Anxiety makes us a bad decision maker. The better way is:

These numbers may be shocking, but some mental health experts say they aren’t surprised.

While the symptoms of anxiety can be very uncomfortable, Marquez said emotions are actually an essential tool that our bodies use to get out of dangerous situations. “Anxiety, as a biological reaction, is a state of struggle or flight,” she explained.

Run away from the lion? Anxiety-related hypersensitivity helps.

But while that heightened awareness and vigilance makes biological sense, Mr. Marquez said emotions also undermine our ability to make rational choices.

“A lot of anxiety actually causes problems in decision making, which is what I see in my clinic,” she said. “Patients have a hard time understanding “whether this is a good decision or not”. And that’s because their brains aren’t fully moving to be able to make decisions. “

What it is about: As the Covid-19 pandemic unfolds, many are facing daily decisions with high stakes for family life and life.

Want better news? Marquez and other experts say there is a lot you can do to manage anxiety at home—a technique that you can use to feel good and make wise choices. Let’s start here.

Why is it difficult to make a decision?

When he was feeling anxious, he activated a series of structures called the limbic system of the brain, Marquez said. It is the area responsible for emotional reaction, memory, and motivation.

Instead, our best reasoning and decision-making comes from the prefrontal cortex, what Marquez called our “thinking brain.” She explained that the limbic and prefrontal areas fight for caution.

When the brain is in combat or flight mode, the overheated limbic system can cycle through an endless series of dreadful possibilities. Scientists call it “amygdala hijacking”-it seems that your prefrontal cortex has lost control of the vehicle altogether. The amygdala is part of the limbic system.

“When you are on [amygdala] Hijack, you’re “turning around,” Marquez said. Take care of my child? ——Of course, that makes you more worried. “

That emotion can paralyze your ability to make choices. And if your limbic system is under control, you may not like something that calms down anyway. “They are emotionally moved, so they are decisions that may not be your best decision,” Marquez said.

How to hack anxiety reactions in the brain

“The best response is to cool the brain before making a decision,” said Marquez. Doing so will give you an opportunity to control your rational prefrontal cortex.

These strategies help get out of the cycle of anxiety and return the prefrontal cortex to the driver’s seat.

Marquez recommended adopting these anxiolytic strategies as needed, but said that maintaining one’s health and building a sound foundation is just as important. This means more resources are available when anxiety arises.

Determine what you can and cannot control

Once in the mind, Marquez proposed to remind you that you don’t have to manage or get everything.

“We are in the midst of this great uncertainty and many things are out of our control,” she said. Marquez recommended facing the uncertainty head-on rather than planning for every possibility. “It’s important to keep this discomfort for a while.”

Psychologist and senior director of the American Psychological Association, Lin Bukhka, agreed. For example, you may not have control over whether an employer stays on the water. Instead, she suggests focusing on things in your power, letting the rest go.

“Several things you can say: “This is not a decision I have to make,” she said. For example, your child’s messy bedroom? Bufka said he would let it go.

Once you have narrowed it down, pull out a piece of paper and note the strengths and weaknesses. If everything is black and white, it’s easier to understand the problem.

Also, if you are obsessed with researching or reading news, consider setting a time limit.

Make an incomplete decision in an incomplete situation

You may not make the perfect decision, but Bufka calmly reminded me that it’s okay to move on anyway. “We make the best decision we can make with the information we have,” she said.

For the London-based writer Valentini, she adopted the type of self-care recommended by experts such as Marquez and Buchka. She attended a virtual yoga class. Usually hateful, she started jogging, which seems to raise her mood.

She is still very anxious. As the pandemic continued, her friends and family wanted to know when the wedding would be. Valentini said that thinking about it gave her heart palpitations.

But in the end, Valentini and her fiancé used the information they had to make the best decision they could and deposited the 2021 wedding deposit in Southern California.

And what do you know? Despite the fact that the world remains confusing and stressful, she said it helped. “It was like a practice of forcing you to do something when there was no certainty around you,” she said.

“You are like this:’It really made me feel much better.'”