Feeling moody? Maybe it’s the weather

[photo courtesy James Jordan]

The brain is a complicated muscle, but one we’re learning more about all the time. Most people aren’t adversely affected by the changes in the weather as summer draws to a close, whilst some feel moody, drained and depressed with the arrival of cold winds and gray skies.

In the news recently the results of research was announced that identified a biological reason why two million people in the UK suffer from seasonal affective disorder.

Scientists from the Centre of Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, Canada, conducted brain scans of 88 adults. They discovered that those who experienced low moods and depression in winter had a higher level of a specific protein than those who were unaffected by seasonal changes.

It’s believed that the identified protein soaks up serotonin (feel good chemical) in the brain, causing an adverse effect on people’s mood. It’s long been known that depression is accompanied by low serotonin levels, so the research further emphasises how important a healthy mind and body are for your sense of well being.

With anxiety being such a complicated and deep rooted issue I’d suggest that other factors are probably at play along with the higher levels of a certain protein. However, the fact that scientists are now able to identify some of the biological reasons why the brain behaves in a certain way emphasises the strides being made in understanding anxiety in all its forms.

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Originally posted 2008-09-02 16:26:53. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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How Deep Breathing Can Help Reduce Social Anxiety, Stress and Panic

Along with food and water, giving your body a supply of air is essential for maintaining your heath and well being. If you’re not breathing properly then this can cause imbalances in your blood and affect the way your body behaves.

Poor breathing can cause dizziness, shortness of breath and shaking, which are all too familiar symptoms if you suffer from anxiety or panic.

The key is to learn how to breathe deeply in a natural manner that fills your stomach and rib cage, as well as the top part of your chest, and it can be practiced using simple exercises throughout the day.

Why is breathing properly so important?

Breathing regulates the balance of oxygen and carbon dioxide in your blood. Too much oxygen can cause you to feel agitated and nervous, whilst too much carbon dioxide might calm you temporarily but it can make you feel light headed and distort your responses.

Instead you should practice being able to breath deeply and naturally so that your body can maintain a healthy balance of oxygen and carbon dioxide and behave healthily.

Deep breathing is practiced as part of Tai Chi, Yoga and other forms of meditation due to its effectiveness in helping you think and behave in a clear, healthy manner.

The benefits of breathing properly include:

• Release tension in your neck, chest and diaphragm


• Reduce anxiety and panic by having a healthier balance of oxygen and carbon dioxide in your blood so you can think and behave in a calmer, clearer manner


• Reduce build up of stress and tension throughout the day


• When practicing as part of a meditation exercise, breathing can divert your attention from stressful, unhelpful thoughts


• Exhaling for longer than you inhale will help you to relax

Why just take a deep breath is bad advice

We’ve all heard the advice to take a deep breath when we’re feeling stressed or anxious. However, the problem is that most people interpret this as taking rapid breaths, rather than deep, natural breathing that fills our stomach, as well as our upper chest.

Rapid breathing can simply imbalance the oxygen in your blood, causing you to feel more agitated and nervous. Deep natural breathing is slow and calm, rather than rapidly gulping down oxygen.

So how do I practice deep breathing?

Here are a few breathing exercises you can practice to train your body to keep a healthy balance of oxygen and carbon dioxide, as well as help to reduce stress, panic and anxiety:

Sigh Breath

Take a moderate breathe through your nose and then slowly exhale, prolonging your exhale for longer than your inhale.

As you exhale try and relax the muscles in your face and shoulders to release any built up tension.

When you next inhale, try and divert your attention to the sights and sounds around you without passing judgement on your thoughts but just letting them flow

This breathing technique works well with mindfulness meditation because it focuses your thoughts away from whatever stresses you’re feeling that day.

Sigh breathing can be practiced whenever you’ve got a spare minute or two throughout the day, and can help you learn to regulate your breathing.

Easy Breathing

• focus on only your breathing for 3-4 minutes.


