The word Anxiety is such a buzz word these days. Everyone is saying it. I find myself even saying it when I speak of a situation that made me feel uncomfortable or that was hard. I say "I had anxiety" all the time. In reality I don't have anxiety. I maybe felt nervous about something and it felt like anxiety. For some reason it is the Go to word for when we are not sure of a situation we are in. I do think everyone feels anxiety at times. The definition of Anxiety is "a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome." I think everyone can think of a time when they felt anxious about something. The thing I want you to be aware of is how we are saying it. Are you saying you have anxiety or are you saying you feel anxiety. These are two totally different things. The clinical definition of Anxiety is "a nervous disorder characterized by a state of excessive uneasiness and apprehension, typically with compulsive behavior or panic attacks." Whatever definition of Anxiety you relate to I would like to encourage you to stop saying you have anxiety. Even if you have been diagnosed with "having Anxiety." It just gives so much power to the word. It makes it sound like Anxiety has you and it may feel that way right now. But if we can stop saying that we have anxiety and start saying that we feel anxiety it just lets us take some of our power back. We don't want anything to have that kind of control over us. Even if you feel like you have no control over your feelings of anxiety, if we can just start to say "I feel anxiety", it just softens those feelings a little. We are not so hard on ourselves. We start to realize that we have some control. Because guess what? We do have control over our feelings and anxiety is a feeling. What if the worse thing that can happen is we feel anxiety. It is such a process to retrain our brain. That is why if we can take some baby steps now and start to tell yourself that you feel something, that it does not have you then we are onto the first step of that realization. The realization that you can get control back even when you feel anxiety. If you have a teenager in your life or a young adult who would benefit from learning more about how to take control of their feelings of anxiety click the button at the bottom of the page for a free mini session.