3 Mindfulness Techniques for Anxiety

There is no human who doesn’t worry about something his or her life at some point.
And that’s totally normal because we control our lives and some of the most important things for us are our jobs, relationship or family. And it’s okay to worry. Even the smallest things can get us to worry, and there is always a reason to worry about something.

However, if we worry too much, our worries can stop us from enjoying some of the moments in our lives, and if we leave it and we worry for too long it can turn into more serious problems such as panic attacks or anxiety.

Every day we spend most of the day thinking. We make plans, think about things that happened, analyze everything, and most of us spend time thinking about something from the past and we think about the future a lot as well.

However, when we worry too much it’s easy to mistake our fears and worries for facts. When the facts are actually just our thoughts. That’s why we interpret things wrongly sometimes such as why didn’t your friend return your call.

The good thing is that there is a way to help yourself once you start feeling that you are losing yourself in a worry.

With these mindfulness techniques for anxiety, you will stop yourself from over-worrying and you will release all the stress and you will feel relieved while stopping the anxiety.

Technique 1 – Anchoring

When you are feeling lost in the sea of worries and you know that you need to calm yourself down but you can’t, this technique might be useful.

1. To calm yourself and your mind down, simply anchor yourself by directing your full attention to your lower body and start immediately thinking about it.
2. How are your feet feeling? Are the socks too tight? How do they feel inside the shoes? How do they feel against the ground?
3. After you anchor yourself to the sensations of your lower body, you can anchor yourself to upper legs as well.
4. Then start slowly to concentrate on your breathing as it’ll be really relaxing once you breathe out when anchored.

It’s a simple way to get anchored, which really helps to focus and get away from worries and facts we made up. You can do it anytime and anywhere.

Technique 2: Breath Counting

Breath counting technique can be used in conjunction with the anchoring.
Start by anchoring yourself and once you are anchored, on your next breathe-in count up to 6 all the way in, and then on the breathe-out count up to 10.

This technique will slow down your breathing, but also slowing down your heart rate. However, if you feel too panicked to do it simply tell yourself in when your breathe-in and out when you breathe out.

Technique 3: Finger Breathing

1. To perform this technique, simply hold your hand in front of you with a palm facing you.
2. With the index finger of the other hand, slowly start tracing outside length of your thumb while breathing in, and then pause at the top of the thumb.
3. With the index finger of the other hand, slowly start tracing outside length of your thumb while breathing in, and then pause at the top of the thumb.
4. Then trace it back down the other side as you breathe out.
5. That’s two breaths and you should continue counting them as you trace your finger with your index finger.
6. Once you have done it for all the fingers, start doing it in reverse.

It’s an easy technique to learn, yet very powerful when it comes to stopping anxiety. It is very useful when there is a lot of going on and you can’t concentrate.

What did you think of these 3 mindfulness techniques for anxiety? Let me know in the comments sections. Also feel free to share these three techniques on your social network.

You should also consider looking at some of the best guided meditation videos.