Let me do the breath counting thing. Like breath counting is one way that people choose to sometimes meditate. Like every exhale is a number. And most people can't get past six or seven. If you get to eight or nine, you're having a really good day of like focused and controlled.

SPEAKER_03 18:34

I struggle with that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:35

I got to seven today, and it was like, shit, seven. And then the minute I noticed I got to seven, it was over. I couldn't get to all the other thoughts came flying in. And I meditate every day and have for years. And you're thinking about the thinking, isn't it? Yeah, that's really interesting. I was thinking about that. We were recording, I was thinking about like uh stuff just came in and like, but the practice is like, oh yeah, whatever. I gotta let it go again and see if I can come back to a focus point. It's training, it's practice, and sometimes I suck at it, but that's okay because I'm human. I'm not allowed to.

SPEAKER_03 19:04

I love meditation as sorry, that's hard. Why I love meditation is as well is that it helps you catch Craig the Critic. It does. So when you were like, Oh, I couldn't get past seven, why you're not concentrating, that's not meditation. Nope. Meditation is observing that Craig the Critic's pouncing on your ability to just think. And and good meditation is oh, I've got seven, fair enough.

SPEAKER_02 19:31

Yeah, I do it right. Like, I and I think this kind of counts because people, when they try and do either they're gonna they're trying to learn to meditate or they want to be mindful. It doesn't work for me because I can't just turn my brain, just doesn't turn off. It's not supposed to. No one's does right. You're the the goal of being mindful or meditating is not because I think it speaks directly to this question what am I supposed to think about? It's not to turn your brain off, it's to let your brain run free and do what it wants without judging it or interacting with it.

SPEAKER_03 19:57

And why people feel so restful is that they've stopped grappling and fighting with it, they just release their grip and allow their brain to go wherever it goes. And go for it. That's why people feel chilled. Yeah, you know, yeah, your thoughts are. And you're teaching the brain as well. When talking about threat monitoring, so the massive part, I mean, everyone threat monitoring, particularly people with body-centric anxiety, panic disorder, health anxiety, yeah, uh, and even OCD, it's that threat monitoring, whether it's physically in your thoughts, in your mind, wherever, part of that is you wrestling with the content of your thoughts and getting involved and having that inwards compulsion. You know, meditation can be good when practiced, when you can't, you just kind of let go of it a little bit and just let it go wherever it wants. You're like, oh my god, this feels unsafe. No, you you go for it.

SPEAKER_02 20:44

Yeah, and I think uh what you would use. So, what am I supposed to think about? You're not supposed to think about anything, you think about whatever you want or whatever comes up. And I think in this situation, the answer to the question is like, try and look at those non-engagement strategies, which would be pick a focus point, maybe your breath, maybe a sound, what do you hear? What do you smell? Like those things do work because that's just like, oh, I can let the conveyor belt of thoughts go by, and I can use those non-engagement skills, diffusion skills, if you will, to stop evaluating them and judging them, not to stop the thoughts, to just I'm just gonna put it's like driving a car and you put it in neutral. If you drive a uh, you know, a standard, you take your foot off the clutch, right? And or you depress the clutch and the engine just spins freely and the car just coasts to a stop. Try that, right? Like yeah, like those strategies are good and they're useful in those situations. I'm just gonna to let my brain run wild here or free or whatever you want to call it. I'm just not gonna I'm gonna refrain from the what does that mean? That's not right. I have to control it. I have to regulate my brain, right? Like I'm trying to regulate my brain. And no, you can't. Your brain is it's on its own, man. It's in charge, it's gonna do what it does. It's fine.

