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May 13, 2004:
Handling
Nervous Situations
Interview
with Lavinia Plonka author of What
Are You Afraid Of?
Mike
Carruthers:
It happens to all of us, you're in one of those situations that
make you nervous, speaking in public, meeting with your boss,
whatever it is and you feel that feeling…
Lavinia
Plonka:
Butterflies in the stomach is one, a feeling of weakness in
the knees, shortness of breath, sweating.
Lavinia
Plonka, author of the book What
Are You Afraid Of?, has a couple of very effective techniques
that will help in those situations. One of them involves using
one of your hands.
Just
bringing your fingers very, very gently together on one hand,
and then very gently pulsing them apart, very slowly and gently
bringing your fingers together and apart. You just can't do
that and be anxious at the same time; it just automatically
begins to calm
you down.
The other
technique, is to notice when you're in those situations, how
it is you're breathing.
You know
you breathe in your diaphragm, in your abdomen, in your ribs,
in your shoulders, in your back, I mean a full breath involves
use of the full torso. And if you actually intentionally continue
breathing, but say, stop your ribs for a few breaths, or stop
your back for a few breaths, what that does, is it redirects
your attention toward your system of breathing, and in that
process it starts to slow the rhythm of your breathing down,
without you going, "I've got to slow my breathing down,
I've got to slow my breathing down." And when your breathing
starts to slow down, then the system perceives you that you're
in a safe place.
At somethingyoushouldknow.net,
I'm Mike Carruthers and that's Something You Should Know.
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