Using Mindfulness to Manage Anxiety and Stress

Life can be stressful enough when you’re managing family issues, pressure at work or school, problems with money or worries about the future. But if you’re also struggling with anxiety, depression, or another mental health challenge, it can feel completely overwhelming at times.

 Mindfulness is a powerful tool for coping with stress and anxiety. While it may seem simple, learning to be fully present and engaged with the moment you are in can provide much-needed relief from your racing thoughts. It may also help you feel more resilient.

How Does Mindfulness Help?

If you’re feeling anxious or stressed, your mind may have become caught up replaying past worries or trying to figure out future problems that may or may not happen. Maybe you’re obsessing over that embarrassing thing you said yesterday, or panicking about an upcoming exam or social event.

The problem is, all that mental churning and time-travelling creates more anxiety, keeping you stuck and making it hard to actually deal with whatever you’re facing. Mindfulness teaches you to get out of your spinning thoughts and reconnect with the present moment.

Anxiety and stress happen when your mind rushes into imagining a worst-case scenario. Mindfulness interrupts that pattern by shifting you into the reality of the very moment, which is rarely as awful as your mind would have you believe.

Becoming Aware of Your Thoughts 

Through mindfulness, you become aware of anxious thoughts, and see them for what they truly are – just thoughts. These mental projections may or may not be true, and mindfulness helps you recognise when your mind is catastrophising. This can help you put the brakes on to avoid getting caught in a cyclone of worry. Then, you can use various mindfulness techniques to calm your anxious mind and find your grounding.

Mindfulness also relieves stress by dissolving the struggle with whatever you’re experiencing. When you practice acceptance of the present moment without judging or resisting it, your mind relaxes and the stress begins to settle.

 Mindfulness Exercises for Anxiety and Stress 

 1 Breath Awareness

Your breath is an anchoring tool that you can use to get back to the present.

When you’re anxious, simply tune into the physical sensation of breathing. Feel the gentle rise and fall of your belly as you inhale and exhale. You might even put your hand on your tummy to enhance awareness of the movement. This focuses your attention on what’s happening right now.

 2 RAIN

This acronym is a helpful way to work through difficult emotions and anxiety attacks.

 R – Recognise how you feel, and give the feeling a simple label such as ‘worried’ or ‘feeling anxious’.

A – Allow the feeling to be there rather than fighting it or judging it. Let go of the struggle.

I – Investigate the experience with interest and curiosity. Observe the physical sensations and note down any thoughts simply as mental activity. Don’t judge the thoughts. 

N – Non-identification – remember that you are not your anxiety or worried thoughts, you are purely the person witnessing the experience.

3 Mindful Walking

When anxiety feels overwhelming, sometimes the best move is to literally walk it off. Mindful walking involves fully focusing your awareness on the physical experience of walking. 

Notice the sensation of your feet making contact with the ground. Feel the subtle shift of your body weight with each step. Tune into the movement of your arms and legs, and the rise and fall of your chest with each breath. 

If your mind wanders into worries or judgments, gently bring your attention back to the physical movements and sensations of walking. This grounding exercise can provide relief from anxious thoughts.

4 The 5-4-3-2-1 Technique

This simple mindfulness exercise is great for anxiety relief on-the-go. Pause for a moment and use your senses to note:

 5 things you can see

4 things you can feel or touch

3 things you can hear

2 things you can smell

1 thing you can taste

Focusing your attention outward and naming aspects of your current environment helps take you out of the anxiety loop in your mind, re-anchoring you in the present reality. As you get used to this technique, start making the features you observe richer than a simple list. For example, rather than just observing, start to describe colours, textures and sounds in more detail. This activates your observing mind, helping to calm anxious thoughts and feelings.

Final Thoughts

At its heart, mindfulness is about being fully present. This means letting go of racing thoughts, and opening your mind to the reality of this very moment. With regular practice, it will help you manage life’s ups and downs more easily, with greater resilience and compassion towards yourself. 

Once you have started to learn mindful techniques, you can use them whenever you start to feel anxiety or stress creeping in.