SPEAKER_03 21:54

It doesn't need to be forgot about that. Uh sorry, uh yeah. No, I love that. Yeah, it's that it doesn't mean anything. I've got to stop like it's almost compulsive. That can be your compulsion, which is what does that thought mean? What does it do? What's the evidence from it? What's the analysis from it? What how can I use this information to better myself? None. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:16

And and then the answers to some of those thoughts, that's the the answers to the meta thoughts. So I'm having thoughts and love to convey about gonna use that, totally stealing that. Um, they're the thoughts are going by, and then I think about the thoughts and I judge them. What if these thoughts mean that I'm not really recovered? Maybe that's what they mean. Maybe. Don't know. Doesn't matter. The best answer is because when you when you try and talk yourself out of it, no, it doesn't mean that. Drew and draw said it's okay, I'm allowed. The better answer is I don't know. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. We'll never know.

SPEAKER_03 22:55

I don't maybe Joe and Josh don't have to do this. Maybe they don't know.

SPEAKER_02 22:58

That's right. Maybe I don't know. What do these thoughts mean? Am I doing it right? Don't know. The answer to the meta thoughts is don't know. Let me go back to like counting sheep or remembering my favorite song or thinking about you know the dinner I had with my kid or something. I I don't know. I don't have to.

SPEAKER_03 23:13

Or going back to this the daydream I had before.

SPEAKER_02 23:15

Yeah, right. Let me revisit that and see how this turned out. The truck story is a great story. I'm gonna see how it ends.

SPEAKER_03 23:20

I've I've made it to Germany. Wow. Uh, and I get out, and the guy's actually the leader of a crime syndicate. Uh, but we end up being friends.

SPEAKER_02 23:29

Well, because he's so impressed with your resourcefulness and ingenuity. I'd be like, dude, you really been in the back of the truck all that time?

SPEAKER_03 23:35

Yeah, well, I I actually end up explaining to him in fluent German that I was a it was an exposure for me to stop ruminating. And he's like, I understand anxiety disorders. Uh sorry for any German listeners, that was really insulting. And uh, and yeah, but yeah, why not? I'm gonna go back to that. Or I could just start compulsively going inwards and trying to fix myself and sending signals to my brain that's something wrong with me. There's nothing wrong with me, it's okay. Um, talking about conveyor belts though, did you ever have that? What was that game show? Definitely had it in the US and the UK where you have to memorize all these like shopping items that came along on a conveyor belt, like uh you know, a bunch of bananas, an umbrella, a mini oven. I think, oh, what was it?

SPEAKER_02 24:18

No, is it prices right or something? I can't remember what it was. We had yeah, the prices right was huge here. I think it's still on.

SPEAKER_03 24:23

Really? Oh, I was I was I was went away, but like the um, yeah, they had this conveyor button, you had to memorize in order. What was there? Well, what was there? You're doing that, everyone. You're like, oh, I need I need to concentrate on this conveyor butt because it's important to notice each and every item when all you've got is a toasted sandwich maker, you know, you've got I don't I don't know, a bunch of flowers, you've got a toy car, maybe you've got shh. It doesn't matter. Stop memorizing what's on the wheel.

SPEAKER_02 24:53

There's a there's an eagle on the wheel, a red tail hawk slash named eagle on the on the on the conveyor belt.

SPEAKER_03 24:59

It just perched, moving across the screen slowly.

SPEAKER_02 25:03

You know what the one just one scream and then leave the you guys don't get to see this, but the best part of that is I was watching him get ready to hit that button for the last 90 seconds, just prostoring and fidgeting and getting right. I knew the phone was in your hand. I'm like, there's a sound coming. I know there is. So I just didn't know what it was going to be. You know, and I think always remember too that if you're going to try and take some of this on board and say, Oh, I'm my I can let my brain make any, you don't have to try to stop your thoughts or control them or steer them. I can choose to have a thought. I can never choose to not have a thought. So if the not thoughts that you don't want come in, you can let them, you don't have to analyze them, you can back away from that process, and that will feel risky. So it's supposed to feel risky to stop this habit at first. It's okay. It feels like you're taking a chance. But if I but if I don't address this, then I'm I might never get better. Maybe. I guess we'll have to roll that dice.

