What I learned after running for one year to fight anxiety
Right after my first panic attack (my love story with anxiety) I started devouring all the articles, blogs and news I could find on anxiety disorders and how to deal with them. In all of them I found a simple, but life changing, advice: exercise, exercise a lot and regularly.
This happened somewhere around November 2016 so at the time it was raining a lot and temperatures were low. The conditions were perfect for any excuse. At first I would use all the excuses I could find soon I realised that…
Doing something is better than sitting still trying to racionalize the whole thing hopping for a ‘I figured it out!!’ moment.
I’m not saying that you shouldn’t use reason to argue with your mind. I think you should but there is something as therapeutic as cognitive behavioural therapy, cognitive restructuring (helped me a lot) or journaling (also a great tool), and it’s free and available to us all: RUNNING.
For me, the main problem I solved with running was my unflagging ruminations. When, after a busy day of work, you try to sit still arguing with your mind you end up ruminating a lot, I mean, all the time. In that time I would become desperate and tried to slept it over. Here are some ruminations:
Am I the only feeling like this?
Is this never going to pass?
What’s wrong with me?
Will I never be normal again?
What I realised was that running worked like a filter in my mind preventing these ruminations to escalate.
There all kinds of studies proving the benefits of running for mental health issues. When I run I try to focus all my attention on my breath and on my body sensations, trying to have a mindfulness workout. Another cool thing I experienced was the famous “runner’s high”, where ‘endorphins’, the ‘happy’ chemical, showed up to the party.
I was running, and still do, 5k at least twice a week and I was definitely starting to feel much better.
Right after a panic attack I would feel devastated and the most crucial advice, for this situations, I can give you is that…
“Right now is a good opportunity to do things differently”
This was the sentence I would often say to myself. I had tried staying home and ruminating and it was awful so it was time do it differently. It took me sometime to follow this mantra but when I did, I realised that we hold the key from the basement we are in.
Course there were times when I ran for only 5 minutes and others that I did not ran at all and just walked. It was in one of those occasions that I remembered how much I enjoyed walking/running on rain. Somewhere along the process of growing up we tend to forget a lot of simple things that so many times brought us such joyful moments.
It was only a few months later after I devoured
’s book “The power of habit” that I learned more about the “habit loop” (the cue that creates a behavioural routine that results in a reward) that I realised I’ve traded one behaviour, smoking, for another, running, to expect the same reward: pleasure and a break. Only this new behaviour gave me much more: resilience, perseverance, health, peace and a huge sense of acomplishment.Another good way to keep sustain the running habit is to install some app like Nike Running or RunKeeper.
I started with Runkeeper and then moved to Nike Running Club. Both allow you to set goals and to follow up trainings. It was only when I started using NRC that I began to track my pace and distance and pushing it a little further every week. Seeing this evolution is much more that analysing numbers, you really start to commit to them and feeling prouder and prouder of yourself for becoming a better version of yourself.
“There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that’s your own self.” — Aldous Huxley
Now I run and I run whether I’m feeling anxious or not, now it’s more like a way of living. It now plays a crucial preventive care to my mental health.
So now you know, if you are still reading this chances are you relate to my story somehow, GO OUTSIDE AND DO THINGS DIFFERENTLY. If it’s cold and raining then you have the perfect conditions for a first run.
Well, that’s all folks, hope you enjoyed it, if so, leave your feedback in a comment or your clap.
