It may be external – unreasonable demands placed on them, conflict in relationships, worries over one’s commitments or a particular work deadline. It may be internal – unresolved issues from the past which keep resurfacing, demanding to be addressed. Whatever, the influence, it is important to separate what I call ‘reasonable anxiety’ from ‘unacceptable levels of anxiety’. Reasonable anxiety is the response to life’s circumstances or events that for the majority of people would cause distress – the breakup of a relationship or sudden change in work or personal circumstances that result in a lot of pressure etc. Unacceptable anxiety is where a person’s response seems to be out of proportion to the threat. This is when internal unresolved issues might be to blame or you are getting a very strong reminder from within that you are avoiding changing something in your life.

Let me give you an example of the latter. One of my clients had a dream to be a writer. Her family told her to find herself a good job first and then pursue the dream in her spare time. She spent the most part of ten years doing a ‘sensible job’, denying her desires. Her avoidance of pursuing her dream (if only part time whilst supporting herself) led to a dwindling sense of self-worth and lowered confidence in her abilities. Her anxiety got greater although she didn’t know the reason why she was anxious – after all, she had given up on that dream a long time ago and her life seemed to be going well. However, there was another part of her that somehow reminded her that she was not being true to herself.

After spending far too much time staring out the window at work wondering if there was more, a reminder from a friend of her dream led her to make some changes. Almost miraculously, her anxiety abated. She made plans to take an extended working holiday abroad whilst thinking about what she really wanted to do. These changes were not made without ‘reasonable anxiety’ as she anticipated her new life. However, the unacceptable levels of anxiety that were crippling her life disappeared almost overnight as she listened to herself and took responsibility for making some changes to her life.

This example highlights that if you are feeling anxious, know that anxiety is not something you catch or acquire. Anxiety is a powerful response from within reminding you that all is not well in your life and that something needs to change. You may need help to do this, but by seeing anxiety as a wake-up call, it might help you see its real value and not only the pain it brings.

Sometimes a person might know why they are feeling anxious – a looming deadline, missed commitments, difficult conversations to be had, a double life being lived or fear or losing a job or relationship. At other times, the reasons are unclear and the feeling of anxiety ‘for no real reason’ may lead a person to think they are heading for a serious mental breakdown.
Anxiety is a powerful indicator that all is not well. At a conscious level, a person may feel they are dealing with certain issues well and yet at an unconscious level, our body and emotions cry out that something needs to change. Consciously, a person may hoodwink themselves into believing that all is well and yet if they are feeling anxious, the reasons behind this must be found – they will not just go away as the sufferer hopes.

Often, not living the life you want to live or the relationships you desire, or not having the creative outlet for your talent despite achieving much in an existing job, can give rise to anxiety. Giving yourself a good ‘talking to’ will not stop anxiety rising if deep inside, you are not living the life you want. By exploring what is behind the language of your anxiety, you can take back your power to decide what needs to change and make anxiety a thing of the past.

As a psychologist with over 20 years experience, I have seen hundreds of clients for depression and anxiety. I have seen a picture emerge of what is going on. Every one of those clients I have counselled have lost connection with themselves; they can’t hear from within what is important to them, they have compromised on their values and choices, feel out of control and powerless to develop the lives they want and many believe that their depression is a condition that somehow they are out of control of.

My experience and professional interventions have shown me that depression is something the person develops in response to experiences, self-limiting beliefs and life’s circumstances. When people can re-connect with what is important to them, see the choices in whatever their situation when they don’t believe any are there and learn to ‘communicate’ with themselves, they TAKE THEIR POWER TO BE HEARD.

Counselling can be a powerful way to find the language of your depression and move out of it. I am interested in helping deal with the source of their depression and there are many ways that a psychologist can assist someone to improve their lives. Counselling is one way but there are other methods that can help too – strategies and techniques to use right away and programmes that help people not only communicate with themselves, but also with others.

Communication is the currency of all your results – you can learn to ‘hear’ what you need to do. When you combine it with skills to communicate with others and make your voice heard, you will be surprised at how depression may become a thing of the past.

