Even as a somatic therapist, I am not immune to stress and anxiety. I was plagued with it growing up. Panic attacks, dread, rumination, yea...the whole lot. After I left the origins of my stress, I implicitly continued to create a life that reenacted it. "What you don't complete will repeat" is a very real experience for many trauma survivors. More stress, more responsibility, no boundaries, co-dependency...yippee for me. I am beyond grateful for Somatic Experiencing for waking me up and calming me down (lol).

10 Somatic Therapy Strategies To Help You Manage Chronic Stress and Anxiety
Here are my top 10 Somatic Therapy Strategies that I've learned to switch my system from anxiety and stress ball, to cool as a cucumber.
First, though, chronic stress and anxiety are signals. They are white flags, waving furiously for you to notice them. These states are meant to happen, to get our attention. Imagine the anxiety screaming: SOMETHING NEEDS TO CHANGE. They are not states you should just contain, repress, and wrestle into submission. They are states that are hardwired to get our attention: SOMETHING NEEDS TO CHANGE.
Unfortunately, these states can get stuck on and run amuck if we aren't sure how to soothe them or get them to "turn off". Like an alarm bell at a fire station, anxiety, and chronic stress symptoms are meant to be short-lived. They should jump us into action to make the necessary change and then we have to learn to settle. For people who suffer from anxiety and chronic stress, this stressed and anxious state is daily, hourly, if not every minute.
Learning to settle and calm is an inherent pathway that our human bodies can develop. For those with insecure, avoidant, disorganized attachment (or whatever you want to call a non-secure attachment), these attachment styles have developed strategies for soothing. These strategies negatively impact their ability to settle into intimacy and vulnerability. Those with post-traumatic stress, complex post-traumatic stress, anxiety, panic, or depression, can find it incredibly hard to settle.
Look at chronic stress and anxiety as alarm bells. The chronic stress and anxiety might be stuck from unresolved trauma. Also, the anxiety might be signaling there is something emotionally threatening in your current life. Whether it harkens back to your past or you are in the thick of some serious shit right now, don't fret. I've got some tools you can apply TODAY.
1. BREATHE
I know, cliche, but did you know that you can completely switch your nervous system state just through breath??! My goodness, for the amount of cray cray that our brains can conjure, breath is one of the most productive tools. Breathing and breathing in a mindful way has a way of anchoring yourself to this moment. See my previous post about different breath techniques you can play around with. Do it for 10 minutes. Thank me later.
2. SOOTHING SELF TALK
Do you know what makes panic attacks 100% worse? Thinking you are going to die, that's what. When you are stressed and anxious and you start beating yourself up, shaming yourself, or projecting how horrible this is going to be, you are literally adding gasoline to the fire. "Where attention goes, energy flows." While your nervous system is mobilizing for a real or imagined threat, it is only natural to have thoughts that back that up. One way you can down-regulate yourself is by actually talking to yourself with kindness, with a slow pace, and with assurance.
"I got this"
"Whatever happens, I will be okay"
"I am not going to die, I can calm and will calm"
One of my favorite meditation and mindfulness teachers, Thich Nhat Hanh had a way of helping people learn the way of compassion while experiencing anxiety. You can try, "Darling, I know you suffer and I am here for you".
ps. Get curious about why you go negative when you actually need soothing. ...hint hint, you probably didn't get a ton of healthy emotional attunement growing up. If you didn't get healthy soothing from your attachment figures, how in the world would you know how to do that? You have to learn how.
3. SEEING THE STRESS/ANXIETY AS A PART OF YOU
This is another awesome tool that increases earned secure attachment... in addition to calming you the fuck down.
Feel the anxiety or stress in your body or in your thoughts. Next, imagine this as a figure or character that is with you, but is not you. Like: "I am feeling anxiety, I am not anxiety.” The anxiety can be like a nervous nelly or frantic over-caffeinated wedding planner. See them as separate from you and in need of empathy.
Now, instead of trying to make this anxious or stressed part of you "just go away already", you have to see it as someone who needs care, attention, and contact. The more you try to ignore the stress and anxiety, the more it will up the ante by getting loader, stronger, and more needy. Better to just face it head-on.
I recently had my dear niece and nephew here for a visit. Being 6 and 4 years old means they repeat what they are saying until someone responds. Like anxiety, like a little dependent on us kiddos, this is our nature. To feel or say and have someone listen, hear, and understand. That is it. When I thoroughly turned towards little Wren or Krew as they were trying to tell us something, I saw firsthand the big deep breath. Relief. "I am worthy of attention". Most people who suffer from chronic stress and anxiety need to learn to do this for themselves.
Psychedelics have helped this internal process for me exponentially. Entheogenic medicine, psychedelics, Ketamine Assisted Therapy, and plant medicine work helped me vitalize this secure attachment. Many years of healing have taken place for my anxious parts through the sacred use of these medicines.
4. Eliminate inflammation-inducing foods, substances, and beverages.
Did you know that foods, substances, and beverages you crave are attempting to restore the depletion states you have? "Mood follows food" is a hard pill to swallow, but it is one that can change your chronic stress and anxiety. These foods and substances could be feeding inflammation. Inflammation lies underneath a lot of mental health conditions. A key consideration is to weigh the cost of the food, substance, and beverages on your heart, mind, body, and soul. Then, make a plan for reducing, supplementing, substituting, or not. The choice is yours.
One of the root causes of depression is inflammation. And we can do so much healing by just feeding and watering ourselves better. Educate yourself about what you consume, explore what you may be depleted in, and how you can start to truly support yourself. A great book to explore is The Craving Cure by Julia Ross and Rhythms of Recovery by Leslie Korn.
5. Mindful Movement
I love myself a good workout. The more intense the better. But for those that have chronic conditions or who are not able-bodied, the workout culture is a total soul sucker. I invite you to define the movement for you. For someone recovering from an eating disorder might define their walk as taking their body out for some fresh air. For someone with a chronic condition, they might define movement as bringing oxygen to their cells. Whatever you want to call it. Movement, when done as a tool for stress and anxiety, can help your nervous system organize and mobilize. This organization of mobilization can bring coherence to your nervous system. Coherence, or flow, can shift a stuck state.
Exercise science has evolved a lot in the last decade. We are still learning how moving our bodies more regularly feeds the mind, body, and spirit. How movement is hugely beneficial for affect regulation. When we move our bodies, in a mindful way, we are signaling to the nervous system we are not stuck (or frozen on the couch) nor are we running from a tiger. We are moving because we can. This, let alone the bazillion other benefits on a cellular and mitochondrial level, can help that stress move through the body.

