How Do We Use Mindfulness In Anxiety Therapy? (Part 2) | EP 319

How do real anxiety therapists apply mindfulness principles when working with real anxiety clients in real therapy sessions? Let's check out part two of my chat with therapists Lauren Rosen and Joanna Hardis. We all make heavy use of the principles of mindfulness in our practices, and in our daily lives.

What you'll learn in this episode:

• Why "being present" isn't about feeling calm or peaceful
• The concept of being "aggressively present" when anxiety strikes
• How mindfulness is really attention training, not relaxation training
• Why meditation for anxiety is like going to the gym for your attention
• The difference between facts and the meaning we make of facts
• Practical ways to interrupt anxiety spirals in the moment
• Why you can't just decide to be mindful only during panic attacks

Key takeaways:

• Mindfulness in anxiety treatment isn't gentle - it's about slamming on the brakes when your mind races toward catastrophic conclusions
• The goal isn't to eliminate anxiety, but to develop a different relationship with it
• You have to practice attention skills during calm moments to access them during triggered moments
• Recovery means feeling real fear but knowing you're not in real danger

If you missed part one (episode 318), go back and listen to that first for the complete conversation.

This episode offers a practical, no-nonsense look at how mindfulness actually works in anxiety recovery - not the soft-focus version you might expect, but the real-world application that helps people move forward in their recovery journey.

Resources mentioned:

• Lauren Rosen: theobsessivemind.com
• Joanna Hardis: joannahardis.com
• More resources at theanxioustruth.com

Remember: there are no small moves in recovery, only valuable ones. Keep at it - you can do this.

Support The Anxious Truth: If you find the podcast helpful and want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee.   Other ways to support my work like buying a book or signing up for a low cost workshop can be found on my website.  None of this is never required, but always appreciated!

Interested in doing therapy with me? For more information on working with me directly to overcome your anxiety, follow this link.

Disclaimer: The Anxious Truth  is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to The Anxious Truth does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the host or guests of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.

Transcript

Applying Mindfulness to Anxiety Treatment

Speaker 1 0:00

How do we apply the principles of mindfulness and mindful acceptance when treating anxiety and anxiety disorders? Well, this week we're looking at part two of a conversation between three anxiety therapists. That answers that question, so let's get to it. Hello everybody, welcome back to the Anxious Truth. This is episode 319 of the podcast we are recording in early June of 2025. In case you're listening from the future.

Speaker 1 0:29

Today we're going to join part two of a conversation that I had with my friends, lauren Rosen and Joanna Hardis, two other anxiety specialists practicing in LA and Cleveland respectively, where we talked about how we apply the principles of mindfulness and mindful acceptance when treating anxiety and anxiety disorders with real clients. If you have not watched episode 318, which is the first part of this conversation, go back and do that now and then come here and pick up as we finish the conversation and look at directions that we might take going forward. So, before we get back into this chat that I had with Lauren and Joanna, just a quick reminder that the Anxious Truth is more than just this podcast episode or this YouTube video. There are way more resources on my website at theanxioustruthcom, including books and social media feeds and workshops and all the goodies, so head on over there to theanxioustruthcom, check them out, avail yourself of all the resources, especially the free stuff. There's no reason not to. I hope you find what you get there helpful.

Speaker 1 1:32

Let's get to it. We're going to finish talking with Joanna and Lauren about how the three of us apply principles of mindfulness and mindful acceptance when we are treating real anxiety and anxiety disorders in real therapy clients. I hope you find it interesting. So here we go. When last we left our band of three here, we had done a little bit of a role play where I was the anxious client and you guys were the seasoned therapist, which you certainly are, and what struck me about that was how different. I even said it in the last episode. I put a little edit in and say look how different the approaches were. Same principles, vastly different approaches. So it seemed like it, or was it just the way you presented it? I don't know.

