Try Some Existential Therapy
While several forms of talk therapy like cognitive-behavioral therapy have been shown to be quite helpful for exploring and working through fear of death, theres a specific approach called existential psychotherapy that is often especially helpful.
Existential therapy focuses on issues of death, meaning, and responsibility that are often key factors in a persons fears of death. By working with a therapist who specializes in these types of issues, its often easier to get to core causes of death anxiety that are more philosophical or existential in nature.
For example, if you think your fear of death is connected to a struggle to find meaning and purpose in your life, an existential therapist might be able to help you uncover what a meaningful life really looks like for you and what the obstacles to pursuing that are.
Plus, if youre someone who naturally has a more philosophical bent then existential therapy can also be quite enjoyable since it can be hard to find other people in life to relate to on this level.
If youre curious about existential therapy and whether it might be a good fit for you, this book is a very good introduction: The Wiley Handbook of Existential Therapy
Train Your Brain To Stop The Fear Response
President Franklin D. Roosevelt famously said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” It’s this fear that paralyzes you before you make that super important call, walk on stage for a keynote the first time, or introduce yourself to the girl of your dreams. The anticipation of fear kicks in and you turn to Jell-o. But after you pull it off, you realize you’re not in danger and no monster ate you. So training your brain to accept that there’s no threat will help you to switch off the fear response. You’ll soon realize that it’s the fear of fear that you fear, nothing else. And that will eventually become easy to manage.
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Mindset Shifts To Overcome Anxiety
First, to learn how to overcome fear and anxiety, you need to reflect on some situations that might have led your subconscious mind to form this understanding everyones different, and your brain has created this reaction for you solely because of something it heard, saw, or felt in the past.
If you really struggle with this part, therapists , can lend a hand here. Then, in order to change the pattern, you need to change it at a subconscious level by shifting your mindset and there are few ways you can do this.
1. Hypnosis
One of the most effective ways to reprogram your subconscious mind is through hypnosis. Its a trance-like state, similar to meditation, where you can dialogue with your subconscious mind and give it positive suggestions.
During hypnosis, your brain waves shift from beta to alpha, meaning your subconscious mind is open and willing to listen to new thoughts and ideas. Hypnosis is not scary, and its not mind-control. Its a direct way to talk to the subconscious, and its something you can do with a certified hypnotherapist or RTT therapist, or you can simply find the hundreds of free downloadable resources on the internet that can help you shift your mindset.
2. Creative Visualization
3. Change Your Language
4. Self-Talk
Whether you write it down or say it aloud every day, list out the attributes of the person you want to be and tell yourself every day, for as long as it takes, that youre that person. Youll see just how effective this is.
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Studies On Anxiety And Fear
A study published in the journal Science by researchers from the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne does a good job summing up how the brain actually has to re-experience a fear in order to extinguish it. Heres what the researchers did: They put rodents into a small box and gave them a mild shock and then took them out. Over a long period, the researchers returned the mice to the box but didnt administer shocks. Initially, the mice froze, but with repeated exposure to the box, and no additional shocks, they eventually relaxed.
For humans repeated exposure to the event that created the trauma can help the anxiety subside. For example, the treatment for fear of flying is often exposure therapy that involves slowly and repeatedly being exposed to the object that is feared in a controlled environment.
Types Of Anxiety Disorder
As noted above, anxiety can range from mild to severe and can come and go over time. For some anxious thoughts may feel like a relatively minor issue or may present as troublesome, frustrating, or annoying. Or it may feel completely overwhelming and a real detriment to your daily life.
You may have anxiety over one specific thing or a more general kind of anxiety that extends into many facets of your life. For some people, anxiety causes them to focus more inward, others become less introverted and cope by distracting themselves with more extroverted behaviors. However, introverts tend to experience more anxiety, possibly because they may be more in tune with their inner life and anxiety level.
For many people, anxiety is relatively manageable, but others feel ruled or limited by it. How we cope with our anxiety has a big role in how impactful it becomes. For some, anxiety tips over from typical nervousness or apprehension into more profound anxiety disorders. According to the National Institutes of Health, approximately 43% of people with anxiety have mild cases, 33% have moderate anxiety, and almost 23% have a severe prognosis.
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Visualize Yourself As Unafraid
By visualizing yourself performing with confidence and competence in an area where you are fearful, your visual image will eventually be accepted by your subconscious mind as instructions for your performance.
Your self-image, the way you see yourself and think about yourself, is eventually altered by feeding your mind these positive mental pictures of yourself performing at your best.
How To Overcome Your Fear Of Making Mistakes
No one can reduce mistakes to zero, but you can learn to harness your drive to prevent them and channel it into better decision making. Here is how to become a more effective worrier: dont be afraid or ashamed of your fear, use emotional agility to label your feelings and act on your values, focus on perfecting your processes not outcomes, broaden your thinking, recognize the value of leisure time, and avoid judgment-clouding noise.
The Covid-19 crisis and its fallout including recession, layoffs, and uneven economic pain as well as recent protests over police brutality and demands for racial justice have presented many of us with challenges that weve not encountered before. The high-stakes and unfamiliar nature of these situations have left many people feeling fearful of missteps. No one can reduce mistakes to zero, but you can learn to harness your drive to prevent them and channel it into better decision making. Use these tips to become a more effective worrier.
