2 Anxiety ‘Cheat Codes’ That Give You An Advantage Over Uncomfortable Feelings
Visual tools, backed by research, that help you tame overwhelming emotions.
GaudiLab | Shutterstock Some feelings are just so uncomfortable and painful, you almost want to run away from them. The problem is, you can't. You're stuck with them. And that's how it feels: like you're stuck inside of them, with no way out.
The trick is to find a space between running away and burying yourself inside the pain. How? You make a little room for those feelings to live and breathe. Stop fighting them and stop indulging them. If you make room for them, you can get distance from them so they’re not so in your face.
To help accomplish this, I'm sharing two powerful, research-based tools that can help you manage painful, anxious, and even overwhelming feelings.
Two visual 'cheat codes' that give you an advantage over anxiety, according to psychology
1. The 'Microscopic Explorer' technique
Visualization is a powerful tool for human creativity and problem-solving, as explored by Lloyd Rieber in a historical review of visualization in human cognition. Start by identifying the feeling (e.g., sadness, grief, anxiety, fear, anger, etc.). Identify where in your body you feel the feeling (e.g., chest, throat, head, neck, whole body).
Close your eyes and imagine yourself as a microscopic explorer. Imagine your microscopic self entering your body and standing in front of the identified feeling.
Imagine this thing you’re standing in front of is something you’ve never seen before. You know nothing about it and are here simply to observe it.
As you look at this thing in front of you, notice:
- How big it is. Does it take up all the space in that area of your body, or is there some room around it?
- Whether it’s 2-dimensional or 3-dimensional.
- Its shape. Does it have any edges? Are they rounded or sharp?
- Its colors. Does it have any shading?
- If it moves or is static.
- Its texture. What would it feel like to touch it?
Now, walk all around the thing to see if it looks the same from the sides and back or if there’s anything different.
When you return to the front, leave the microscopic you for a minute and center yourself in your mind. Take five slow, deep breaths.
Each time you exhale, imagine directing the breath to the feeling in your body, the thing you were observing. Imagine the breath flowing around the feeling, almost massaging it, as suggested by research in The Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine.
After five slow breaths, return to your microscopic self. As you stand in front of the feeling, go through all of the same observations you went through earlier. See if anything has changed.
Walk around the feeling and see if anything looks different from a different angle.
When you return to the front, take a moment to see if there is anything you want to do to the feeling before this exercise ends. You might want to kick it or push it over a cliff. You might want to hug it.
You might want to tell it something. There’s no wrong answer.
When you're ready, open your eyes. Gently notice how the feeling feels. Notice if the overwhelm has softened.
Look Studio via Shutterstock
How it works
The International Journal of Psychology & Psychological Therapy published a review of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) that helps to show this impartial observer technique is an acceptance exercise used. It reminds you that they're "just" feelings. They're not you, and they're not bigger than you. You're always bigger than they are, even when it doesn’t feel that way.
When you identify a feeling, you automatically take away some of its power. Naming the feeling is always helpful. When you locate it in your body, you're getting yourself out of your analytical brain — important for working with feelings.
When you stand in front of the feeling and observe it, you automatically have some separation from it. You've put some room between you so you can see its edges. You've found a way to have a perspective about it.
When you ask yourself those six observational questions, you're putting your focus on something besides the discomfort. You're moving away from experiencing the feeling as a problem and learning a different way of engaging with it — just noticing.
When you pause and breathe, you're pairing relaxation with the feeling, which reduces some of its intensity. When you imagine massaging the feeling with your breath, you're creating some compassion for the feeling.
It's no longer an unseen, unknown, enormous, all-bad, overwhelming force.
2. The 'Zoom Out' technique
First, try to "zoom out" on what you're feeling. Get a little space from it in any way that makes sense to you.
Then, start by identifying the feeling (e.g., sadness, grief, anxiety, fear, anger, etc.). Close your eyes and imagine the feeling of "standing" in front of you. You may see it as a shape or color.
Imagine you and the feeling are in a small broom closet. It’s tight in there. There’s just enough room for you and it, so it’s almost impossible to concentrate on anything else. It’s literally in your face and all around you.
Now, change that broom closet to a huge warehouse. Suddenly, there’s tons of space all around you.
Imagine moving away from the feeling, walking to the furthest end of the warehouse. Though the feeling doesn’t change in size, the feel of it changes. From this perspective, the feeling looks smaller. You have distance. It’s not so in your face.
Look around and see what else is in the warehouse. Perhaps it’s got pallets and pallets of pink stuffed elephants in it. Perhaps you see people in the distance, working. Or, perhaps, it’s empty.
When you’re finished looking around the warehouse, open your eyes and gently notice how you feel about the feeling.
Cast Of Thousands via Shutterstock
How it works
It’s not about changing the feeling itself but changing your relationship to the feeling, as covered in a longitudinal study in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. When you imagine plenty of space around it, you create a way to get distance from it.
This distance allows you to notice other feelings or thoughts. You've made room for the feeling of being there without it being the only thing you can see.
By looking around and noticing what else is in the warehouse, you're actively taking our focus off of the feeling. This is how you get unstuck, and it’s much easier to do once you have a little distance.
You can’t make an overwhelming feeling "go away," but you can lessen its intensity by making room for it. Start by naming it.
Take three giant steps back and observe it. Look for its edges and notice its characteristics. Then, look around and find other feelings, thoughts, sights, or sounds to take your attention.
I promise you, they are there.
Needs approved bio
Suzanne Manser, PhD, is a licensed psychologist with a private practice in Portland, OR. To read more about living with self-acceptance, meaning, and ease, visit her blog and join her on Instagram: @drsuzannemanser.