Lynne S. Gots, Ph.D.
Licensed Psychologist
Making Peace with Anxiety
By Lynne Gots, posted on January 4th, 2023.
Anxiety is highly unpleasant. It causes physical discomfort—shortness of breath, muscle tightness, dizziness, queasiness—and mental anguish. In all my years of clinical practice, seeing thousands of people with anxiety, I have never encountered anyone who has not desperately wanted to get rid of it.
Earlier in my career, I was a dedicated advocate of techniques aimed to reduce, if not entirely eliminate, anxiety. I taught progressive muscle relaxation for tension- and pain-reduction, deep breathing to manage panic attacks, and thought-challenging to address catastrophic thinking. But in recent years, these approaches are no longer regular staples of my clinical repertoire. Like many of my cognitive-behavioral colleagues, I have changed the focus of treatment from reducing anxiety to learning to accept and manage emotions, even negative ones like anxiety, while embracing uncertainty with the aim of living a richer life.
Practicing acceptance requires a major shift in attitude. For most people with anxiety, avoidance is the most common coping strategy. But avoiding anxiety-provoking situations and triggers comes with a steep cost: a flat, joyless existence.
Think about anxiety as a wave in the ocean. If you try to outrun it, you may end up crashing into the shore with skinned knees and a mouthful of sand. But if you dive into the middle of the wave, it will wash over you and lose its momentum as it reaches the beach.
Why is it worth it for you to dive into the wave? If you can answer this question − hint: consider what values are important to you − you will finally be able to stop avoiding discomfort and start living a more fulfilling life, anxiety and all.
Tags: acceptance, anxiety management, mindfulness
Posted in Acceptance and Mindfulness, Anxiety |
Don’t Shoot Yourself with the Second Arrow: How not to Turn Pain into Suffering
By Lynne Gots, posted on January 30th, 2022.
Imagine walking in the forest, lost in contemplation, when suddenly you feel a searing pain in your calf. Looking down, you see blood pouring from a wound and an arrow sticking out of your leg. Far ahead, behind a tree, you catch sight of an archer, bow and arrow poised to shoot a deer in the clearing. How do you react?
You are in pain, of course. An arrow piercing your flesh is no trivial matter. But what you do next will determine how you cope with the wound. If you clean it, bind it to stanch the bleeding, and hobble home to tend to it, you still will feel the pain. But if you start berating yourself for not seeing the archer, or getting upset with yourself for having gone for a hike instead of staying home to tend to neglected chores, you will be shooting yourself with a second arrow.
The Buddhist parable of the second arrow is metaphor for how we turn pain into suffering. We often add insult to injury by blaming others or ourselves for the consequences of an action, feeling guilty or dwelling on regret for choices we have made. The suffering the second arrow causes magnifies the pain one hundred-fold.
Recently I’ve had the opportunity to practice not shooting myself with the second arrow after I fractured my ankle when my dog pulled me over onto the ice. In the first two days after the accident, the second arrow really wounded me. I beat myself up for choosing to walk the dogs that afternoon instead of opting for a trip to the grocery store. I told myself I was a failure as a dog trainer (ironically halfway through an online course, 21 Days to Stress Free Walks.) I lamented having to delay a trip I’d been eagerly anticipating. But three weeks into my recovery, I am coping with the inconvenience and, yes, the physical pain, better.
What has changed? I still have a broken ankle. I can’t walk my dogs or ride my exercise bike. Going to the grocery store and even just taking a shower require major efforts and logistical maneuvers. I have no idea how long I will have to wear a walking boot or when I will be able to return to my normal activities.
But I am practicing an attitude of acceptance.I recognize I have no control over the situation and very little ability to influence the outcome, aside from following the doctor’s orders. Do I like it? No, but I am seeing it for what it is without adding to the discomfort and inconvenience by shooting myself with the second arrow.
A little gratitude and perspective also help. I am thankful my fracture, on scale of 1-10 was only, as my orthopedist put it, a 2. A neighbor told me of her leg injury, much more severe than mine, requiring surgery. I also learned of someone else whose dog pulled her down, causing four broken ribs and a broken arm.
Removing the second arrow has allowed me to attend to the slow process of recovery without the weight of added emotional baggage. I almost feel lucky.
Tags: second arrow
Posted in Acceptance and Mindfulness, mindfulness |
How to Cope with Returning to “Normal” after Lockdown
By Lynne Gots, posted on March 25th, 2021.
With vaccine distribution increasing and states relaxing restrictions on indoor gatherings, many of us are contemplating the prospect of resuming activities long abandoned over the last year. Some people can hardly wait to board a plane for a Hawaiian vacation or gather at a favorite restaurant with friends; others are feeling, as one patient of mine put it, “not ready for things to go back to ‘normal.’”
And what does “normal” even mean in the current context?
We know from studies conducted after the quarantines imposed during the SARS epidemic that the mental health ramifications of even short (more than 10 days) periods of enforced isolation are not trivial. Reactions included post-traumatic stress disorder, avoidance behaviors, and anger, lasting in some people for several years. Research conducted in the aftermath of the COVID pandemic is already uncovering similar—and even more pervasive, given the duration—patterns.
The absence of in-person social interactions over the last year may make it especially hard to go back to seeing people face-to-face (or, mask-to-mask, as it likely will be for quite some time) for those prone to social anxiety. Avoidance is a prevalent coping mechanism, albeit not a healthy one. It might relieve anxiety in the short run but over time, avoiding triggers backfires because it prevents practice.
Returning to the office or seeing friends in the flesh might feel awkward because social skills have grown rusty. And heightened body awareness might add to the uneasiness. Wearing “hard pants” after a year of working from the couch in sweats can feel strange and uncomfortable, especially for those (22% by one estimate) who have put on some weight during the pandemic.
People with OCD may fear seeing even fellow vaccine recipients unmasked and cling to washing and decontamination rituals adopted early in the pandemic, even if they are no longer deemed necessary. The over-estimation of danger is a thinking style common to all anxiety disorders. And as one recent study showed, news reported by media outlets in the US skewed overwhelmingly negative—87% of COVID coverage in national US media, compared with 64% in scientific journals, emphasized bad news—adding to the atmosphere of threat for those hypersensitive to it.
Even in the absence of preexisting mental-health issues, nearly all of us will experience some degree of post-traumatic stress, complicating our return to a BC (Before COVID) life. The trauma of actual illness and of losses—of lives and livelihood for many—have left deep emotional scars. Navigating the reentry into the world will take time, patience, and understanding, of others and ourselves. We all are grappling with a confusing mixture of emotions: excitement, fear, and even nostalgia for the early days of quarantine, when decisions were more black-and-white and unambiguous, and a sense of being “in it together” prevailed. Current times present a much higher level of uncertainty, making life far more complicated.
Acknowledging difficult feelings and allowing them to surface rather than trying to push them away are important strategies for coping with any challenge to emotional equilibrium. The road to the new “normal” will be rocky. But cultivating an attitude of acceptance will make the path less treacherous.
Posted in Acceptance and Mindfulness, Anxiety, COVID-19 Mental Health |
