Hi Rebecca,

I’m so sorry to hear that you’re going through such bad times at the moment.

I’ve actually experienced similar feelings – I’d call it a kind of existential anxiety – and it was very hard at the time. I was afraid of living, because I never thought I’d get better. Everything seemed pointless, scary, bizarre and arbitrary. I was afraid because I was in charge of a life – i.e. my own! – and felt completely ill-equipped to deal with this responsibility. I remember feeling utterly claustrophobic in my own body and mind too.

I don’t have these feelings any more, and I really do believe you can get past them too! 🙂

I did a lot of searching for answers and managed to find helpful resources; one was a book by Claire Weekes called Essential Help for Your Nerves (the language is a bit old fashioned, but that’s OK!). Another book was by a guy called Paul David called A Life at Last (this is actually referenced in one of the articles on TinyBuddha).

These books were extremely helpful to me. The basically advise accepting your feelings completely, because trying to fight anxious thoughts will only make them stronger. The constant stress this puts your body under makes you more susceptible to anxiety, and you find yourself in a vicious circle.

It’s also important not to be afraid of what you’re thinking. Allow yourself to think whatever you want – it’s only a thought! – and then try to continue with your daily life as best you can. It really does help to engage in activity because it pulls your mind away from constant ruminating, and ruminating is the least helpful thing you can do!
Trying to stop your thoughts is hard, but you can replace them with other thoughts to take up your focus.

I’d also recommend looking into mindfulness; in addition to acceptance, this includes an element of approaching your thoughts and feelings with curiosity and open-mindedness instead of shrinking from them. This is useful as it helps take the fear out of what you’re experiencing.

Trying to stay in the present moment is also a great help – maybe finding some guided meditations online would be an idea.

At the moment, you’ll be sensitive to anxiety so be patient with yourself too. It took me time to get over my worst period of anxiety because it became a habit; I was so used to feeling anxious that peace was unfamiliar and took time to accept and get used to again – but it did happen!

My anxiety came about because of life events and, I think, suppressing certain feelings over a long time. Acknowledging and addressing this also helped me. Trying to cultivate the kind of life you want will help – I understand that this may be unimaginable at the moment given your fears, but writing some things down may help. Even if it’s just ‘I want to be at peace’, that’s a start!

Again, I really believe that you can get past your current anxiety, so don’t give up!

Peace and all the best 🙂