We are not meant to compartmentalize our body, mind, and spirit into silos. They are interdependent. Using an interdependence approach is what can help you to overcome anxiety.
Anxiety rarely happens overnight, although some in some cases, a trauma can immediately create it moving forward. Usually there is a combination of poor quality eating, lack of varied exercise, inconsistent sleep, little or no spiritual practice, and most importantly consistent negative self talk.
This idea that anxiety is multi-layered hit me again while I was reading Louise Hayes' book Loving Yourself to Great Health. Recreating the interdependence between these three parts of self was a direct key to my own personal healing. She states that although a little bit of stress can be beneficial, it becomes an issue when there is chronic stress. Chronic stress has a direct and profound effect on your health. In other words the negative thinking, a lack of some sort of spiritual practice, and a healthy lifestyle impacts the body.
She wrote that when stress becomes chronic, it sends a danger signal that stops blood from rushing to your brain, immune system and instead directs it to your limbs so that you can outrun the danger. This means that your body can't digest properly, your immune system can't protect you and your brain can't think straight.
She continued that under chronic stress, your nervous system is no longer in balance. What was once a harmonious relationship between the sympathetic nervous system (which mobilizes your nervous system's fight-or-flight response) and parasympathetic nervous system (which helps you rest, sleep, digest, and heal) is now tipped toward the sympathetic nervous system. In effect, chronic stress keeps you revved up and hyper-vigilant, making it hard for you to rest replenish and nourish your body.
Another side effect of hyper-vigilance is that it makes you more suggestible, meaning people in this state are more easily influenced by other people's suggestions and ideas. This is compounded when you are speaking with a person of influence such as your boss or a physician or maybe even your partner.
The good news is that the cycle of hyper-vigilance can be disrupted with a series of hypnosis sessions where a person goes into a deep hypnotic rest and supporting suggestions are given. Once hyper-vigilance has been broken, that's when the hypnotherapy begins.
Although disrupting hyper-vigilance is important (as well as changing negative self talk), its just as important to work on the physical and spiritual part of yourself at the same time. This can be extremely difficult when you have an anxiety disorder. Anxiety often show with depression like symptoms. So for example, it could be difficult getting out of bed or be exhausting just taking a shower. These are the times when you need to push yourself to do self care such as eating the right kind of food, taking any support supplements, doing a spiritual practice such as mindfulness, meditation or even prayer, exercising, and working on getting better sleep. In essence refocusing from what is going on outside of you to what is going on within you.
Making these kinds of changes will help support and re-balance your body back to the parasympathetic nervous system which in turn, will help you to minimize the stress and anxiety even in times of increased stress.