Kindness Begins With Me – Days 25 & 26 of #31daystohappy

Statistically speaking, you become just like the five people you choose to spend the most time with. For me, all five people were in my head and each one struggled with anxiety, fear, insecurity and doubt. It was awful.

Loneliness is a real thing, ya’ll and let me tell you how much it feeds the monster of anxiety. Anxiety thrives in isolation. It loves the dark. If you take your anxieties outside of yourself and make them confront reality, the hustle, the bustle, the lives being lived and loved, you’ll find them screaming and shrieking, thrashing and fighting. You know why? They can’t survive that environment.

Anxiety can’t grow in a space of friendship & honesty. Do you know why we must share our talents? When you hide your talents, you feel dishonest. By not sharing, you build a wall. The anxiety monster builds his nest in this wall between you and the world.

How do we defeat a monster so insidious? By being brave & vulnerable and visualizing your success, even in spaces where before you’ve felt like a failure. I know how challenging being social & putting yourself out there can be. In the past, I attended several retreats hoping to surround myself with friends. I struggled with anxiety even then, but still had a deep sense of knowing I needed social connections.

At one particular retreat, I had a terrible experience. Whispering, mocking, and cliqueyness don’t make anyone feel good, but I let these actions by a few individuals destroy me. The feeling of isolation in a crowd is painful. To avoid it, I packed my bags and left as soon as I could. My anxiety fed on this singular experience and dragged out the memory often. My monster used it as proof I shouldn’t and couldn’t attend social events. I was unlikable. People didn’t want to be around me. I should be ashamed that I ever thought I could have many friends. I let these thoughts build and reinforce the wall in my mind.

After that, I could barely go out without my husband next to me. I feared interacting with anyone, lest I force them to spend time with my unlikable self or allow them to place yet another bruise on my soul.

My one mandatory social event, quilt market, became nearly impossible. At first, with Weston nearby, I behaved almost normally, but made no connections. By setting myself up to fail, I did. Anxiety turns fear & self doubt into reality.  At the next quilt market, Weston could barely leave the room. Guilt forced me downstairs holding my baby, but I used her as an excuse to avoid people, protecting them from me & my heart from any more hurt.*

By the following May, my anxiety had physical manifestations. I could barely walk due to an intense migraine. I couldn’t eat, my sleep was plagued with nightmares and the entire time I struggled to string words together, worrying about offending anyone with my presence. What happened to me?! I had fed my anxiety, little by little over so many years until it made the decisions, not me. My confidence was gone and with it any chance to make relationships.

How do you get over a monster who destroys your happiness? What is the recipe? How do you make friends once your anxiety tells you it’s impossible? It starts by making friends with yourself and it starts small. If we’ve established what we want, if we’ve established we have gifts to share, now we need to establish who we want around us.  I need friends who are real, who have hearts, who can nurture and allow me to be generous with my own gifts. That one experience was just that, an experience. By letting it go and putting myself out there, I’ve been able to defeat the fear that had held me down.
 

Prompt #25 – #31daystohappy

Figure out a time and make a plan to involve yourself in something. If you need to take someone with you at first, do it, but put yourself in a place where you can safely be vulnerable and meet good people. Be gentle with yourself.

Why would these people want to be our friends? Because we are just like them. We are real. We struggle and we can admit it. We can be bold and brave and do the hard things. We care. And caring is the second step.

Since we are putting ourselves out there, we must remember how to make friends. People know when you don’t care for them. It’s instinct. It is embarrassing to admit, but anxiety had wrapped me so completely in my own mind, I barely paid attention to people I met. As I developed these prompts for myself this summer, I realized this weakness. I worked to release this inward view and instead focus my energy on people I came into contact with and really connect with them.

Prompt #26 – #31days to happy

Pray for five people not intimately connected to yourself each night. This brought two challenges into my life. The first is to interact with five people and the second is to remember them at the end of the day. This has become one of the best parts of my evening routine. What a blessing to be in a world with such interesting people!

This habit helped me to stop paying so much attention to the fearful voices in my head and begin paying a lot more attention to the people around me.

Where do we find people to care about & take our minds off ourselves? People rarely knock on your door looking for you. But where do you go? I’ve found filling my schedule with meetings and groups to be quite effective. Church can be a place where truly like-minded women build relationships. On the suggestion of a church leader, I attended a 12-step program and find the steps effective for anxiety and hearing from other people made me care for them. Book clubs, quilt guilds, cooking classes, & community planning events, the list goes on. If one doesn’t work, drop it and move on.

Make time for yourself and fill it with opportunities to connect with those around you. Women’s retreats are an amazing place – providing you pick the right one. I had the privilege of attending Enlighten Retreat this weekend and it was powerful and life changing. I decided to go based on the bloggers I knew were going. I want to be around women who write like that, who allow themselves to be vulnerable, to cry in public and put down the mask. I made friends, something difficult for me. I felt connected to something bigger than myself. It changes your life to know you aren’t alone and there are people rooting for you.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. I know agoraphobia is a real thing. This may not be right for those with a debilitating condition, but you know yourself the best. Make wise choices. I’m not talking about easy stuff. If this is something you’ve already incorporated into your life, I’d love to hear about it in the comments!

Thank you for reading along with my adventure in happiness!

PS: Enlighten is about to announce their dates and availability for next year. If you are near Utah or up for traveling make sure to click here for more details.