When you have a sore throat, it does not make you feel better because it has hurt before. So it is with anxiety attacks — no matter how many times you have to experience them, it is still difficult to cope with another panic attack. What to do? How to help ourselves?
British writer Matt Haig suffered from severe depression for nearly a decade. In an attempt to get out of anxiety attacks and cope with panic attacks, he tried all methods, reasonable and not so: alcohol, yoga, meditation, reading books and listening to podcasts. He wandered through social networks and watched new series. But almost every way to divert attention dragged him deeper and deeper into despair.
Only years later did he realize: it was a global life overload. In the informational, emotional and physical impact that the world has on us today, increasing anxiety, provoking stress, mental exhaustion, mental disorders. The author reflects on how to survive in conditions of dizzying changes in the book “The Planet of the Nervous”.
Here are a few phrases that help him maintain a special space around him, in which you can just breathe and enjoy being — without external stimuli.
MATT HAGUE: «WHEN I CAN’T DO IT, I TELL MYSELF…»
1. Everything is in order.
2. Even if everything is not in order and you can’t influence it in any way, don’t try to control it.
3. You feel misunderstood. Everyone feels the same. Don’t try to make people understand you. Strive to understand yourself, and everything else will no longer matter.
4. Accept yourself. If you can’t be happy with yourself, at least accept yourself the way you are now. You cannot change yourself without knowing who you are.
5. Don’t be cool. Never. Never try to be cool. Don’t think about what cool people think. Strive for people of a different warehouse. The meaning of life is not coolness. It’s easy to twist your neck on tight turns.
6. Find a good book. Sit down and read. There will definitely come times in life when you will be lost and confused. Reading is the way back to yourself. Remember this. The more you read, the better you know how to find a way out of any difficult situation.
7. Don’t get hung up. Don’t let your name, gender, nationality, orientation, or Facebook profile (an extremist organization banned in Russia) fool you. Be more than just data about you. The Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu said, «When I let go of who I am, I become who I can be.»
8. Take your time. Lao Tzu also said: «Nature is never in a hurry, but always in time.»
9. Enjoy the Internet. Do not go online if it does not bring pleasure. (A simple commandment, but how difficult it is to follow.)
10. Remember that many feel the same way. And these people can be found very easily on the web. It’s one of the most therapeutic aspects of the social media age, being able to find an echo of your own pain, to find someone who understands.
11. According to Yoda: “Don’t try. Do it. Or don’t.» Trying is not life.
12. Weaknesses are what makes us unique. Accept them. Don’t try to «filter» your humanity
13. Buy less. Don’t let marketing and advertising convince you that happiness is a business deal. As American Cherokee cowboy Will Rogers once said, «Too many people spend their hard-earned money on things they don’t need to impress people they don’t like.»
14. Go to bed more often before midnight.
15. Even in crazy times: Christmas, family holidays, in a state of emergency at work and in the thick of city festivities — try to find moments of peace. Go to bed from time to time. Add a comma to your day.
16. Do yoga. It’s hard to be tired when your body and breath are full of energy.
17. In difficult times, stick to the daily routine.
18. Don’t compare the worst moments of your life with the best moments of other people’s lives.
19. Appreciate the things you would miss the most if they suddenly disappeared.
20. Don’t paint yourself into a corner. Don’t try to figure out who you are once and for all. As the philosopher Alan Watts said, «Trying to improve or improve oneself is like a man trying to bite his own teeth with those very teeth.»
21. Walk. Run. Dance. Eat peanut butter toast.
22. Don’t try to feel what you don’t really feel. Don’t try to be what you can’t be. It will empty you.
23. There is no future. Plans for the future are just plans for another present where you make plans for the future.
24. Dyshi.
25. Love right now. Immediately! Love fearlessly. Dave Eggers wrote: «Life in anticipation of love is not life.» Love selflessly
26. Don’t blame yourself. In today’s world, it’s almost impossible not to feel guilty, unless you’re a sociopath. We are filled with guilt. There is guilt that we learned as children, feeling bad because we eat when so many people in the world are starving. Wine privilege. Guilt before the environment because we drive a car, fly an airplane or use plastic.
Guilt due to buying things that in some way may turn out to be unethical. Guilt of unspoken or wrong desires. Guilt due to the fact that you did not live up to someone’s expectations or took someone’s place. Because you can’t do what others can, that you’re sick, that you’re alive.
This guilt is useless. She doesn’t help anyone. Try to do something good right now, without drowning in what you once did wrong.
27. Look at the sky. (It’s beautiful. It’s always beautiful.)
28. Spend time with animals.
29. Be boring and don’t be ashamed of it. This might be helpful. When life gets hard, aim for the most boring emotions.
30. Don’t judge yourself by how others judge you. As Eleanor Roosevelt said, «No one will make you feel inadequate without your consent.»
31. The world can be sad. But remember, a million unnoticed good deeds happened today. A million acts of love. Quiet human kindness exists.
32. Do not torture yourself for the chaos in your head. This is fine. The whole universe is chaos. Galaxies are drifting everywhere. And you’re just in harmony with the cosmos.
33. If you feel mentally ill, treat it the same as any physical illness. Asthma, flu, whatever. Do what you need to do to get better. And don’t be ashamed of it. Don’t walk on a broken leg.
34. Allow yourself to lose. Doubt. Feel vulnerable. Change opinion. Be imperfect. Resist movement. Allow yourself not to rush through life like an arrow flying at a target.
35. Moderate desires. Desire is a hole. Desire is a defect. This is part of the definition. When Byron in Don Juan wrote «Looking for a hero!», he meant that there is no hero. When we want something we don’t need, we acutely feel an emptiness that we haven’t felt before.
Everything you need is right here. Man is perfect simply because he is a man. We are our own destination.
Source: Matt Haig’s Planet of the Nervous. How to Live in a World of Thriving Panic (Livebook, 2019).