Methods for Reducing Anxiety and Stress

Coping with Anxiety, Stress, and Uncertainty

Index

Advice to start with

Help with ANXIETY and STRESS on this website

Complete a free questionnaire to help diagnose underlying causes of frequent problems with anxiety and stress

Other Internet Help Links

Anxiety is one of the most basic emotions.  One cause is being uncertain about whether or not important goals, needs, or values will be satisfied.  Many of the self-help materials in this website concern changing beliefs and skills that can reduce anxiety.  There are general methods for dealing with anxiety, such as the CHUG-OF mental control strategies and methods that can help with anxiety in specific situation such as dealing with an interpersonal conflict.  In this case, if the anxiety is caused by lack of knowledge about how to deal with the situation, learning conflict-resolution skills can help.  Different words to describe the basic anxiety emotion include stress, nervous, apprehensive, fearful, and worried.  Too much anxiety also usually underlies problems of shyness, introversion, fear of rejection, and lack of assertiveness.

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ADVICE 
Try to determine the following yourself:

• List the values, goals, and/or expectations that you are afraid won't be met? Also, what level or degree is your expectation (how high is it)?

• How realistic are your expectations and goals?  Will changing your expectations or goals help reduce the anxiety?  For help with changing goals and expectations, click here.

• Are there several life areas affected--career, family, significant other, income, health, recreation, etc.? If so, your anxiety will be higher.

• List external and internal resources you have for dealing with the problem(s). 

• Is uncertainty about how to deal with this situation (what to think or do) a factor in  your anxiety?  If so, first make a list of steps that can help you solve at least part of the problem. Then get help advice from someone who has solved similar problems successfully, a website, a book, or an expert.

• If this is an ongoing problem, do you need to build some skill to increase your ability and confidence for dealing with the problem? If so develop a plan to build the skill.  Perhaps it is a specific situation that you can get direct advice to help with.  For example our web links have many useful tips for dealing with interpersonal problems that can make an immediate difference.

• Are low self-esteem, negative thinking, prolonged fears. a history of anxiety in this area, or some other more personal issue behind much of the anxiety?  If so, try to examine these and get counseling (see below).

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HELP WITH ANXIETY and STRESS ON THIS WEBSITE

To get a comprehensive list of all references to anxiety in this website, you could use the SEARCH feature and search for the word anxiety.  However, that would lead to a large number of references.  Instead, I have some suggestions of where to start.

For a general understanding of the MOST BASIC CAUSES OF ANXIETY, try the following:

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, Chapter 7

For some GENERAL anxiety-reduction methods, try the following:

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, 
Chapter 2 (How to explore your anxiety to identify underlying causes of your anxiety) 

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, 
Chapter 8 (The Six CHUG-OF Mental Control Strategies to get control of your emotions)

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, 
Chapter 8 (The LAPDS ways to lower anxiety by changing goals and expectations)

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, 
Chapter 3 (How to use your Higher Self to build confidence and resolve inner conflicts) 

For methods to help with a SPECIFIC SITUATION where anxiety may be a problem, go to the topic that you are concerned about.  Start with the references below:

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, 
Chapter 4 (How to deal with your worst fears of death, poverty, loneliness, etc) 

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, 
Chapter 5 (How to deal with self-esteem-related fears and anxiety)

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, 
Chapter 6 (How to deal with anxiety related to trying to please others, codependency, or non-assertiveness) 

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, 
Chapter 9 (How to deal with problems related to lack of achievement)

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, 
Chapter 9 (How to deal with problems related to feeling overwhelmed, too much to do, time-management problems)

How to deal with a specific situation that is too overwhelming because it involves so much to do with too little time to do it in or is too complex or difficult and you keep avoiding it, go to (How to Manage Overwhelming Tasks Using POSSI).

You Can Choose To Be Happy: "Rise Above" Anxiety, Anger, and Depression, 
Chapter 8: FOCUS (How to deal with fears related to any kind of performance anxiety including speaking in public, test anxiety, meeting people, etc) 

Overcoming Fears of Rejection and Loneliness 

Using the Systematic Desensitization Technique to overcome specific fears and phobias

Dealing with test anxiety and improving learning and comprehension

Panic Reactions and Runaway Emotions

SHAQ Questionnaire: 
To take a self-scoring questionnaire that may help you understand some of the factors related to anxiety, anger, and depression, go my companion web site and complete the Success and Happiness Attributes Questionnaire (SHAQ) at http://www.csulb.edu/~tstevens/success.  [It takes 30-90 minutes to complete.]

You can also use the SEARCH feature on the Home page

OTHER INTERNET LINKS

***American Psychology Association (APA) information about anxiety disorders
http://www.apahelpcenter.org

***World Health Organization Clinical Research Unit for Anxiety and Depression information 
About panic disorder and agoraphobia:


ADAA - Anxiety Disorders Association of America
www.adaa.org 

***Virtual Pamphlet Collection of the University of Chicago--SEE ANXIETY
Free online pamphlets about relationships and many other topics written by psychologists and other counselors from University Counseling Centers across U.S.A.
http://counseling.uchicago.edu/vpc

International Stress Management Association
www.stress-management-isma.org 

Mindtools
www.mindtools.com/smpage.html  

Also see the general psychological self-help websites that offer web help for anxiety.

Self-Help and other resources on this website (and site map)