Speaker 2 2:06

I think that there were maybe differences in terms of like application, right. So I think I started in on it, sort of talking about the concepts and like being, because we were talking more about the general day-to-day life that you were having. It's almost like an introductory part of therapy. And then, you know, joanna was really in the like, the application in the moment, which was so like I actually really appreciated that we hit both sides of that Like it sort of had a natural progression to it. But I, I will say a lot of you know the way that like Joanna approached, in that Joanna approached in the session when it was happening that hey, can you actually say this thing? Can you actually say I'm noticing that, I'm having the thought that, or I'm having the thought that blank, because sometimes just getting that that granular about the whole experience is so crucial.

Speaker 3 3:08

But I think some of it may be also stylistically. Yeah, totally.

Speaker 1 3:13

I think. So I got more like direct, although I'm sure that in actual sessions that would change over time. Naturally it was just a little snippet, but I got from Joanna more like instruction or a little bit more instructional or coaching, and from Lauren I got more imagery, which was both very helpful. You combine them together like pretty solid right.

Speaker 2 3:33

Right, I hope so.

Speaker 1 3:34

Are you?

Speaker 2 3:34

feeling better.

Speaker 3 3:37

Well, and Lauren, identifying you know which I remember being really impactful for you, how you. You know how you were feeling, that you were feeling scared.

Speaker 1 3:48

Yeah, that's a big part. Thank you for reminding me that, because I was thinking about that last week too. Like Lauren, you were really good at that. Like you must be really scared, right now?

Speaker 3 3:56

Yeah, I think that is what she said.

Different Approaches, Same Principles

Speaker 1 3:59

And I think that's such an important part, where we use principles of mindfulness, we're trying to like objectively describe the moment that we're in and instead of trying to like pretend we're not afraid, how about we just start with like I'm really afraid right now. Okay, well, now, what? Now? What do?

Speaker 3 4:13

we do? So, well, we're not doing anything with it, just like, just like that's okay to acknowledge it, let it be there, but we don't have to make, obviously, make meaning of it or, you know, process it to death. It can just be there, be in your body, be in the room, and then okay. Well, how do you want to respond to it? Like, what do you want to do?

Speaker 2 4:37

Yeah, and here's some other ideas to like kind of what you were doing, as to what you can do with it. I will say like to the discrepancy that we're talking about, though one thing that I found over time is like so much of it is modeling that what you were just describing in the room with people is like, oh, you're going to, you're going to tell me that you're anxious, and my response and part of this is just now how I've learned to respond to anxiety more or less, especially with other people is like, oh, yeah and right, like that. There's not like this big reaction to it and I was actually reading up on this is so nerdy. Experiential avoidance in parents and how that informs experiential avoidance and anxiety in kiddos and the whole idea for those listening and who are not as nerdy as I am, that like the idea that like people are avoiding internal experiences like anxiety and the the the study showed that experiential avoidance mediated the impact of being controlling. Like parents being controlling like that kids were more anxiety anxious with controlling parents, but only if there was. They were. They were being controlling out of a place of like I don't want to feel that way.

Speaker 2 5:53

Um, which is interesting and and does speak to this idea of like, if we show up in session and we can telegraph to the person that we're with like yeah, you can, oh, yeah, okay, yeah, you're anxious, cool Me too. Now what? That's a totally different approach than most people are used to having, whereas, like, even really well-intentioned anxious parents going like, oh my gosh, you're anxious, what do we do now? Like, oh, this is a problem, right, Anyway?

Speaker 1 6:22

Well, there's that flexibility that you know, if you look at the whole acting like the triflex thing get present, open up, do what matters. Well, open up is the part where, like well, all right. Well, you will usually only see one option, which is fight this or you know resist, or whatever.

Speaker 1 6:35

But if you open, is there another possibility? What else could that be? And you're right, as clinicians we might start with. It's funny. I said that to a friend of mine the other day. She's practicing in Florida and she's like I don't know, maybe I should say it as this anxiety disorder thing and just stick in my lane. I'm like really Half the battle is just learning how to shrug kindly when people are anxious in your room, like that's where you know. So you start there like okay, that's a good place to, to be aware, right, and watch the experience unfold moment by moment, like I'm anxious, I'm having this sensation, I'm having this thought, I'm having this emotion. Now what do we do?

