Hey everyone! Its been awhile since I last visited this forum, but I like to drop by every once and awhile to share what worked for me and offer my encouragement. It has been several years since I too was one who lived on this forum, scanning it daily for any words that would give me a glimmer of hope. I know the hell that many of you are going through, but I am here to tell you that my life is so much better now and yours will be too...just keep believing! I know you have heard it a million times, but you really do hold the key to your own recovery and it lies within your thoughts. When I was stuggling with anxiety I would exercise,try to eat right, attempt to meditate, read what others wrote...etc, and all of these helped, but I didn't have significant improvement until I made a conscious decision to work on my negative beliefs and thinking. I began to purposely choose the things that I put in my mind. If you think of your brain as a computer and your thoughts as the data its easy to understand the correlation. If you type in a bunch of nonsense into your harddrive, your computer is going to freeze up, give you an error message, or just plain wig out because you are not imputing what it was designed for. It is the same for the human computer. When we imput a bunch of garbage (negative thoughts) our system is going to overload due to the harmful information (kinda like a computer virus). The result is stress, anxiety, panic,and depression. Its cause and effect. So...program your mind with the information that will keep your computer running smoothly. Positive self-talk and affirmations daily are the tools that helped me to put my life back on track(Carolyn's soothing voice on the affirmation part of the driving tape was awesome...she needs to make an affirmation only cd!). When you have a negative thought, purposely tell yourself the exact opposite (the postive version). This is where I disagree with Lucinda a tad...She says that you shouldn't tell yourself something that you won't believe like when you think, "I feel fat and ugly," don't counter with "I am hot and beautiful." I disagree. For me, because I grew up in such a negative environment, ANYTHING positive would be rejected from my mind as bologna. It didn't matter the degree of truth...so I went for the gusto and said the most positive thing I could think of...at first my mind objected the "silly" new thoughts, but the more I purposely imputed them, the better I began to feel and slowly, but surely I began to believe a lot of them. Am I a total 100% positive thinker every minute of everyday who never suffers from any anxiety? Of course not. Anxiety is a part of being human and a lifetime of negative thinking dies hard so I still have to make a conscious effort to work on it daily. Is my life a million times better? YES! I can't tell you the confidence I have now knowing that when I feel anxious, I can change it just by changing my thoughts. Its not always easy, but it does work, you just need to believe! One hint of caution...I know this forum is a great source of comfort to many of you, but just be careful about how much time you spend reading everyone's millions of symptoms and fears. Its really hard to think positive when you are bombarded with every negativity out there. I'm not saying to not support one another, but try and do it with positive encouragement instead of dwealing on all of the problems. We all know anxiety can bring a world of weird, scarey feelings...we need to focus on what to do about it not drown in its misery!

I wish you all the best...I know you all will succeed!

K

Thanks so much for your encouraging post. Drop by again to help us out sometimes here.

Thanks for the encouring post! We need more like that! Glad you're doing well.

K: Thanks for your words of encouragement! I have found much support in the forums and chat, but like you mention I have found it can actually increase my anxiety. So I thought maybe I would just come to Triumphs, and saw your post today. I am on my second time through the program, and needed some encouragement through this growth spurt.

Thank you for the great post, K. That was a great analogy and definetly food for thought.

I couldn't agree more!!!
I am half way through the program a second time around and I am seriously a completely diffferent person!
I am currently reading (well re-reading even though I didn't finish it the first time)
Shad Helmstetter's book, What to say when you talk to yourself.
Its a great book and basically says the same thing, your brain is like a computer and the more you program it with negative thoughts, the more negative your going to be and project that negativitiy.
I do also have to say that it has seriously helped my negative thinking but specifically scary thoughts. I can say, "I never get scared by those silly thoughts, that is what I used to do. Now I know those thoughts are just mental energy and mean nothing! How great and wonderful it is to know and feel this way!"
It seriously makes me feel so much better. You may have to repeat and repeat and repeat but eventually your mind does start to re-program itself and before you know it, those scary thoughts and negative thoughts are a thing of the distant past!
I'm feeling wonderful and you can too!! Keep re-programming!!
Lisa =)

Thanks for the post K...

I whole-heartedly agree... a commitment to the elimination of all negativity from my thought life lifted such a burden... I believe that this was 85-95% of my problem.

In addition, during times when I am not forced to think on work or other things, I have purposed to meditate upon the Lord. Upon awaking every morning, I ask the Lord for a specific characteristic of his (i.e. God is Love) and I choose to focus upon the goodness of the Lord all day long...

For The Lord will keep you in perfect peace when you choose to set your mind upon Him just because you trust him in every situation. This is his promise to us in the Word of God ... Isaiah chapter 26 verse 3.

This has been my saving grace.

That was a great post K- Thank you, I have a ton of scary thoughts, I hope I can get there too!

Thank you K and ld26angell for these posts. I find that going through the website often increases my anxiety because I assume all of the symptoms of other writers. I truly appreciate these positive reflections and they do the world in encouraging me.

Because of these posts, I believe that I can conquer this and be the calmer positive thinker you describe.

I believe we can do it.

Thanks much.

that was wonderful to hear, sometimes you feel there is no hope, but your sharing showed me ther is hope and to follow with the positive and look for positive people to help you get influenced. Thank you i pray i will be in your spot someday i have had bullemia for 16 years and have always hated myself.Now i would love to reverse my negative mind and finally like myself!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Very positive thread and oh so true!

I love this post. k! you inspired me!

Zoe