Last month, anxiety didn’t just win—it staged a full-scale takeover.

It was the perfect storm: I’d been jetlagged for 45 of the last 90 days, running on little sleep, and juggling a major medical emergency alongside a work season that felt like a fight to the death. Exhaustion, stress, and worry literally had me on my knees. I dreaded going to bed, fearing insomnia and also what bad news awaited me when I awoke. I wasn’t sure how I was going to get through it.

Thankfully, the tide started to turn. I’ve spent the last 30 days taking a forced crash course on how to handle anxiety. With a mix of trial & error, supportive friends & family, prayers, and not to mention a perfectly-timed seminar on anxiety at my church (props to Junior Ziegler), I’ve started to turn the corner.

I’m still very much a work in progress. But, here’s what’s actually been working. I’ve learned to get out of this anxious season with 4 actions: block out, zoom out, work out, and seek out.

STEP 1: BLOCK OUT JUDGMENT ABOUT BEING ANXIOUS

Let’s start with a controversial and awesome way to view anxiety.

Anxiety is energy. Nothing more. Nothing less. It’s an energy smoothie blended with the ingredients of fear, excitement, and anticipation. Feeling anxious in and of itself is not sinful or bad. There’s no judgment for feeling anxious. No need to be anxious about your anxiety :). It’s part of our human experience. We’ve all been there.

Maybe even Jesus? He wasn’t worried, but he felt anguish. He was greatly disturbed. He anticipated the pain of the cross; he even asked the Father to remove this cup. Not my will, but yours be done. How many times did he think about the cross before he went there? 

So, if anxiety is just energy, then what you do with that energy is everything.

STEP 2: ZOOM OUT, DON’T SPIN OUT

Anxious energy spins me around, faster and faster. My vision gets narrow: all I can see is the one exact thing that I’m anxious about and all the worst possible scenarios. It’s like I’ve zoomed in on one pixel of a picture on my phone with my eyes one inch away. And now my phone is frozen, and so are my eyes.

I now know I have two choices – I can either spin out, continuing to spiral down lower and lower, obsessed with every little bit of that pixel. Or I can reset the phone and zoom out. Gotta zoom out. Here’s 10 ways I’ve been learning to zoom out, physically relationally, and spiritually:

Zoom out physically

1. Breathe — yes, this is the most simple thing and the go-to action during panic attacks. With just 2 minutes of slower inhales and exhales, I physically hear my heart rate slowing down. Then, observe the surroundings with your 5 senses — what do you smell, hear, see, taste, feel around you right now? It reminds me: I live in a physical body in a big, physical, amazing world, not just that one abstract, tiny thought in my head.
   
   
2. Walk — go for a walk (even better, in nature). Be surrounded by God’s creation. Look at the trees. The key is to move your body. Get your blood flowing. You can’t think your way out of anxiety, but more often than not, you can move your way out of it.
   
   
3. Take care of your body
   • Work out — like walking, working out gets you moving. A hard workout forces you to consider your breath, your body, and a lot of other stuff beyond your one pixel. Your body also produces all kinds of “feel good” hormones afterwards, which also helps with sleep. When I was in the darkest part of the anxiety pit, I had to work out every single day — it kept me sane. It made me so much less cranky. It chilled out my body. It helped me make better decisions about my sleep and diet. As it’s all connected, it created a virtuous cycle (instead of a vicious one).
     
     
   • Sleep well — As a frequent insomniac, I know this is much harder than it sounds. But the fundamentals are still the same: go to bed around the same time every night, in a room that’s completely dark and cold, on a bed that’s only for sleep (& sex). Before you go to sleep, do a relaxing night time routine to shift down. Avoid alcohol, food, and caffeine too close to bed. Most importantly, before you do your nightly routine, live out the day fully and abundantly, spending your energy on good things. Live full to sleep well.
     
     
   • Eat well — Confession, I definitely eat my feelings — if I don’t want to feel stuff, I’m talented at stuffing those feelings by stuffing myself with donuts. Bonus points for stuffed donuts with creme :). I eat poorly, I don’t feel good, I don’t feel good, I eat poorly, I don’t sleep well, I don’t feel motivated to work out, it can be a deathly cycle. Sometimes breaking out of that cycle starts simply with making one good eating decision, and then stacking a few together in a day.
     
     
   • Do these things today, and you can start to snatch the day from anxiety’s jaws. You start getting some positive momentum. Then do them tomorrow. Start building a lifestyle and you will become more resilient. It will take more to rattle you.
     

Zoom out relationally

1. Reach out to others. Talk to someone. Be with people. In fact, all the suggestions above on zooming out physically? Triple the points if you can do any of it with others! There are 58 “one another” commands in the bible: we are meant to live our life with others.
   
   
2. Serve others — helping someone in need that helps zoom out your perspective. This snaps me out of being too self-absorbed.
   