Speaker 2 7:14

Right.

Speaker 1 7:14

Yeah, oh.

Speaker 2 7:16

And, and to Joanna's point, nothing right Like the. The idea is that we do nothing with that, but you have to be aware that that's happening in order to not respond to it Right and then to just pivot toward what matters to you. Um back to the present, right Like, and really um grounding in your sensory experience of the here and now to the best of your ability, cause that's where life is Right Like yeah, we're talking about it before we hit the record button, the that word being present sometimes I find that that's a challenge too, because the word presence comes with all kinds of imagery and connotations and they people like qualities to presence.

Speaker 1 7:58

Like presence means calm, presence means clear clarity. Right, I'm being present, yes, fully engaged. Like all right, maybe, but really I think, in our context that we're working on here, presence is like a hard slam on the brakes, like there ain't, there's nothing gentle about it. It's the moment, it's being able to observe and describe what's happening and then stop. That's all that's happening. And like the idea that this means I'm dying, or this means I'm having a stroke, or this means I'm this far from insanity. That is going out. That's going beyond what's actually happening right now. Right, presence is just slamming on the brakes. Yeah, stopping for a second before you jump to that last conclusion.

Speaker 3 8:38

Right, it takes people a lot of practice. It's um, I have it as one of my shameless plug for my book. One of my mental fitness skills is practicing the difference between identifying the facts of the situation and then the meaning you make of the facts. Yeah, and I think it's really helpful in session even for people to practice that, because it's hard to do. Yeah, I mean, even like we were talking before we started recording, after we recorded, and I found myself ruminating, you know, starting to go down that path, about you know how much I screwed up and all of that. The facts were. We recorded. You know, I said some things. The meaning I made was that, you know, I didn't know what I was talking about and I said something stupid and they're going to kick me out of this group and all of that that was you know none of it happened, except in my mind.

Speaker 3 9:35

Yeah, I'm joking, but I had. It was a process of me like literally nine times over the weekend, you know, bringing myself back and doing that separation. Now you know, I think we're all, we all practice this stuff all the time, so we know to do that. But I think that's how granular, using that word that Lauren brought up, we have to help people. You know people get to, yeah.

Speaker 2 10:06

Yeah, and I think, building off of that and combining what you were saying, drew, about how abrupt that process is, it's not soft, it's like the catching yourself.

The Power of Aggressive Presence

Speaker 2 10:19

You can be gentle about it, but I often say to my clients I need you to be aggressively present, not like you know, like we're not talking, like it's like the, the interrupt button, right, that's what we're looking to do. We're looking to interrupt the momentum of this thing that will otherwise carry you off and, like Joanna was describing, like okay, I'm, I'm ruminating, and I too was, like you know, second guessing myself and no, well, did I do it? Right? Or? But to be able to say, oh, look, I'm thinking, oh, okay, I'm, I'm not, but that's not what I'm doing right now. Like, right now I'm playing with my, my baby, right, like. So I'm just going to bring my attention back to the smile on her face and the sound of her giggles. And, yeah, the thoughts are still going to be there and the feelings are still going to be there, but I don't want to miss this moment so that I can try and figure out whether or not I screwed something up on a podcast, right?

Speaker 1 11:09

That's really good. Aggressively present is really great, like when I'm like Joanna's pretty directive and when we did the role play. When I'm working with clients, I will often you know, you're kind of learning this skill, so you're coaching them through it I will often say that's not what I asked. All the time, yeah. So ask yourself that question Like wait, is that? Is that a question that was actually asked here? I'm answering your question. That doesn't need to be asked. You know well what's going on right now. Well, it feels like that's not what I asked. I asked what's going on right now, not what it feels like.

Speaker 1 11:39

So, yeah, there's a. There's a little bit of aggressive presence in that. I like it.

Speaker 3 11:44

Totally, we should get shirts that say that we can get shirts that say like cross out, be present, because I hate those dumb shirts anyway.

Speaker 1 11:53

Yeah.

Speaker 3 11:54

And get aggressive, aggressively present.

Speaker 1 11:57

Aggressively present.

