How Mindfulness Can Help You Live with Anxiety
2025.01.17

I am sure you have heard MINDFULNESS at some point in your life, but it might be a bit difficult for you to explain what exactly that is and how it can help your anxiety. My aim is to help you have a better understanding about mindfulness and how you can live with anxiety by using mindfulness.
What is mindfulness
Mindfulness is the practice of bringing one's attention to the present moment in a non-judgmental manner. It involves being fully aware of one's thoughts, feelings, and sensations without getting caught up in them. This state of awareness allows individuals to observe their experiences without labeling them as good or bad. Instead, they simply acknowledge what is happening and let it be.
What it means to live with anxiety
As I discussed in the last blog post, a lot of people try doing something that does not actually help such as trying to think positively, suppressing anxiety and disputing anxiety. What I mean by “living with anxiety” is not any of them.
I want you to take time to think about how anxiety has been actually helping you ever since you are born! For instance, before you take tests at school, you study because you are anxious if you can get a good score. When you drive, you drive carefully to make sure that you do not get into an accident and such because your anxiety is helping you. The point here is that your anxiety has been a best friend at certain times. ALSO, there can be times when your anxiety has been enemy.
How mindfulness can help you live with anxiety
One important thing I want you to understand is that as aforementioned, some anxieties are helpful, so you need to respond to them. However, some anxieties are not really helpful for you, so you do not have to respond to them. That is the time Mindfulness can be a great resource.
When you are anxious and let’s just say they are not helpful anxieties, you are basically caught up thinking too much about the future. This means you are not in touch with the present. When you engage in anything you are doing mindfully, you are basically back to the present moment. However, I am sure that anxieties pop up in your head again because feeling is supposed to come and go. Yet, if you are mindful of the fact that your anxieties come back, and continue to be mindful of anything and everything, you can come back to the present moment. If you keep doing this, usually you do not have to suffer from anxieties and can focus on whatever things you want to focus on.
I hope this was helpful for you.
Tatsuya Arakawa, LMFT (82425)