SPEAKER_03 26:01

It's the resistance that gives it importance as well. Think about all your thoughts that aren't anxiety related throughout the day. You don't resist them, do you? I don't resist the thought about I need to put the bins out, and so therefore it's not an important thought. Yep. You know, but if I have a thought like, uh, what if this depersonalization makes me feel like I'm going crazy? And what if it's getting worse? Then I'm resisting that thought and I'm treating it like it's something important. Yes, the immigrant is kicked in, and then we're feeling anxious and stuff like that. But how we respond to the thought. Yes, it's trickier when we're anxious, but we still aim to respond to it as if it's not important because it rewires. You know, we did that episode on neuropathways, which was super important. Drew often says behave how you want to feel, which I love. It's like try to show that this I know it feels important, but use your behavior to be like, it's not, and I'm gonna show it now because this if I resist it, it becomes important. Psychology trope, what you resist persists.

SPEAKER_02 27:01

I know it's a cliche, but it actually matters. It's true. Let's do a couple of minutes on the other coming at this from the other side, which is you know, things like, well, I I should be choosing positivity and gratitude, and like this is how I'm gonna get better, is I'm gonna choose positivity. I'm gonna vibrate properly.

SPEAKER_03 27:17

I don't want to get on a feeling may feel more depressed when I see that.

SPEAKER_02 27:20

But I think just the same way that you cannot stop a thought, you cannot demand to be positive. You we don't get to do that. You don't get to demand, I must be happy and feel gratitude right now. I mean, you could work, you could decide, like, you know what, I'm gonna let me let me dig through my memories for that time that we had that really great vacation when we went to wherever. We had Norway, we saw the fjords, it was amazing. Cool, but you so you might feel really happy and have big positive emotions come up, or you might feel nothing about that in that moment. We do not get to demand to think up particular emotional states, brains don't do that.

SPEAKER_03 27:58

When you were talking about that, I was thinking about how many people do either anxious or not, it doesn't matter if you have an anxiety disorder or not, how many people actually don't really enjoy their wedding day or their whatever or the first few days of their holiday, no, they should be, and they get annoyed because they can't summon and command the correct emotion, and yet this is where I sit smugly in my chair in my therapy, and I'm like, and yet, how do you feel reliving some of the memories of that now? And they're like, actually, yeah, it was really good to see my friends and friends. Well, then that is you enjoying it. Just because you didn't summon it there and then doesn't mean that anything's wrong. You know, I remember going like even going to gigs when I was anxious. I was like, Oh, this is one of my favorite bands, I should be feeling this. Nah, and actually later on, I was like, that third track was really good. Um, you know, it's okay. Sometimes you'll enjoy it in the moment, sometimes you won't. Try not to fix, get involved, step in that river. Stop trying to kick a river back upstream.

SPEAKER_02 28:55

Yeah, it's not gonna work out. Yeah, and sometimes you feel you might feel positive in the moment, or you might feel not neutral. Contented is a state. Contented is I'm not really thinking about how I feel. I'm just okay. Like in comparison to being in a threat monitoring, highly agitated or activated state, that is positive, right? Neutral is positive in a way, if in comparatively, but it's really okay to be at that gig or to be hanging out with your friends and discover that, like, oh, I'm just kind of neutral right now. I'm just I'm just here. Uh-huh. Okay. That's a default state most of the time. We don't live our lives. And and in our community, especially people listen to this podcast, you see a lot of that Craig the Critic perfectionism and demanding emotional states to to prove that you're still a good person, you're not an anxious person, you're recovering. I but I I was at the the playground with my son, and I I just couldn't feel fully present. Uh and they're just beating the stuffings out of themselves for especially parenting in that context. I've I'm not fully present with my child.

unknown 29:53

Uh uh.

SPEAKER_02 29:54

Really? And you're gonna rake yourself over the colds for the next four days because you couldn't conjure an emotional state.

SPEAKER_03 30:02

Yeah, and also look at all the positives you're there for your child. You want it to be present, you want to like that's enough. Don't worry about it.