Speaker 2 11:58

I'm so in for this.

Speaker 1 12:00

Yeah, I think, I really think it's 530 in New York, give me till 630.

Speaker 3 12:05

We'll have those t-shirts. That is so true.

Speaker 1 12:07

I mean we're laughing, but I think it's a really useful. You know we're talking about how do you apply principles of mindfulness, because it's so confusing for people. Aggressive presence is not soft focus. There's no outcome to it. It's really concrete and that's what we're looking for.

Speaker 2 12:24

And I'm going to go ahead and throw out, like the cause it's always the dialectics, it's both sides. Once you stop yourself, it is to soften. Yes, right, like it is to just be, instead of like it's not, like I'm going to be perfectly present 100% of the time when we totally see people get stuck in that Like I have to be perfectly present and that's we've missed the boat. It's just that moment of interruption is much more aggressive than I think people think it's supposed to be, which is totally reflected in session.

Speaker 2 12:54

When I'm like I'm going to ask you to stop Right, and and not in a rude way, but like if somebody is ruminating out loud and going over and over the content and telling me about, like how, the meaning and how it, what, what if this and what if that, that I me about, like how the meaning and how it, what, what if this and what if that, I'm gonna be like look, let's pause. Right, like right now. Look at what you're doing. You're doing it right. Like. You're doing it out loud with me. Pause. Do you really want to keep doing that? Can you instead accept the feeling that's generating all of this?

Speaker 1 13:21

yeah. So the pause or the aggressive stop or hitting the brakes is to not not so that you can do more things better. It's so you could do less things better.

Speaker 2 13:32

Yeah, yeah, well said.

Speaker 1 13:35

Do less Cool, love it, but first you have to be able to pay attention. You've got to be able to pay attention, or else you don't even know that's happening. Like you never see the choice point. If it just stays on autopilot, you never see your choice point.

Speaker 3 13:47

Yeah, totally. Right Cause you have to notice when you're starting to get hijacked.

Speaker 1 13:51

Yeah. So then let's apply that. Like Joanna and I, you we've done some of those things. We did a couple of distress tolerance things a couple of years ago and we always talked about like bottom up, like that's a hard sell too. I find from my clients, like I know, you want me to teach you how to be present, mindful and perfect when you're panicking or when you're having a torrent of thoughts about hurting your dog. That you don't want to do. But we got to start from the bottom up. You can't just decide to only be present when you're triggered. It won't, it doesn't work.

Speaker 2 14:22

Yeah, no, no, and I think we can also view it. Maybe this is part of the cell is like again don't you want that for your life anyway, because this is the only moment that you're ever really alive in. So if you're, if you're not going to be present, you're going to. You're going to miss the moments, whether you're anxious or not. So I, like, I think that that can be a way to support people and really prioritizing this practice more generally, so that they're building the skill outside of a level 10 panic, which, of course, practicing any skill when your new skill is hard and then you add it, you're dysregulated and forget it.

Speaker 3 15:03

I mean, I'm a big, I totally am with you, lauren. I'm a huge believer in discomfort's discomfort, whether it's. I mean, obviously, if you're you know you're it's your worst anxiety, that's going to be higher. So and I know, Drew, we tried to sell this, you know. So start with something like start with something that's easier, like leave your cell phone in a different room for a period of time, and so you start because you're going to feel uncomfortable, because to your brain that's so unfamiliar. And so if you intentionally do that, the whole practice is how are you going to you can? How are you going to respond differently to the discomfort practices? How are you going to respond differently to the discomfort what?

Speaker 1 15:51

No, you finish, I'm sorry yeah.

Speaker 3 15:52

So can you soften, can you relax into that discomfort, because then you're showing your brain safety, which we know we have to do, and it's a pretty low stakes. I know people are going to be like, but what if my kid calls and it's an emergency Like no, like, come on. If my kid calls and it's an emergent like no, like, come on. The possibility of that is so low but it's something that they can. You can practice and build on and discomfort's discomfort.