If someone avoids having difficult conversations time and time again, they often feel anxious all the time and don’t make any connection with how it developed. They assume they have ‘developed anxiety’ which can be removed with techniques or strategies, rather than realising that anxiety is a powerful internal reaction to something you are doing that needs to be changed.

For example both in and out of work, conflict is often avoided at all costs. A difficult conversation exists when the opinions differ, emotions arise and the consequences of the dialogue are pricey. In personal relationships there are numerous examples: negotiating more time on your own, ending a relationship, advising parents that you are not attending family events, telling a partner they do not listen to you, negotiating with an ex-partner time with the children.

Whilst counselling might be enormously valuable in learning how to manage the internal discomfort or increasing your confidence to address certain issues, a person often lacks the skills to have those conversations. Some sort of skills training must accompany the personal change they feel if they are to get better outcomes.

In the work situation a manager or small business owner faces difficult conversations on a daily basis. Typical examples include, telling a supplier their work is not up to standard, increasing your fees, saying no to a customer who takes 50% more of your time than other customers, telling a co-worker that they are not pulling their weight, telling a receptionist that her voice is too shrill and upsets the people waiting in the reception. These and many more are examples that cause anxiety in the many people who anticipate conflict. As with personal conflict, avoiding these conversations or conducting them badly, can result in feeling incredibly anxious and stressed.

Counselling can be enormously valuable but my experience as a psychologist is that the best way for people to have permanent changes in their behaviour is to provide people with the skills, techniques and attitude changes alongside the internal changes that must take place. Only then can they learn to navigate their relationships more effectively – in and out of work.

I regularly run short courses on effective communication – in the boardroom and the bedroom…. and everywhere in between. Visit http://communicate31.com for more details.

Over a period of time, they contribute or even cause conditions of depression, anxiety or obsessive disorders because the internal landscape is negative and self-critical. Thus, the quality of communication a person has with themselves directly influences the creation or maintenance of psychological wellbeing.

The quality of your communication with other people also has the potential to uplift, inspire and make you feel important and valued by others. Conflict, judgment, friction or feeling misunderstood by others can leave you feeling lonely and misrepresented. Someone who has a healthy relationship with themselves and supportive internal dialogue, may feel lonely in an exchange with another person but doesn’t go down a path of self-judgment and despair that the world is a terrible place. Instead, they may feel hurt or disappointed, but they don’t feel powerless to change their situation, speak up or question their part in the results they get with other people.

Effective communication is essential for psychological wellbeing. We must become good communicators with ourselves and with other people. We must learn to have an open and supportive conversation with ourselves on a regular basis. We must also learn to become expert communicators with others and see our part in getting the results we have in our lives through these interactions.

So what has communication got to do with anxiety? Having worked with hundreds of people, I have learnt that communication is a key component to understanding and alleviating anxiety. This might seem like a strange statement but anxiety is a powerful response and message from within that ‘all is not well’ Understanding the language of that anxiety is the key. Often, the sufferer believes that if only they could remove the ‘anxiety’ then all would be well. If they can learn to communicate with themselves, listen and interpret the message that a part of them is trying to get them to listen to, and then act accordingly, then the anxiety would have done its job. Anxiety is an alert button that something else has to be dealt with – it may worry, fear of consequences, anticipation of something bad; whatever it is, anxiety is the symptom and not the cause. Getting to its meaning starts with learning to communicate with yourself and listen carefully to the messages from within.

Anxiety also comes from difficulties in communicating with other people. Many people dread having difficult conversations with other people where they anticipate negative responses, blame or criticism. They then avoid these conversations and anxiety arises again – anxiety that the problem has not gone away and anxiety and self-blame that they have short-changed themselves by not standing up for themselves.

People can learn to identify, label and understand their thoughts, feelings and meanings. This, combined with skills to effectively listen and communicate with others, empowers the individual to be the author of their own life and not someone who is pushed around by external events and circumstances.