SPEAKER_02 30:08

And half the other parents at the playground aren't present either because they're hung over or they're sleep deprived, or they're bosses. Oh, right, they're bored to tears. Like, I have been pushing on this swing for for 11 minutes. That's a long time for me. I don't want to do it anymore. But we somehow think we should control our thoughts, we should be able to create positivity, we should be able to create the right emotions, and none of that. So we brains don't work that way.

SPEAKER_03 30:31

So no, no, and yeah, if that applies to a lot of the thinking stuff, thinking for sure, thinking and emotion. Um, we well, we we hope you got something from that. It was a really good question. I really enjoyed discussing it with you, Drew. Yeah. Um, oh, I did watch the one finally touch on something I was thinking about before. Sorry if you can hear the sounds of Manchester, all right, the emergency services constantly. Um I wanted to touch on like what should you talk about when you yeah, what should you think about in particular when you're doing an exposure? So let's say you're doing a scary thing, let's say you go into a shopping center and it scares you because you're agrophobic and you're scared of panic attacks or whatever. What should you be thinking when you walk into the shopping center? I think during a specific exposure where you know you will be anxious.

SPEAKER_02 31:20

Yes. Well, that so what I have found in uh over the experience that I had is when I was getting better at it, I would I would frame the action that I was about to take. I am going to choose to trigger myself now. Why am I doing that? Because this is a way that I can get better. And so the things that I found that myself actively thinking about wasn't like, am I doing it right? Is my am I keeping my heart rate down? Am I slowing my breathing down? Yeah, a little bit because I'm trying to like slow down and relax my body, and I would, you know, make sure I was doing those things. But I was really connecting to why I was doing that and what I was trying to get out of the experience. So instead of just only thinking about am I doing it right? Am I doing it right now, am I lowering my heart rate? Am I am I my anxiety level going down? No, I would advise you to try to say, why am I doing this? And what am I gonna try and learn out of this? Those are good things to connect to.

SPEAKER_03 32:13

I used to just focus, pour it all into my attention. So the joint we've said before, 51% of my attention. Yep. When I say 51%, to the try and to the majority of my attention is on something else. I'm not gonna have all of it because I'm anxious. Of course I'm not. Like threat responses screaming suggestions at me. But I've got 51%, and I would almost like go through and be like, turn it into like a game. I'd be like, I go in and be like, right, I'm in the shopping center now. Um I need some jeans. You know, these are old, they're almost like papyrus. Uh, I need to go and get some some new genes. So I walk into the shop and I even talk to myself, like, nope, we're gonna look through the shop here. I'm gonna go to the jeans section. All right, I'm feeling anxious, I'm feeling horrible, derealized, whatever. What would non-anxious me do? Oh, hi, excuse me. Can you point me in the direction of the jeans? Yeah, cool, over there. And and and I'm really kind of like just going for it and trying to keep my attention external. It's probably 60% external. You know, there'll be seconds where it go keeps going in, checking, like, no, you know, keep going. What am I thinking about? I'm thinking about my attention, where it's going. Then I'm gonna think about well, actually, what kind of jeans do I want here? Yeah, I love that. Actually, I want some blue jeans here. Yeah, yeah, but what if your heart explodes? Great, but what if these genes don't fit? So I'm gonna go and put some changing rooms and do that. And it's almost like a battle with your attention, but you win when you get 51%.

SPEAKER_02 33:35

Yeah, or even if you can't, you keep going anyway, and like you win. I I think I love it. I think those fit together like puzzle pieces. I might have described what you think about going into the exposure, but you're right in retrospect. What are you thinking about while you're in the middle of it doing it? Just what is my next step? Literally, what is my next step is closer to the genes department, but you know, in figuratively speaking. So what's my next step?