Speaker 1 16:18

Yeah, that forces you to. It forces you to use that, that watching or that awareness skill too, because I go. I left my phone for that. That's a good example. I have my phone in the other room and like, ah, this is foreign to me, I don't really like this, and blah, blah, blah. But like, hang on a second. You would have to watch the feeling of discomfort arise in you then.

Speaker 3 16:37

Yeah, you practice and you see, especially if you're committed to more than five seconds, how your brain will get used to it and your body will get used to it and that, yeah, you can witness. Yeah, the discomfort, like the discomfort's going to go up and then, if you just stick with it long enough, the discomfort's going to go down.

Speaker 2 16:59

And then maybe it arises again, right, but it's like it's naturally fluctuating over time. It's one of the beautiful things I will say about meditation practice in particular is that it really gives you a window into that happening, to watching the whole drama of life playing out in your mind.

Speaker 2 17:18

Because, there's not a lot vying for your attention when you're, you know, often eyes closed and focused on something relatively boring like the sounds in your environment, right Like it's, it really becomes clear that that process that you're talking about yeah, people tend to have a difficult time with like, but okay, fine, mindfulness is good for anxiety, but it doesn't work for me because they're not understood.

Starting from the Bottom Up

Speaker 1 17:41

They don't understand the difference, or like they're not. Maybe it's just a hard sell and it needs more explanation. Like, no, no, no, the connection between sitting on your sofa or a cushion or something for five minutes on a Tuesday morning and panicking in a plane because you think you're going to open the door and try to jump out because you're so anxious? There really is a connection, I promise, and that's that sitting on your sofa or sitting on the cushion teaches you to watch, to pay attention to the machine that's operating. Yeah, and it's really hard because it requires patience and practice and like, I wish I could tell you how to just feel better on the plane, but I can't, I don't, I don't, I don't have a way to do that.

Speaker 2 18:18

But how often do you find yourself saying to people like speaking of, like just wanting to feel better on the plane or wherever, like how often you say people like to people when they say like well, it's not working, like what? What does working mean?

Speaker 1 18:31

yeah, that's always. I think we all ask that question. What does it mean to work? What does that mean? What do you hear, joanna? What do people say?

Speaker 3 18:37

um, well, that is the work. I mean, the meditation is the work, I mean, the mindfulness is the work. Right?

Speaker 2 18:46

right, that whole attitude of non-striving, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 3 18:49

And I often describe it. It's like it's, you know, it's the difference between the formal and the informal is like going to the gym, cause you know, a lot of people that I treat go to the, you know, but they go to the gym for their physical fitness and like going to the gym, we go. Why do people go to the gym, you know, especially if they're older people, they go to the gym so they can bounce back from surgery, they can bounce back from health, from injury, faster, and I'm like, well, it's kind of the same thing.

Speaker 1 19:17

Yeah.

Speaker 3 19:19

I've been playing, sorry. Go ahead Like we. You know you have to do the formal practice to get the technical skills down of how to do it, so that when you're in life and it's, you know, which is like a series of exposures, you know how to bounce. You know, you know how to respond and bounce back better.

Speaker 1 19:39

Because I practiced this. I practiced this on my sofa.

Speaker 3 19:43

Yeah, yeah, but it's a brutal sell.

Speaker 1 19:46

It really is.

Speaker 2 19:47

Yeah, yeah, nobody, it's a brutal sell. It really is. Yeah, yeah, nobody's like, oh, yay, you mean, I just get to like tolerate this. This is fun. I'm just going to sit here and like watch thoughts. That sounds delightful.

Speaker 2 19:58

I have been playing around with this idea like sort of furthering this metaphor around the gym, because I totally agree with you, but maybe something to flesh out because it's not totally thought through yet. I find it really fascinating. People don't go to the gym and expect to get to a point where that they will breathe less hard. Right, the goal of like working out isn't to necessarily never have shallow like uh, breathing. It's to do that so that your overall system is more capable. Right, like you're trying to exercise so that your cardiovascular system is is like better, and I I think that there's a relationship between that and what.

