Articles
Overcoming Comparison and Finding Your Joy Again
Are you currently in a season of feeling like you are falling behind? Failing? Missing something? Do you frequently struggle with comparison? Do you find yourself saying any of these statements? “Their house looks gargantuan and is decorated farmhouse picturesque while mine is covered in toys and toddler crumbs before 6:30 a.m.” “They can take expensive vacations and we are barely making ends meet.” “They have four children that are all involved in extracurricular activities/sports while we have two children and feel like we are running around like chickens with our heads cut off.” “Their toddlers are always so well-behaved and [...]
Why am I Angry, and How Do I Make it Stop?
If you are someone who struggles with anger, you may wake up each day with the best intentions to remain calm and kind. But soon the stressors start, and you find your resolve crumbling as the familiar signs of irritability set in. Anger manifests itself uniquely for everyone, but some common signs of a rising temper may include an elevated heart rate, tunnel vision, feeling overheated or trapped in your clothes or environment, and the desire to express your feelings in a verbal or physically forceful manner. While some individuals may have problems with their expressions of anger, many who acknowledge [...]
Living with PTSD
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a type of anxiety disorder that can occur when you have been traumatized by witnessing or experiencing an event so frightening that the shock of it creates changes in the structure of your brain. This triggers your body’s threat response, which in turn floods your brain with stress hormones, causing the memory of the event to be stored differently than a normal memory. Trauma memories feel as if they are still happening right now in the present, and your brain gets locked in a cycle of trying to defend itself from future assaults. PTSD was first [...]
4 Ways Teens Deal with Grief and What Parents Can Do to Help
Dealing with grief can be difficult, and it presents challenges specific to adolescents. While teens may experience the same stages of grief as adults, they experience unique difficulties related to their age at the time of their beloved one’s death. Other important factors will likely have implications on how teens deal with grief as well. For instance, during the process of a chronic illness that results in a loss, family members may have already begun grieving while the beloved one that was lost was still alive. In contrast, if the loss was sudden and unexpected, this type of loss may be [...]
8 Benefits of Gratitude as a Daily Practice
Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. – 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 If you’ve ever had to do a chore or errand you didn’t find particularly pleasant, you probably know that the experience feels interminable. When you go into something expecting it to be bad, it can feel like it’s going on forever. Trips to the DMV, the grocery store, or an unpleasant conversation with an unpleasant character are all difficulties we need to face at one point or another in life. However, it’s possible to make a tough situation [...]
Spiritual Tips to Curb the Influence of Anxiety in Your Life
Our society is marked by busyness. Bursting schedules and activity-packed days squeeze out essential time for rest and rejuvenation. What suffers? Our sleep, peace, and healthy connections with God, self, and others ultimately pay. The high cost of loss mounts in our attempts to keep pace with the bustling world around us and can result in anxiety. We sometimes succumb to the lure of multi-tasking, trying to recoup losses. Doing too much in too little time yields the opposite effect. Playing into the hands of “catch-up” drains energy, erodes focus, and elevates anxiety levels. It frays nerves like the loose ends [...]
Help and Hope for Anxiety and Panic Attacks
Anxiety and panic attacks have certain similarities, but they are two different conditions. How can you tell which is which? The main differences between them are the way they present themselves at their onset and the intensity, severity, and duration of the symptoms. The DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) describes a panic attack as “a sudden episode of intense fear that triggers severe physical reactions when there is no real danger or apparent cause.” It does not, however, list or include a definition for what is commonly referred to as an anxiety attack. Although “anxiety attack” is not [...]
Understanding Social Anxiety: Causes and Symptoms
Conversations around anxiousness and stress management are becoming more and more common in our society’s public dialogue. From A-list celebrities talking openly about their mental health struggles, to friends and family admitting how hard it has been to get back to normal after the isolation of early-COVID quarantine, people of every class and creed seem to be experiencing greater feelings of social anxiety and fear than they have before. Many mental and emotional health conditions have been exacerbated by the threats to public health, societal divides, and financial stressors of recent years, and social anxiety is no exception. More people than [...]
When Your Family Gives You Anxiety
In an ideal world, family conflict would not exist. However, the world is full of people who make mistakes or who make choices that you don’t like or agree with. This then puts you in a position of needing to make difficult choices about how to engage with your closest relations. Whether dealing with narcissistic parents, siblings who always bring the drama, or the full political spectrum of aunts/uncles/grandparents, family can become a source of anxiety for many. You are not the only person who feels panicky around the holidays, or when anticipating a family gathering. As an individual focusing on [...]