Shania Twain

Apparently she is suffering from Dysphonia, a condition whereby a person loses their voice following, amongst others things, emotional trauma. It would appear that she has experienced her fair share of trauma, more recently the betrayal of both her husband and best friend (who are now partners) has undoubtedly contributed a lot of stress to her life. She herself states feeling she should keep everything to herself and present a strong face to the world, has taken its toll.

Having worked with hundreds of individuals over twenty years, I have come across others whose inability to speak the unspeakable or express deep trauma, results in losing their voices. This would seem to be particularly the case if a person needs or uses their voice in their professional life. Other examples of the ‘body speaking the mind’ so to speak include a football player who repeatedly broke his right foot (whilst not on the football pitch), a golfer who damaged his fingers on the hand that guided the club (again outside of playing golf) and an opera singer who lost his voice with no apparent physical damage to his larynx (voice box).

Effective communication is more than verbally expressing something. Effective communication skills begin with our ability to have a conversation with ourselves, to listen to that inner voice of what we need and to listen carefully to what we must do to live a life that is congruent and authentic.

What is a Crucial Conversation?

Kerry Patterson et al (2002) used the term Crucial Conversation in the book Crucial Conversations: Tools For Talking When The Stakes Are High. They define a Crucial Conversation as one in which:

• Opinions vary
• Stakes are high
• Emotions run strong

Imagine the potential for crucial conversations in the workplace? Opinions differ all the time together with emotions as people have different beliefs about how things should be done, how resources should be apportioned and the likely outcomes of action. When the stakes are of these differences are high – and this can be in terms of human resources, finances, strategic, diplomatic costs and more, we have a Crucial Conversation.

Whilst I would encourage people to read this book, I would like to share with you some key bits of wisdom I have learnt over the years from my clients that might shed light on how to acquire the art of having crucial conversations.

• Crucial conversations with others must be preceded with the ability to have crucial conversations with yourself.
• When you can handle your own emotions about something, you will handle other people’s emotional reactions to what you have to say.
• When a person is able to reflect on the effect they or their message has on the other person and empathise with the other person’s perspective ‘in the moment’, they can maintain a co-operative dialogue and salvage a conversation that might otherwise be conflictual.
• Trust between people is essential to navigate to a good outcome of a crucial conversation.
• It is easier to convey challenging information when one’s request or comment is balanced with more positive support for the other person’s point of view.

The first three points relate to the changes that must come from within a person – the ‘inner work’ I referred to earlier. This is essential if the person suffering from anxiety is to find long-term solutions to working with diverse perspectives whilst obtaining cooperation from others. I tell my clients that anxiety is a feeling rising from within that is shouting very loudly to be heard. It is my job to work with them to find the language of that anxiety. Invariably, in the social context, it arises when a person fears being criticised, made to feel foolish, undermined or experiencing a feeling of inadequacy. These internal fears are often so great that they prevent a person from attempting crucial conversations. Instead they avoid them at all costs, giving rise eventually to more conflict and cost.

The last two points relate to some of the conditions under which an effective crucial conversation can be had. Whilst it is outside the words of this blog to provide an in-depth training in the art of crucial conversations, suffice to say that trust, empathy and respect for other people’s perspective is essential. Without these crucial ingredients, one has to resort to force or organisational rank to make their point rather than gaining cooperation and ideally collaboration from others.

References: Patterson, P. Grenny, J. McMillan, R. & Switzler, A. (2002) (2002) Crucial Conversation in the book Crucial Conversations: Tools For Talking When The Stakes Are High. NY: McGraw Hill

“Build the mental picture of what you really want, not what someone else wants you to have or what you think it is your duty to have – but what you really want. Many people lead miserable lives of failure because they try to please others. Your life is a divine gift for you to live, not for someone else to live for you. Only what you sincerely want can make you happy. Build mental pictures upon that and nothing less”.

You owe it to yourself to seek the guidance to help you navigate the changes to live the life you truly want to live. If you are feeling anxious or even experience panic attacks, the answer to your dilemma might be nearer to home than you think.