Speaker 2 20:42

Like this idea of the cell, right, um, because it's it's like we're not trying to get you to watch your thoughts so that you have less thoughts or you have less anxiety or or any of those things. It like we actually need those things. Like that's a part of it. Just like going to the gym involves breathing heavier, even though ultimately, the goal is that you have better cardiovascular health, which might lead you to actually breathe more slowly or have a lower heart rate. Whatever Does that make sense?

Speaker 1 21:13

It does make sense. I often try to tell people the gym thing that I throw in is like mindfulness, practice and meditate. It doesn't seem like it makes any sense, but it's like going to the gym. But people will often say like, oh, so what I'm building is my calmness, like, so I'm building calm muscles or regulation muscles. No, it's the gym for attention. Yeah, totally, you're taking your attention to the gym and exercising your attention. That's what you're exercising. Yeah, then we get back to the hard sell. Okay, hang on, I have to learn to pay attention. So I can do what? So you can pay attention when you're really triggered. So I can do what? So you can choose to be really uncomfortable on purpose.

Speaker 2 21:48

Why would I do?

Speaker 1 21:49

that Call another therapist. I'm out, yeah.

Speaker 3 21:51

Well, and if you went to the gym and all you did was focus on how much you hated it, especially if you're doing something really hard at the gym.

Speaker 2 22:02

You're not going to last very very long.

Speaker 1 22:04

Yeah Right, this isn't working. I put more weight on the bar and I couldn't lift it. It's not. This is a gym, doesn't work.

The Mental Fitness Gym Analogy

Speaker 3 22:09

Yeah, I mean. So you really do have to be. You know you really have to work on zooming out, you have to work on softening in some ways, you have to work like all of these things. You have to like it does work. But I think people still have lots of people don't really want to be alone, like I hate this word like alone with their thoughts, whatever that means. Yeah, I mean, I think that that is um, I hear that so much.

Speaker 2 22:36

Yeah, yep, it's a scary place to be for a lot of people, I think.

Speaker 3 22:40

It is, but I think also.

Speaker 2 22:42

It's like people don't want to be alone with their emotions. Is really what we're?

Speaker 3 22:45

talking about Exactly. Yeah, You're so right. I think that that is yes. I mean, I hear that so much.

Speaker 1 22:55

It's probably really good, lauren, because if I'm alone with thoughts about pizza, I'm good with that. I love pizza. Thoughts about something difficult make difficult emotions and those I don't want I can't but I want to be quiet with those. So I hear that.

Speaker 2 23:08

And how do I deal with this if it comes up? Yeah, it's so hard.

Speaker 1 23:12

You know what I find interesting about the gym. Let's stay in the gym for a second. What I'm really interested in is if you go to the gym, especially if you are strength trained and Joanna can attest to this if you have a big ass loaded barbell over your face, you are paying attention in that moment. So, like what are you not paying attention to? How you feel, what you're worried about, what you're afraid of a psychotic break? These are the things you're not paying attention to because you have no choice but to not fall off the treadmill, not get sucked into the stair climber and not drop a barbell on your face. Yeah, so all important things, I suspect that exercise, the gym, athletics, playing pickleball, whatever. Like you are paying attention to something for some extended period of time and not paying attention to all the things that your fear wants you to pay attention to. I don't know. Yeah, that's sure, but also I'm paying attention to something else.

Speaker 2 24:04

Yeah, and I was going to cause I thought you were going to go a total different direction with that, like cardio exposure, right?

Speaker 1 24:11

Sure.

Speaker 2 24:12

It's going up, you're, you're, you are literally being anxious, like having a lot of the physical symptoms of anxiety and learning that it's perfectly safe to have them. That's another. So really, what we're saying is go to the gym.

Speaker 1 24:28

I guess. But I might suggest too that like people like well then I should exercise, yeah, you should. Maybe you should exercise in something that requires a little bit more attention. Just running on a treadmill you can do mindlessly. So you run on the treadmill and you time travel into your worries while you're on the treadmill, so you don't get that benefit. You get the physical benefit but you don't get the mental benefit.

Speaker 3 24:48

Yeah.

Speaker 1 24:48

Yeah, so yeah Cause.

