Coping with Anxiety

By: Jason Marcle

Everyone copes with anxiety differently.  I guess that is why it is so difficult for people to find a proven method to relieve anxiety.  I can’t speak for everyone; I can only speak for myself and how anxiety has affected me. 

Emotional awareness is very important when dealing with someone facing anxiety. So many face anxiety disorders but are afraid to talk to someone about them.  Me personally, I don’t like talking about my anxieties because other people may think I am crazy.  Some may look at me as being weak and afraid.  I know that isn’t the case, but that is what my mind will tell me.

Let’s talk about my anxiety.  Coping with anxiety alone is like trying to pull 1,000 pounds up Mount Everest. I mean, it is a huge load to carry by yourself. As bad as I want to pull that weight up Mount Everest by myself, I know that I can’t.  I have a lot of anxieties.  Amy has a lot of anxieties, but hers are different than mine. She is afraid of riding in a car down a busy interstate.  I am not.  I am afraid of being alone one day.  I’m afraid one day my cardiologist is going to tell me my heart failure is much worse. I’m afraid of having a heart attack one day and leaving this world too early. This list can carry on forever if I dive deep enough into it.

When I get anxious, I squeeze my hands together. I clench them together so hard that sometimes I leave bruises. I sometimes get short of breath or have some minor chest pains. It is a very scary feeling.  I will just get quiet sometimes and I don’t want to talk. I’m trying to process all the racing thoughts moving in circles in my head.  There are several things that help me when I get like this, and there are things that sometimes makes me worse.

The insane part of my anxiety is I know I always have someone on my side, but I refuse to let them in.  I’m talking about God, my higher power. I know that if I prayed every morning when I get out of bed and show gratitude to God and ask him to help me put away my anxieties, he will help me.  Why don’t l do this as much as I should? My faith has been weakened due to all the different events I have experienced over the last 5 years.  I need to listen to God’s word and quit being so stubborn. I need to stop trying to control the outcome of everything. 

That is also part of overcoming addictions.  Learning to give up control to my higher power.  I love listening to addiction recovery stories. I always seem to find great information that I can apply to my life.  I find good examples and principles to live by.  Recently I was speaking to an older gentleman that has many years of recovery under his belt. Currently he is facing cancer for the fourth or fifth time.  He has an

amazing attitude. I wish I had his emotional intelligence, his emotional awareness.  This is a man that lives by what he preaches.  I don’t want to use his real name, so let’s call him John.   I asked John how does he continue to keep a positive attitude when he is continuing to fight cancer?  He responded with “I stay out of God’s business. This cancer is God’s business, not mine”.  He then gave me a paper he wrote. He stated “When my doctors ask me how I have beat cancer so many times, I hand them a copy of this letter I wrote”.  It reads:

Let me take the opportunity to explain myself as best I can as it relates to my present circumstance.  The motivational speaker Zig Ziglar says that I should not pay too much for my problems. My present condition requires of me that I follow the medical protocol that has been outlined by a wonderful medical team that I trust completely.  Therefore, this problem deserves my adherence to the plan of treatment that has been laid out for me.

The overpayment part is harder to explain.  This cancer does not deserve my sobriety, my serenity, my sleep, my appetite, my attitude, my ability, my trust in the Lord, my relationships with my friends and family, my witness, my love for Sharron, or anything else that may be good and beautiful that God has continued to show me. Therefore, I will endeavor to not pay with those things.

My enemies are self-pity, self-indulgence, isolation, and that vast empty space between my ears. About the only weapons I have are confidence in God, that huge block of family and friends that pray for us and a sense of humor.  I plan to use them to the fullest.

Therefore, as I experience these next few months, I will do my best to ignore what is happening inside and make the effort to make my focus outward.  Having placed my confidence in the one who saved me and the medical team that He has provided, I plan to move forward one day at a time, doing what I can to live normal doing what I would normally do without regard for other issues. From what I have read, there will be plenty of time for side-effects so I will make the effort to not hasten their arrival by fiving them unearned influence.  My prayer is that victory over this present trial will bear witness to the power and love of an almighty God.

Know that we love you and thank you for your concern and prayers.  I have been taught that if we pray about something, we should not worry about it if we are going to worry about something, there is no need to pray.  This is not bravado; this is confidence in Jesus who died that I might have life.  When I consider from where He has brought us, it is antithetical to assume that He would abandon me now.

• John

Isn’t that amazing? I hope one day to not only be able to say these words but live them. Isn’t it awesome to know that there is a God that can help us?  A God that can remove all our anxieties if we give them to him? That is the hard part, because that is where I fail, that is where I can’t let that control go. It isn’t that I don’t want to, I don’t know how to.  That is another reason I say often that I am a work in progress.

The Bible even tells us what to do with our anxieties in 1 Peter 5:6-8 (ESV) 6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, 7 casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you. 8 Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.        

Today let’s start praying that God will remove our anxieties. Let’s cast all our anxieties on him and let him handle it. Let’s give all our worries and concerns to God. It isn’t going to happen overnight, but it will happen in Gods time if we give it to him.  Philippians 4:6 (ESV) says, 6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your
minds in Christ Jesus.