• Ignore everything around you other than your breathing


• move your chest and diaphragm in harmony so that you’re breathing naturally, rather than forced


• concentrating on your breathing in this way will divert your thoughts from your anxiety and stress

4-7-8 Breathing

• inhale for four seconds, hold it in for seven seconds then slowly release your breath for eight seconds


• As you exhale release the anxiety , stress and tension from your muscles, shoulder and face


• this exercise helps you to exhale for longer than you inhale, which can help your body relax if you’re feeling nervous


• you could practice this at any time, whether on public transport, waiting in a cue or when you’re just at home to help calm your breathing

There are plenty of other breathing exercises you can practice which you can learn more about from books and other resources on the net.

Healthy breathing is an important part of coping with and reducing social anxiety, so try a few different breathing exercises to find which ones work best for you and in which situations.

Originally posted 2008-08-27 15:39:25. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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UK School Kids Given Lessons on How to Be Happy

You feel the way that you think, and now UK school children are being taught how to think more positively to help them cope with the stresses of teenage life. Initially, 1500 11-year olds from 22 schools are being given lessons on how to assess situations objectively, how to be assertive and many other skills that can help them cope better with emotionally difficult situations. If the scheme is a success then it could be expanded into class rooms on a national scale.

The scheme uses lessons taught in the USA by the Penn Resiliency Program, based in Philadelphia, which adopts tried and tested cognitive behavioural therapy techniques to ‘detect inaccurate thoughts, to evaluate the accuracy of those thoughts, and to challenge negative beliefs by considering alternative interpretations’.

Teaching children cognitive behavioural therapy could help them avoid problems later on in life

Whilst some might remember their school days with fond memories, childhood can be a difficult period because of peer pressure, the desire to fit in and having to cope with all the struggles of teenage life.

Psychotherapists believe that it’s during childhood that you form your belief system: opinions on yourself, other people and the world around you. Upsetting childhood experiences, such as being neglected or bullied, can lead to problems later on in life because of the negative associations you attach to similar situations.

So equipping impressionable school children with the skills to identify inaccurate, unhelpful thoughts and then to replace them with healthier, happier ways of thinking could prove invaluable in helping them grow into secure, confident adults.

Treatment for anxiety and depression is a global issue

In a 2006 international survey UK children ranked bottom for happiness and well being. Some blame celebrity culture, with its focus on money and possessions, for giving children an unhelpful value system (although the problem is far more complicated than a single root cause). However, teaching them how to feel confident and secure, without needing the latest designer clobber or the approval of others, could be coming at just the right time.

Awareness on the effectiveness of cognitive behavioural therapy, for treating anxiety and depression, is spreading all the time. The UK’s ‘happiness tsar’ Professor Richard Layard even believes it could help people living on benefits to get back to work.

With depression the world’s biggest mental health problem, teaching more people cognitive behavioural therapy (whether self taught, with a therapist or in a group) could make a positive impact on not just on the lives of children but society in general.

Originally posted 2008-09-08 17:02:59. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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How Can I Do a Test for Social Anxiety Disorder?

Over the last few decades recognition of social anxiety disorder has grown rapidly. No longer is it seen as just a case of someone being over sensitive, too shy or introverted, but a recognised and diagnosable condition. But as with all anxiety disorders, it can be difficult to test for social phobia without clear guidance from a doctor or a psychiatrist.

It’s not like having a fever, when you can just check someone’s temperature or their physical symptoms. What’s more, social anxiety disorder can be a complex condition, with symptoms that can very in severity dramatically between individuals. Some people might just prefer to avoid going to parties and speaking in front of people they don’t know, while others might struggle to leave their house altogether due to the fear of negative stares.

Thankfully, a social anxiety disorder test was devised by Dr Michael R. Liebowitz, a psychiatrist and researcher at Columbia University, New York. First devised in 1987, his social anxiety disorder test continues to be the most widely used and recognised method of diagnosing the condition. Studies have shown it to be an efficient and cost effective way for people to test for social anxiety disorder so they can then progress towards beginning a process of treating the inaccurate, underlying thoughts that drive it.

What is the social anxiety disorder test?

The Liebowitz Social Anxiety Disorder Test consists of 24 questions designed to assess the scale at which social phobia affects your life based on an overall score of its severity. Thirteen of the questions focus on performance related anxiety, such as speaking on a phone in public or talking to someone in authority, while eleven deal with social situations, such as going to a party or speaking in a meeting.

