We’ve noted a recent trend in our client population. Dr. Renée and I have dubbed it “re-entry anxiety”. Whether you’ve received the COVID-19 vaccination or not, you’re likely traveling again (especially if the kids haven’t seen their grandparents in over a year); probably even socializing, maybe even indoors. And every time you go somewhere, or meet with someone, the 64-million dollar question lurking in the background of your mind jumps front and center: “Is this a good idea?”
The Challenges
Phobia Bootcamp
As practitioners of mind-body-spirit and energy medicine, we can site any number of research outcomes connecting what we think to how we feel. So let us remind you that all of us have spent more than a year now inundated with announcements, images, and personal experiences directing us to step back and isolate for our own and others’ safety. And many of us followed those mandates and altered our behaviors. Essentially, we’ve not only practiced how to be safe (e.g., wear a mask, wash hands, eat outdoors if you eat out, and for goodness sakes, don’t touch anything!), but also learned, along the way, to be afraid, even of the air we breathe. So the toll that the global pandemic has had on your mind (not to mention your body) won’t just go away tomorrow, nor will you be entirely comfortable resuming pre-pandemic activities—even if you really want to. Your re-entry anxiety is very real.
Pandemic Neuroplasticity
All of us have been training our minds—and by extension—our bodies to adopt the behaviors and reactions descriptive of a phobia. Intense feelings of unease, of foreboding, a need to isolate, repetitive washing of hands, and gastrointestinal distress, are just a few of the ways phobias may manifest emotionally and physically. When we become conscious of the need to avoid something and then actually follow through consistently, our neuroplastic brains quickly acquire a new habit. The brain-restructuring happens totally under the radar of course, but it happens. We train our brains to execute the new habit every time we practice the pandemic-avoidance behavior. And the more we practice the habit, because the herd immunity is still a ways off, the more anxious we get about maintaining that habit and the easier it is for the habit to become a phobia.
We’ve become attuned to the phobia. If we can’t follow through, we feel threatened.
PTSD and Re-entry
There’s another name for that kind of hyper-vigilant reactivity, namely, post-traumatic stress syndrome. We’ve all heard of PTSD as a disorder suffered by military personnel, but it doesn’t affect only soldiers. Research supports that PTSD also impacts soldiers’ families and others affected by trauma. While losing a loved one to COVID-19 most certainly qualifies, so do the time-related repetitive avoidance behaviors engaged in by millions of citizens during the pandemic.
So your experience of “re-entry anxiety” is as real as your struggle to find a new balance for your life. Here are our tips for easing your journey.
The Opportunities
Take Your Time
This pandemic is a global event and by no means is it over. Here in the US, we will continue to need to be vigilant, especially as we deal with the impact of Covid-19 variants on public health and personal behaviors. So to lessen the intensity of re-entry anxiety, we suggest that you take it slow and stretch yourself little-by-little, accumulating positive experiences over time. Your neuroplastic brain will go along, loosening the tension as you become less anxious and more confident.
Try Guided Imagery
One way to work directly with a limiting belief system (e.g., it’s dangerous outside) is to use guided imagery. It’s a technique we offer in our practice that helps you foster a mind-body communication focused on helping you heal the physical and emotional stress-reactivity caused by the phobia you’ve learned.
We help you engage your imagination in ways that focus your mind, relax your body, and open your consciousness to deep levels of change. In a way, it’s an applied meditation. We speak to you, you listen, relax, and that mind-body communication creates a physiological response from the cells in your body. Our energetic support via distant healing also accompanies you on your inner journey. Your self-healing begins and progresses with repetition of the guided imagery.
Click here to find a guided imagery perfect for this purpose. It’s called Dialogue with a Symptom.
Try EFT
Another way to work directly with a phobia is to use Emotional Freedom Techniques, EFT. These techniques use the energy streaming through the body via the meridians to discover and heal experiences (e.g. think traumas expressing as phobias) causing emotional and physical problems. Stuck energy is released by tapping in simple-to-learn-and-remember sequences. We offer this energy technique because it’s easy to teach, easy to learn, and easy to use, anywhere.
Regaining conscious control over chronic emotional reactions leads to a renewed sense of psychological balance and a reduction of anxiety, both of which are essential ingredients for leading you out of pandemic hypersensitivity and into improved physical health and healing.
This energy-based technique is grounded upon gold-standard research that’s been repeated by researchers worldwide, published in peer-reviewed medical and psychology journals, and has received acceptance by the AMA (American Medical Association), American Nurses Credentialing Commission, the APA (American Psychological Association), and the NASWB (National Association of Social Workers).
You can learn the basics of EFT yourself. Millions have and do use it daily to down-regulate stress reactivity. Here is a resource about EFT you may find helpful.
Stay Digitally Connected
In other words, keep video conferencing with family and friends. The need to use conferencing software for work will likely continue for some time still, but it’s the weekly family & friends video-gatherings that’s we’re emphasizing here. This is not the time to give up that resource for connection and emotional support.
Intuitively, Dr. Renée and I sense that staying connected with others is critical for all of us, especially now. Loneliness destabilizes our physical, emotional, and mental balance. Humans are a relational species. We need to connect, to bond, and to interact. In fact, research on loneliness has long recognized that it contributes to a suppressed immune system, depression and spiritual emptiness. If you would like to engage with us about concerns you may be having, we are here for you. With distant Healing Touch, HeartMath® coherence techniques and intuitive guidance, we can support your energy being as you navigate your way to improved functioning.
So stay connected and don’t give up the virtual check-ins just yet.
Adopt a Positive Outlook
Our last suggestion is to stay positive. There’s plenty of research showing the benefits of optimism and a positive frame of mind: better overall health, lowered stress, stronger relationships.
Though it’s not always easy to maintain a positive outlook considering the pandemic and its impact on our way of life, research also shows that optimists are more resilient. We suggest using positive affirmations as a way to either get started being less negative or to strengthen optimistic outlooks. And a committed focus on finding daily experiences / happenings that you’re grateful for will energize the heart’s powerful energy, which can be a real change agent. Being grateful to have made it this far through the last 18 months. Appreciate the little things and re-entry anxiety will ease.
