Dealing with fear and anxiety for creatives

We've been on lockdown in the UK now for 3 weeks and an announcement is expected to extend that further. Many of us are living with fear and anxiety for our health, our loved ones and our livelihood. So what can we do about it? Before my career in jewellery I was a lecturer in psychology (you can find out more in my bio below) so I thought I would take a look at some of the research on the practical things we can do to work through our fears.

Imagination is my superpower

If you are a creative person then it is likely that you have a good imagination. Imagination is one of the things that sets us apart from other creatures. As a creative it is a blessing - you can imagine an earring design without having to make it. You can even draw it and work out how to make it - that's pretty amazing when you think about it. The flipside of this, however, is that you may also be able to imagine a scary future. This side of your imagination can lead to anxiety and fear.

Depression and anxiety

If you are feeling depressed you are living in the past. It is likely that you find your mind going back to old problems and hurts from the past.

If you are feeling anxious you are living in the future. You are thinking about possible future scenarios and are likely focussing on all the things that could go wrong.

Both of these can be pathological meaning that we need to get professional help to deal with them and if you think that might relate to your experience then I urge you to do that if you need. However, for many of us while the anxiety may be severe, there are strategies we can use to help alleviate these effects.

Some strategies:

Acknowledge and feel the feelings

We don't want to feel negative emotions so we try to push them aside, squash them down, mask them in some way. This tactic doesn't work in the long run. Have you noticed that the feelings just come back stronger? What we need to do is acknowledge our feelings. The situation we're in right now is tough. It's not what we planned. It's natural to feel disappointment; anger; loss; fear for ourselves and our loved ones getting ill. We need to acknowledge and feel those feelings and they will start to dissipate.

Martha Beck says that right now we are like the caterpillar in a chrysalis. Before they turn into a butterfly the caterpillar spins itself a cocoon and literally starts to dissolve into a goop before the metamorphosis happens and it turns into a butterfly. Perhaps right now we are in that very messy goop stage! We don't know exactly what life will be like once this crisis is over but hopefully we'll have beautiful wings.

Is it true?

I love The Work from Byron Katie. She suggests always questioning your thoughts and asking yourself 'is it true?'

Often when our thoughts spiral we create stories in our minds about why things happened, what might happen in the future etc. Once again our amazing imagination is coming to fill in the gaps!

So don't believe everything you think. Sometimes we need to interrupt this spiral of thoughts by asking, is it true?

Get back to now

When we feel anxious or depressed we are no longer fully present in the now. Getting back to now is where mindfulness and meditation practice can be very helpful. There are lots of ways to get back to the now, here is one technique I find useful.

Use the 5,4,3,2,1 technique which uses your senses to ground you where you are.

Sit or stand comfortably where you are.

5 - See - Look around you and notice five things you can see

4 - Touch - Find four things you can touch and notice how they feel. Are they soft, rough, hot, cold?

3 - Hear - Listen. What three things can you hear right now?

2 - Smell - What two things can you smell?

1 - Taste - What can you taste?

Hope

One strategy that can work well is to focus on the positives we can look forward to. If there are things about 'normal life' you've been missing then write each one on a slip of paper and get yourself a vase or jar to keep them in. It's likely a lot of them are very basic things you took for granted before. Or perhaps there are things you now realise you have never done that you want to do. Plan to do them when you get the chance!

Some of mine are:

Being in my studio and chatting to my studio neighbours

Meeting my friends at a coffee shop to talk about our businesses (and drink white peach tea!)

Going to a musical

Teaching a jewellery class

Travelling with my husband to see beautiful architecture and landscapes

Visting my family

Going to a restaurant

Gratitude

Research has shown that one of the best antidotes to any negative emotion is gratitude. If you really struggle with anxiety then I suggest starting a gratitude journal and keeping it every day for at least a month. You need to write down three things at the end of the day that you are grateful for.

Alternatively, at the end of every day, think of three things that you are grateful for. It is a good idea to pair this with something you do every day like brushing your teeth so that you remember to do it.

Gratitude works because when we focus our attention on the positives of the day we can't be stuck on the negatives. If you can make it a daily practice, pretty soon your brain will start looking our for things to be grateful for. This means that you are training your brain to look for the positive and that will help turn the tide of negative automatic thinking.

It is natural to feel negative emotions, especially in the uncertain situation we are in. I hope that you can give some of these techniques a go to see if they will help you.

If you found this helpful do also check out the guest blog post I wrote for Jewellers Academy -

Five ways to happiness and wellbeing for creatives >

About me. It's easier to write this in the third person but it seems a bit weird so I'll write it in the first person! I went to university to study psychology. I then did my teaching degree and started teaching psychology in colleges and at a university. I also did a postgrad in psychology (I'm a big fan of learning new things obvs!). I have taught courses in all areas of psychology including health, positive (the psychology of happiness and wellbeing) and creativity. I started attending jewellery classes while I was teaching and became hooked on metal clay. I left my full-time job at a university in 2014 to work in jewellery - yay!