Speaker 3 24:49

I think a lot of people exercise in a. You know, they're distracted, they lift weights in a way that they're not really pushing themselves. I mean, I think there's like I think you're right that we can do it in a very intentional way, where you have to cope. If you're doing something, especially like working on mastery, with exercise, like with weight training, all those voices are in my head about oh my gosh. Well, what if I can't get the bar up? What if, what if? What if, what if? But I have to part. A lot of my work is not putting the like, coexisting with them. I can't make it the loudest voice.

Speaker 1 25:33

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 25:34

Yeah, cause, otherwise you drop the dumbbell on your face.

Speaker 1 25:37

That's probably another reason why'll bring this into it too Might as well. While we're at it, we talk about, oh, mindfulness and meditation for anxiety. Well, we're trying to clarify that and make it practical. And then people often hear about yoga too. You should do yoga. Why do we do yoga? Yoga is just paying attention to where your body is. That's all it is. It's not anything else.

Speaker 2 26:01

No, and it's also one of the things that I cause I've I've had a yoga practice historically is like you have to watch discomfort it's physical discomfort, like it's very clearly like okay, and my quad is burning, like this is happening right now and I there, I'm just sitting here with that, which I think actually has a really great parallel to navigating anxiety and I will say I think it's uniquely positioned mindfulness and meditation practice to navigate mental behaviors.

Speaker 2 26:30

I think that's one of the great. I'm just finishing the book on the mental compulsions workbook for OCD and like the whole the whole of it is on how do we navigate mental behaviors, and like the reality is we don't, we don't know the difference oftentimes between thoughts and thinking, and then we get caught up in thinking which, as we were kind of talking about last time, is like it fans the flame of emotion, right, and so we kind of continually build this forest fire and it's so intense, versus learning how to go, that sort of aggressive stop of like, oh, thinking right, like done next, what was I just doing? And whether that's getting back to the barbell or dumbbell, what's the right terminology, you guys?

Speaker 3 27:18

It depends what you're doing. It depends what you're doing. I need so much instruction, or?

Speaker 2 27:19

dumbbell. What's the what's the right terminology? You guys? I'm not. It depends what you're doing. I need so much instruction.

Speaker 1 27:23

We'll teach you. You can teach us yoga. That's fine, that's cool, yeah, okay, so anyway, that that is another 30 minutes on, like the practical application of of how we we can talk about this for weeks. This is not an easy topic, necessarily, but, like I think, if I was going to wrap it up and put a bow on it and I'm curious how, what your bows will look like, guys, but come on, put a bow on it, I'm going to use it Like what is your bow going to look like? But my bow would be like. You got to really super simplify this. Do not, do not overthink mindfulness. It's because I think a lot of people do it Like it's just paying attention, just practice, paying attention.

Speaker 2 28:04

That's it. That's if I could tell you to do anything, it would be that, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 28:06

What about you guys? What would you throw in?

Finding Simplicity in Practice

Speaker 2 28:10

I think, like I love the simplicity aspect and I think you're right Really honing it down. The only thing that I found to be like sort of an additional piece of that that's been really important in my practice personally and I've seen it be professionally is with with kindness, right, like attend to things in a manner that is not like a drill sergeant it's not, you're not beating the hell out of yourself, right? That's where that like part of the non-judgment piece is, so that's so important. So like paying attention gently, like with the quality of gentleness How's this for a bow? This is the longest bow that's ever happened, by the way but paying attention with kindness, so that and I'm going to borrow from Stephen Hayes here you can get out of your mind and into your life Right, like that is we're trying. I guess, ironically, mindfulness is really about getting you out of your mind Right, like it's getting you grounded. Joanna said it beautifully last week it's like a neck down versus a neck up, like let's get you engaged, so that, yeah, anyway.

Speaker 1 29:23

Or at least recognizing when you're in your mind. And is this workable?

Speaker 2 29:28

Do I want to be here? It's not.

Speaker 1 29:31

Okay, well then I can move somewhere else. I'll pay to do something else, yeah, so, joanna, you got a bow.