   
3. Thank others — Reflect on the people who matter to you in your life. Send them a text just appreciating them and their influence on you in your life. Encourage them about something you’ve noticed about them recently (just thinking about them and observing them will help you zoom out!). Yup, this is a two-for-one: you are both helping to manage your anxiety AND building a deeper connection with someone. Gratitude fights back anxiety well.
   

Zoom out spiritually / mentally

1. Pray, straight outta Philippians 4, and God promises His peace will guard your mind:
   “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” – Philippians 4:6-7
   
   
2. Re-focus your mind, also straight outta Philippians 4.
   “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.” – Philippians 4:8
   
   In the depths of my pit, I shared my struggle with about 20 friends, and had a specific request: to pray for me and to send me one scripture that encouraged them once a week. I can’t tell you how helpful it was to be going through my day receiving those texts. It made me thankful for my friends for remembering me AND it made me focus on something dripping with truth.
   
   Two other good ways to refocus your mind are to meditate and journal. In our world of checking our phones during a 20-second stoplight, this is a lost art. Make some space for yourself. The science proves meditation effectively reduces anxiety physiologically.
   
   
3. Worship God — The ultimate zoom-out, singing worship songs to our Creator reminds me that this life isn’t about me at all. I’m not the center of the universe. I’m not the hero in this story. There’s so much more to life than me. And the awesome God I worship is in control of all the things that are out of my control. Create a worship playlist for reminding you of the things that you easily forget about God.
   
   
4. Live in the moment and leave tomorrow’s worries for tomorrow. Some of my deepest regrets in life were because I let tomorrow’s worries (I can’t control!) and yesterday’s pain (I can’t change!) make me non-present (and sometimes destructive) for my family today. All we have is today. Yes, we can plan for tomorrow to our best ability. Yes, we can reflect on the learnings from yesterday. But all we have is right. now.
   
   “Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.” – Matthew 6:34

Zoomed out yet? Now, onto real work on leveraging our anxiety for good.

STEP 3: USE ANXIETY TO WORK OUT A SOLUTION

Anxiety is energy, and all energy needs to go somewhere. So why not use it for good? While zooming in too much and getting stuck there is terrible, that same energy can be harnessed productively. In fact, anxiety can be a gift to help you hyperfocus.

Regarding the problem at hand, think — really think — about what’s in your control and what’s not.

Set a timer for this exercise – 20 to 40 minutes – pray and dive in. Make a list of what’s in your control and what isn’t.

Things in your control: create an action plan, make a list of people you can talk to, find out the information you reasonably can, and walk around the problem to see it from all angles. Use your energy to work out potential solutions. Through His strength and grace, He often gives us fresh insight, unexpected creativity, and heavenly wisdom. Pray continuously. Sometimes one action birthed in prayer can save a day, a week, a year, a decade of frivolous actions.

Things outside of your control: this is now your prayer list. Usually at the top of this list are how other people will focus, act, react, think, and say (FARTS). Stop obsessing over exactly how you might say something to get the other person to fart differently. Yes, be wise and thoughtful, yes, connect authentically, but at the end of the day, let other people’s farts be in God’s hands, not yours. 🙂

“The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord; he turns it wherever he will” – Proverbs 21:1

You may end up moving some items from “things in your control” to “things not in your control,” and vice versa. Pray over all of it. Your good God is still right there with you.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
Courage to change the things I can,
And wisdom to know the difference.

STEP 4: USE ANXIETY TO SEEK OUT GOD 

It turns out anxiety, similar to the emotions that God designed us with, is a fantastic “check engine light” gauge to see where you are really at with God. In my life, anxious energy emanates from all-too-familiar areas of my life. I now ask myself these 3 questions (props to Junior Ziegler for these):

1. Am I avoiding responsibility? A hard conversation that is overdue? An assignment that I know I need to complete?
2. Am I not surrendering something? Holding onto something that is out of my control?
3. Am I hiding sin? Something I haven’t confessed to God and others?

Use anxious energy to answer these questions truthfully, which will draw you closer to God and compel you to take the next right steps — in your soul, in your relationships, or in the world.

I’m still a work in progress, and [update] I’ve already come back to read this again because anxiety has already tried sneak back in. Anxiety is a fierce energy, and harnessed and surrendered, it becomes a vehicle leading us closer to God and to each other. Give yourself some grace if you experience anxiety — it’s in all of us. Don’t let the spin-out steal your joy. Zoom out. Harness that energy to hyperfocus on solutions. Check your soul and trust that our God’s got us.

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Questions for reflection

1. Ask yourself:
   • Am I avoiding responsibility? A hard conversation that is overdue? An assignment that you know you need to do?
   • Am I not surrendering something? Holding onto something that is out of your control.
   • Am I hiding sin? Something I haven’t confessed to God and others?
2. What’s one daily habit you can do to lower your anxiety:
   • Physically?
   • Relationally?
   • Spiritually / Emotionally?