After completing all the questions you are then given a score out of 144. If your score is high, and you are classified in the more severe categories, the important thing is to not feel down and depressed. The fact is that, as with all diagnosable conditions, social anxiety disorder can be treated.

With a diagnosis comes treatment

If you think you might be suffering from social anxiety disorder, the wisest thing to do is to visit a medical professional, whether it’s a doctor or a psychotherapist. They can give you a professional diagnosis along with advice on the best course of action to reduce your symptoms to the level where social anxiety disorder no longer gets in the way of living a fulfilling life.

If your social anxiety is fairly mild, it could be that all you may need to do is to start making some lifestyle changes, such as taking up new hobbies that give you a sense of achievement and boost your esteem as well as provide you with healthier interactions with other people. In more severe cases, where social anxiety disorder is causing you to feel depressed and is adversely affecting your life, then seeing a cognitive behavioural therapist along with a course of medication might be advisable.

So it’s wise to consult a medical professional, whether it’s a doctor or a psychiatrist, for a diagnosis and advice if your anxious thoughts and feelings are getting in the way of your ability to enjoy a happy, fulfilling life.

Originally posted 2013-06-04 14:19:53. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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Discover how you Can live a more fulfilling life free from social anxiety

If you suffer from social anxiety disorder, simple everyday activities, such as going to the shops or standing on a crowded bus, can seem daunting. Worrying about what other people think of you and if something bad will happen blights the lives of millions every day.

Thankfully, I learned to overcome my anxiety through learning more about the mental triggers and the underlying causes. I created this website to share what worked for me in the hope that it can help others overcome their social anxiety disorder (and without medication!) and live a happier, more fulfilled life free from the fear of strangers.

I’m guessing you arrived here whilst hunting for info on social anxiety disorder. Answers to questions like ‘Why does it happen to me?’, ‘Why do I feel afraid of people I don’t even know, am I crazy?’ and, most importantly, ‘What can I do about it?’.

The reason why I know this is because I did exactly the same thing myself a few years ago.

Social anxiety disorder had put a dark cloud over my life since my teenage years.

Simple everyday things, like catching a bus, walking around the shops or going out to meet friends, were a struggle because of overpowering feelings of nervousness, panic and fear over who I might meet or what might happen .

To combat the symptoms I used to ‘self medicate’ to get through social situations. But this just made me feel ten times worse later on.

Eventually my life reached a point where I had a simple choice – continue suffering in silence and simply coping day to day, or do something about it.

So off I went to see my doctor for advice on what I should do.

Unfortunately, as has happened to many people suffering from social anxiety disorder, I was swiftly prescribed a course of beta blockers to help ‘calm me down’.

Suffice to say this wasnt the answer I was looking for – unless you want to feel like a subdued, unemotional robot all day.

So I decided to look for some answers of my own.

Changing the Way You Think WILL Change the Way You Feel

It was while looking into the causes of anxiety that I started finding out about the more specific symptom of social anxiety disorder.

After reading through a number of books on the subject and blogs of other sufferers, I started to discover more about the condition – what causes it and what you can do to overcome it.

I then set about applying what I’d learned to my daily life and making changes to the way I thought about things, how I reacted to situations and making lifestyle changes so I became more active and raised my self esteem.

I wasnt cured overnight. But with practice and patience, the changes I made to how I thought about the people around me and how I reacted to social situations helped me to gradually reduce the fear, nervous thoughts and uncomfortable feelings of social anxiety disorder.

I can still feel anxious from time to time. But my social anxiety disorder is nowhere near the levels it was. It no longer stops me from going where I want to go or doing the things I want to do. And my life has vastly improved as a result.

Rather than being stuck at home, I’m now out living my life, taking part in activities like rock climbing and trekking, and I can even go out and meet friends without worrying what other people are thinking.

I created this website to help others struggling with social anxiety disorder by writing about the strategies and tactics that worked for me in the hope they can help other people as well.

Originally posted 2012-01-05 18:58:44. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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