Speaker 3 29:40

Or are we like like stressing you out by making oh my god, I'm so stressed. I'm coexisting with it, though. Um, okay, my bow. I think what I would add is just that we have to train this attention. That it's that we really have to. This is a skill we have to practice we have to practice the kindness and we have to practice the skill of paying attention. It's not intuitive, it's not like we're born with it, so it's something that we have to be paying attention like, training, moment by moment.

Speaker 1 30:13

Yeah, so all right, very good, like I did last time, I will come back and give you links and where you can finduren and joanna. You should absolutely be following along with both of these guys, because they trust them implicitly and they know what they're talking about. And actually, in the practical mindfulness class that I've been running, we're going to do it together. So very soon, it won't just be me like teaching that the three of us will be working on that together, and I cannot think of two people I want to do this more with than you guys.

Speaker 2 30:37

Triple the fun.

Speaker 1 30:38

Triple the fun.

Speaker 2 30:40

So good, I'm stoked.

Speaker 1 30:41

Anyway.

Speaker 2 30:42

All right.

Speaker 3 30:43

Come back as much fun as you can have.

Speaker 1 30:46

Without pickleball.

Speaker 2 30:48

Without judgment.

Speaker 1 30:51

As much non-judgmental fun you can have outside of a pickleball court.

Speaker 3 30:55

Hey, I missed it today for you guys, happily.

Speaker 1 30:58

That's a terrible, and look for the like I missed it today for you guys, happily.

Speaker 2 31:01

That's a terrible and look for the like what was it? Aggressive present. Aggressive. Aggressively present for the aggressively present t-shirt.

Speaker 1 31:07

Maybe we will, I don't know. Maybe I'll make one. Anyway, I'll come back in a second and wrap this up. I'll give you guys links. Thank you both. Appreciate you guys.

Speaker 3 31:13

Thank you All right.

Speaker 1 31:20

Awkwardly hit the end button. Okay Well, I had a good time having that chat with my friends Joanna and Lauren. These are two people that I trust implicitly. They are very well-respected clinicians in the anxiety disorder community. They know what they're talking about and they have a strong mindfulness component in their practices and also in their own lives. So I trust these guys implicitly when it comes to this sort of topic and I hope you guys got something out of this conversation Again.

Speaker 1 31:42

If you missed part one, go back and watch episode 318 of the podcast from two weeks ago. So that's it. If you would like to get in touch with Lauren or Joanna or you want to follow them, I will put their links on the screen, but Lauren is at theobsessivemindcom and Joanna Hardest is at joannahardestcom. If you'd like a little bit more detail or show notes on this episode, including the links to Lauren and Joanna's websites, you can go to theanxioustruthcom, slash 319, and I'll have all the goodies there so you can follow along with them if you would like to. If you're not, you really should, because they know what you're talking about. That's it. I will end this episode of the podcast, like I always do, with asking a favor If you're watching on YouTube and you dig it, then maybe like the video or leave a comment, ask a question. I'll see if I can drag Lauren and Joanna in to maybe answer a few, of course, subscribe to the channel, hit the notification bell so you know when I create new content and upload it. If you're listening to this on Spotify or Apple Podcasts as just audio, then if you dig the podcast, leave a five-star review and if you really like it, maybe write a review, a little paragraph or two that says why you like the podcast, helps more people find it, helps more people get the help that they need, and that's why I do this to begin with. So we will be back in two weeks with another topic on episode 320. I don't know what we're going to talk about, but we will be here and remember.

Speaker 1 33:03

If you could take something out of this podcast episode and the last one, it would be that if you can apply the principles of mindfulness to observe objectively, without judgment, what's going on, even when you're highly triggered and really anxious and afraid, if you could start to do that just a little bit, then you are moving in the right direction because you're starting to understand what it's like to accept your current reality and to work with it instead of against it, and try to control things all the times that are beyond our control. So if you could make this tiny little change and practice that every day you are winning, it all adds up. There's no small moves in recovery. There are only valuable moves. So thanks for listening, keep at it. I know you can do this and I will see you again in two weeks. Take care.