SPEAKER_03 34:00

Yeah, and if you're attention so important. So if you're a gadder, OCD, pure ro ruminator, um say to yourself, well, this is where you do intervene when you're thinking, it's like with your with your in with your attention. So it's like yeah, I've realized that I'm ruminating, which is not the conveyor belt has gone in on itself, so you keep seeing the same thing going round and round and round because you've kind of altered the conveyor belt there because we're ruminating. So I now I'm gonna you know, re-reattach, you know, uh what's it called? Edit the carousel uh the carousel and go and put it back here so it's become the conveyor belt. No, I've changed it from a carousel to a conveyor belt, and I'm gonna allow my brain to do that again. So I'm gonna keep my attention external and I'm gonna allow the brain to start reboot the um the conveyor belt. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cause when I obviously I've got OCD and stuff like that, when I'm ruminating, it's it's changes from a conveyor belt to a carousel. Right, right. Nope. Back on the conveyor belt. Let all these thoughts come in and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_02 35:04

And people with GAD and pure OCD, they'd be like, but I don't have to go to the supermarket, I don't have exposures. Yeah, you're in one every time you discover I'm in my own head and I'm problem solving and excessively ruminating, and I don't like it anymore. It's causing me a problem. Boom, you're in the exposure. So what am I gonna do? I might visualize that a different way. The conveyor belt becomes a carousel, or there's a conveyor belt and a carousel. So if I'm a GAD person and I tend to excessively ruminate and problem solve in my head as my default, I keep jumping from the conveyor belt onto the carousel. Oh, I'm on it again. So I'm gonna jump off it and go back to the conveyor belt. Perfect. Which feels like, oh, that's really risky though, because that means the carousel is still going and I haven't fixed it.

SPEAKER_03 35:44

I haven't put who's manning the carousel. That's right. No one. I can't leave this.

SPEAKER_02 35:48

I can't leave this question unanswered. I can't leave that problem. Something bad will happen.

SPEAKER_03 35:53

Yeah, I love that.

SPEAKER_02 35:53

Yeah, jumping between Yeah, I'm gonna jump off the carousel and the conveyor belt.

SPEAKER_03 35:57

Go back on the conveyor belt. Yeah, you know, just keep going, see where that takes you.

SPEAKER_04 36:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 36:02

Carousel's boring. Just go around and round and round, you're not going nowhere. You know, and well, it feels too dangerous to leave it alone. It's fine, don't worry about it. Yeah, go ahead, take the risk.

SPEAKER_02 36:11

Anyway, do we have any any did it anyways? Or we have an audio did it anyway. We have uh one I can read, and we have a question. How about we do a let's do our audio one? How's that? Okay, yeah, sure. Let's do it. Here we go.

SPEAKER_01 36:26

Hey Jash and Drew, this is Danielle. You can use my name. I wanted to share I Did It Anyway. So for the past uh couple months, I've been dealing with some pretty severe anxiety and panic disorders, along with agoraphobia. Uh, one of my biggest fears is driving in a car with my son. Um, so my mom has been picking up the slack quite a bit, taking him places he wants to go. Today she said they were going out to lunch and to get him some track gear because he just joined the track team. And I said, Yes, I'm gonna go with you. So I got in the car with him and started and quickly turned the car around and told him I didn't feel good and I was gonna stay home. And off they went. I got so mad at myself that I got in my mom's car, which was left behind, and I took off after them, met them for lunch, and then went and looked at track gear and then came home. Even though it was in a separate vehicle, I still did it anyway. And maybe next time we'll all do it together. Thank you for everything you do. It's beyond, beyond appreciated.

SPEAKER_02 37:33

Whoa. Outstanding. I love that. Is that harnessing of the anger? Oh no, you're not doing this to me again. Too bad.

SPEAKER_03 37:42

Oh, it's brilliant. Well done. Uh big congratulations from us. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 37:46

I don't know, Danielle, but I could I'm picturing this person just angrily grabbing the keys and stomping out to the car. F this, I'm going out. I love it. Love that.

SPEAKER_03 37:56

Oh, brilliant, brilliant. Uh, you got a written one, haven't you?

