What Is The Best Treatment for Anxiety

If you read my last article you’ll remember that during my most blissful period in life, I had an extraordinary routine. I was going to the gym in the morning, I was reading and learning new things throughout the day, and I was consistently keeping up with my 5 daily prayers.

This can be categorised into the following:

Physical (Gym)

Mental (Reading/Learning New Things)

Spiritual (Prayer)

My daily routine and daily actions meant that I was consistently developing myself physically, mentally and spiritually.

Sure, it helped that I had little responsibilities back then, but if I hadn’t been doing the above then I would have drowned in misery and sorrow from lethargy and boredom.

The problem with University, and the traditional working life is that all the eggs are generally placed in one basket. When you’re at work, the only thing you’re developing or utilising is your mental faculty. Unless you have a job that requires manual labour…but then you’re not using the mind really.

However, when the job becomes repetitive, you don’t develop any longer. You become stuck in the same monotonous routine. 

You may go to the gym on a regular basis and that’s great. It’s needed in this time of “unhealthy” daily routines. But if you’re job isn’t challenging you mentally, if you’re not learning new things daily, if you’re not progressing mentally then you’re going to become anxious.

And the biggest problem I see in the world today is the third element, spirituality. I am of the firm belief that to live a peaceful and content, happy life…we have to be continuously developing in all three of these elements.

The spiritual element is pretty much lost in today’s society.

I do pray regularly, but my mind is not in it more often than not. I’ll be thinking about what happened earlier, what am I going to do next, or lost in some other thought.

When you reflect on your life, can you identify whether you are making progress every day in terms of developing yourself in the three areas above?

Are you:

• Getting healthier, stronger or fitter every day?
• Learning new things, developing new skills, getting smarter every single day?
• Meditating, praying, developing a connection with God or nature every single day?

If not try it…take one day at a time. List your goals. Make the intention of doing at least one thing everyday, no matter how small, that makes an improvement in all 3 of those categories.

It’s also incredibly important to define your purpose. What are you looking to achieve both short term and long term?

Where so many people go wrong is that they haven’t figured out their correct definition. So many have goals, aims and ambitions of just “making money”. This isn’t a goal. There must be a why, why do you want to make money?! What do you want to do with that money?

What I see a lot with law students was their lack of purpose and planning. The only thing they had planned, or aimed for was to qualify. The amount of times I’ve heard people say “I just want to qualify” and then get nothing from them after I ask them “why, what then?” is staggering.

They haven’t thought past that point. The only thing on their mind was to qualify. Why? Because that’s all WE were programmed to think. We need to go uni, get good grades, do the LPC and then qualify.

There never was any emphasis on what then.

So if you’re a law student and you’re gunning for qualification…have a plan. Qualification is just one step, a big step, but still just a step. Why do you want to qualify? What do you want to do after you qualify? Do you want to become an expert in a particular area? Do you want to have your own firm? What impact do you want to have? Define it.

Once you have the definition, take action every single day towards that goal.

A lack of purpose is probably one of the biggest causes of anxiety, stress and confusion.

You need to know where you’re going. Let me illustrate with a metaphor, say you want to go from Scotland to London, because there’s a really important thing going on there.

You jump in your car and start the journey. As you drive, all of a sudden BLAM! You get a flat tyre. Cursing your luck you get frustrated, but because you’re on a mission to get somewhere you really want and need to be, you find a way to sort this out. Either replace the tyre yourself, or get help.

So then you carry on, before you hit a bucket-load of traffic. There’s been some sort of incident. The traffic jam will easily add 2-3 hours to the journey. You have the option of turning around and going back, BUT it’s important for you to get where you need to go.

There could be a number of further obstacles on this journey, but each time you face a challenge you overcome it, or find a way to get through, because you have a purpose, you have a destination to get to.

On the other hand, if you didn’t have that purpose and you didn’t define the destination, you’d set off on the journey and probably not get past the tyre becoming flat. You more likely to give up, go back, or wander off somewhere else and get lost.

So the same is with life, if you haven’t defined your purpose, if you haven’t defined what you want to do and achieve, you’re going to end up lost.

To summarise, do the following to take your life to the next level:

– Define your purpose

– Improve your health everyday

– Develop your mind everyday

– Develop your spirit/soul everyday

For an even smaller summary, the two words for you to take away are: MAKE PROGRESS! 

Let me know what results you see after one week, and then get back to me after a month, and then after a year. I’ll be doing the same and will share my experience.

Until the next one…