Taming the Butterflies: Feeling the Breeze

Leila Balcombe
Aug 23, 2024
2 min read

Have you ever felt like you have held yourself back from opportunities, whether that be volunteering to speak in class, present your ideas to the group or apply for that campus job because you felt too anxious to do so.

I know that feeling all too well.

Being an anxious toddler, child and teenager, I tried everything to murder those butterflies in my stomach. For me it felt like I couldn’t control when the feeling would come, and it would get triggered over the littlest things that would prevent me from literally living my life. In the back of my head, I always said “don’t do that it's unfamiliar, stop you are probably going to have a panic attack!”

I mean how silly does all that sound and to my friends and family I was always called “dramatic” and that it was “no big deal”, but it's easier said than done.

I remember seeing my psychologist about my anxiety and trying to explain how frustrated I was because I knew I was perfectly capable to do all these things, but I just couldn’t do it.

She told me that the hard part is training your body to not go into fight or flight, that it actually isn’t life threatening when you have to book a doctor’s appointment over the phone!

What really worked well for me was acknowledging your feelings, whatever is making you feel anxious is a big deal to you, you feel this way because you care. You don’t want to screw up or make a fool of yourself, perfectly understandable!

Sit with your anxiety and remind yourself, “Yes I am nervous, but that’s ok!”

It always helps to break everything down. When you look at situations like your uni assignments, it looks like mount Everest! But when you sit there and break it up into little pieces, suddenly you’re already halfway up the mountain.

Every anxious situation has a solution, you just need to clear the fog to find the right path that is going to work for you.

I like to think of anxiety kind of like the wind, it feels uncontrollable and unpredictable at times. However, when you are at peace with your anxiety it's like a subtle breeze, you know it's always there, it is a calm waft just passing around you to keep you safe, only triggered when your life is in danger.