SPEAKER_02 37:59

I do. I got a written one too, so I will read that one out. Um, this is a did it anyway from Lisa who says, Hi, Drew and Josh. By the way, I want you all to start counting the number of times it says Drew and Josh versus the number of times they say Josh and Drew. Just pointing out, this person put me first. Um anyway, Lisa, thank you for sending this in. Hi, Drew and Josh. You can use my name. Thank you so much for your podcast. It's been a great help for me in difficult times. You're very welcome. I have been struggling with depression for all of my adult life and often experience phases of disordered anxiety, which for me manifest in extreme nausea to the point of throwing up. And it often accompanies me in many aspects of my life, and in most of them, I have found strategies to handle it. However, when it comes to dating and romantic relationships, I have so far chosen avoidance. But I have recently decided to give it a go again. It has been tough. I have considered quitting and just being single many times, but I met a person that I felt a genuine connection with on a dating app, and we decided to go on a date today. The last few days have been extremely difficult. I was nauseous, I couldn't eat, and I generally felt horrible. I considered canceling many, many times, but I am so thrilled to report that I did it anyway. I went on the date despite feeling like I might faint, and I realized that my body can handle much more than I gave it credit for. The date also went well. I don't know what's going to come of it or if I'll see them again, but for now I am so proud of myself and wanted to share this with you and the community. Thank you for everything you do. Oh, thank you, Lisa.

SPEAKER_03 39:25

That was really nice. It was nice. Hope you do have a second date.

SPEAKER_02 39:29

Sounds like you had a good time, so I hope you guys get to see each other again.

SPEAKER_03 39:32

Excellent. Excellent. I don't think we've got time for a question in this one, but we'll do a couple more next one just to make up for it. Yeah, sounds good. Um, I've I've got a writ uh written email, did it anyway. Have we got time for that? Yeah, do it. Okay. Um, this is from Nicola from Serbia. I'm allowed to use um their names. Thank you very much. Um it's nice getting like getting did it anyways from around the world, wasn't it? Serbia. Uh hi guys. I have two huge did it anyways. This weekend I had plans to go fishing. In brackets, I don't fish, and to go to some lunch at a city that is two and a half hour drive from my town with my best man. I packed my bags and then Craig the Critic hit me up. He said, You're not going to be able to do that. Maybe tell him in the morning that you are not feeling well and just go home. I had a terrible night, didn't sleep well. Spent maybe two hours in bed overthinking, ruminating. Got up, Craig the Critic asked me if I want to go. He knows about my anxiety. Not to oh no, no, so not Craig Crit. Got up and my best man asked me if I wanted to go. Um, he knows about my anxiety, but not to this extent. And I've said to him, I'm going. Ended up having a good time. I ignored my anxiety. Today I drove two and a half hours alone home. I've been anxious, but my focus wasn't on that. A couple of times I've had rumination, but my focus was on driving. I forgot that I was a really decent driver and that I love driving. That that feeling was present today. I want to thank you. Your podcast is very helpful. I still have work to do, but I think now that I understand what I need to work on. Sorry if my English is bad. Greetings from Serbia.

SPEAKER_02 41:22

Thank you, Serbia. English was excellent, by the way.

SPEAKER_03 41:26

Excellent, yeah. Well done. You have to, you know, you've learned another language. I'm lazy, I've done that. Uh um, yeah. Thank you very much, Nicola. That was uh that was excellent. The focus wasn't on that. That's one in that one. I love it. I forgot I forgot I was good at driving. Superb. Uh, thank you so much for tuning in. Uh, keep the questions coming in. The Did It Anyways coming in. Thank you for the recent reviews on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Really helps. And hello to new listeners as well. We've seen an influx of new listeners. So uh welcome to uh the crazy wagon.

SPEAKER_02 42:02

This ridiculous thing we call disordered. We're gonna do a little bit more content geared towards sort of the beginning listeners soon, too, so we didn't forget you guys. And uh yeah, appreciate you being here. Follow us on social media. I'm the anxious truth, Josh is anxiety Josh. And uh, I guess we'll see you next week. Thanks for hanging out. Go easy, guys. We're out.