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Helping A Child Who Is Afraid Of The Dark
As with other fears, it is important to handle a childs fear of the dark with sympathy and understanding. Do not ridicule or dismiss your childs feelings, or become frustrated and angry. The first step in helping your child to overcome their irrational fear is to accept their feelings as real and respond to them sensitively.Suggestions include:
- Ask them to tell you about their fears and what exactly makes them afraid.
- Show your child that you understand their fears, but that you dont necessarily share them.
- Reassure them that they are safe explain there are no such things as monsters.
- Dont try to reassure your child by checking in the cupboard or under the bed as this may suggest to the child that you believe monsters could be there.
- If your child is afraid of the dark because of the possibility of intruders, it may help to show them the security measures around the house, such as locks. However, never lock a deadlock while people are inside the house, as it may block escape in a fire or other emergency.
- Ask your child for suggestions on what would make them feel more secure. Offer suggestions yourself. Perhaps they would feel better if they took a special toy or comforter to bed.
- Find out if their fear of the dark comes from other worries. For example, some children may be afraid of their parents separating or dying, and this anxiety gets worse when they are alone in the dark. Talk to your child honestly about such issues.
Record Yourself And Learn
Think about how top athletes go back and watch tape of their gameplay to see how to improve. To overcome your fear of public speaking, you would be essentially doing the same thing by recording your speech.
Set up your phone or a video camera to record your speech. Record yourself giving the talk from beginning to end. If you stumble over your words, forget something, or mess up, just keep recording.
Then listen to it or watch it, and make notes on how you could make it better. Some people do not like listening to the sound of their voice on tape, so it is important that you get used to your own voice and speaking style.
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Realize That Not Everything Is The End Of The World One Way To Do This Is By Consciously Trivializing Tasks
Social psychologist Susan K. Perry suggests in her Psychology Today column that you always think of yourself as playing. If something goes wrong, you can just try again or try it in some other way.
And when you compare something in your daily life to decisions that are truly life-and-death, it gives you better perspective as to what’s really important and that failure at something that’s probably just trivial isn’t something to be so fearful or anxious about.
What Are The Treatment Options For Driving Anxiety
The tips and techniques shared above are effective in overcoming ochophobia. Most of these tips can be actualized alone, meaning you can work on your driving anxiety at your pace and without bothering others.
However, it is essential to remember that driving anxiety is just another form of anxiety. And some anxieties need professional intervention to help overcome them. If you feel youre not making any progress on your own, you can approach a professional for an expert approach.
When it comes to professional treatment options for driving anxiety, psychological therapies are the first line of treatment.
Here are a few therapies that can be used to overcome driving anxiety:
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Cope With Your Death Anxiety Symptoms In A Healthy Way
Everyone and their dog has advice about specific coping skills you can use to manage your fears and anxiety. But when it comes to coping with your fears, you have to be careful
Even though coping skills feel good in the moment, they can easily make your fears and insecurities worse in the long-run.
Heres an example:
- Take deep breathing, a coping skill thats commonly recommended for people who struggle with anxiety.
- Its true that doing even just a few deep breaths can have a powerfully calming effect on you.
- The problem is that if you immediately start doing deep breathing as a way to avoid feeling anxious, youre teaching your brain that its not okay to feel anxious. So even if you manage to feel a little better in the short term, it will have the unintended long term effect of making you anxious about being anxious.
- This means that the next time you feel anxiety, youre going to feel a double-dose because youve taught your brain to be afraid of being afraid!
Be very careful not to use coping skills as an avoidance mechanism.
If you want to cope with your fears and worry about death in a healthy waya way that doesnt make them worse long-termits critical to first validate the fear itself. Which, conveniently, is the topic of our next strategy
What Is It Like Having Social Anxiety Disorder
In school, I was always afraid of being called on, even when I knew the answers. I didnt want people to think I was stupid or boring. My heart would pound and I would feel dizzy and sick. When I got a job, I hated to meet with my boss or talk in a meeting. I couldnt attend my best friends wedding reception because I was afraid of having to meet new people. I tried to calm myself by drinking several glasses of wine before an event and then I started drinking every day to try to face what I had to do.
I finally talked to my doctor because I was tired of feeling this way and I was worried that I would lose my job. I now take medicine and meet with a counselor to talk about ways to cope with my fears. I refuse to use alcohol to escape my fears and Im on my way to feeling better.
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Normal Fears In Children
Many childhood fears are natural and tend to develop at specific ages. For example, many young children are afraid of the dark and may need a nightlight to sleep. That doesnt mean they have a phobia. In most cases, they will grow out of this fear as they get older.
For example, the following childhood fears are extremely common and considered normal:
0-2 years Loud noises, strangers, separation from parents, large objects.
3-6 years Imaginary things such as ghosts, monsters, the dark, sleeping alone, strange noises.
7-16 years More realistic fears such as injury, illness, school performance, death, natural disasters.
If your childs fear is not interfering with their daily life or causing them a great deal of distress, then theres little cause for undue concern. However, if the fear is interfering with your childs social activities, school performance, or sleep, you may want to see a qualified child therapist.
How To Overcome Your Travel Anxiety And Fears
Theres no doubt we are living in a stressful world. 24-hour news saturates our airwaves with doom and gloom stories from around the world. Social media amplifies even the smallest crisis. It is analyzed, shared and played over and over before your eyes.
Its no wonder the modern world is taking its toll on our mental health. With everything going on in our own homes, the thought of travel can cause even more anxiety.
Dont Let Anxiety Stop You From Living Your Dream
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