6. ELIMINATE STRESS, DON'T JUST MANAGE IT
Long-term stress deteriorates our health. We are not meant to exist with chronic stress. So many people have stressful lives and then spend a lot of time and money trying to manage the stress. I am all for journaling, meditation, therapy, massage, sleep, etc. But this is managing. Eliminating stress is GETTING RID of the stress.
Leaving the job. Ending the relationship. Setting boundaries with your work-life balance, and following through on those boundaries. Ending the one-sided friendship. Asking for help with your kids. Leaving unhealthy situations like situationships. Leave dynamics with people with substance abuse. Set boundaries and follow them with adults in your life who are not taking responsibility for their health and mental health. Save yourself.
Having that hard conversation for a better salary, better sex, better connection, better boundaries. You can shift it. One asterisk here is to tolerate people being mad or disappointed in you. Let them experience their feelings. That is change happening.
7. Safety and Security Routine
Those of us with developmental (early childhood trauma), or homes with chaos and neglect, often exist with an underlying sense of insecurity or stability. This insecurity is felt and imprinted into the nervous system. Often the development and genetic encoding of OCD, perfectionism, and environmental control efforts are exacerbated by chaotic or low-attachment-based homes.
The re-do of this type of imprint happens slowly and over time. The re-doing requires consistency and trial and error. This scaffolds a new foundation. Some routines to consider, are a waking routine, a going to sleep routine, and an eating/watering routine schedule. Some might think it is normal to have these routines in place. But for people with childhood trauma, this is a large part of their work in the initial stages of safety and stability cultivation.
8. Pleasure Seeking
Looking for pleasure, receiving pleasure and goodness, and giving pleasure and goodness. Pleasure, found in beauty, art, a good book, sexual expression, creativity, nature, good food and drink, laughter, and quality connection, is a total game changer. When we are stressed and anxious these things are so far from our minds. I work on interrupting the trance of anxiety by dosing myself with pleasure. I drag myself from my usual spiral and expose my system to goodness. This moves the meter in a powerful way.
9. Avoid Avoidance
Ironically, avoidance is one of the most anxiety-provoking tactics. Avoidance is a very common symptom of trauma, post-traumatic stress, depression, and anxiety. Who wants to be triggered to feel incredibly uncomfortable feelings? Ha, not me. It makes sense that avoidance works, in the short term. In the long term, however, avoiding the person or task actually gives the thing more power. Avoidance reinforces anxiety. One more time: Avoidance reinforces anxiety. It is pure trickery. Do yourself a favor and make a plan towards doing the thing or else that thing will build up more and more anxiety. Avoidance of people or tasks that cause anxiety is a natural impulse. A way forward will be to work towards exposing yourself, with tools and resources of course, and seeing that you actually can handle it.
10. Nature
Many of you know I try to spend at least half of my time in the outdoors. I often go on solo trips into the wilderness, hiking, backpacking, camping, and sitting in the trees. These experiences reset my system and reconnected me. Swimming in the ocean, lakes, and rivers cleanse and reorganize me. As an intuitive and empathic human who spends a lot of time with feelings, transformation, and trauma, I have come to honor nature as the church for me. The spirit of aliveness, cycles of life and death, and the frequencies found in nature all help to reset my system and build capacity. The land is sacred to me and practicing earth care is part of a way I can transmute my life-force anxiety into something that matters.
Embracing Your Healing Journey: Next Steps and Supportive Practices
Well, there you have it. This list has gone through many changes over the years while at Compass Healing Project. My process of understanding and healing my anxiety took place with a lot of time and attention. For me, investing time and attention in this part of me was the re-do. Time and attention. That was the root wound that caused my anxiety. With lots of trial and error, you can also find the re-do as well. No big deal if these don't work for you, they are jumping off points. Eventually, I'll share my regime for food, substances, and supplements that best support nervous system calming!

Heal From Your Chronic Stress and Anxiety With Somatic Therapy in San Diego, CA
Are you struggling with chronic stress and anxiety? Somatic therapy in San Diego, CA can help you reconnect with your body and release the tension that's been holding you back. Take the first step toward healing—work with a skilled somatic therapist at Compass Healing Project to discover how somatic therapy can transform your well-being! Follow these three simple steps to get started:
Reach Out and Fill out our New Client Inquiry Form to get started.
Schedule a discovery call with one of our skilled somatic therapists to discuss your needs and goals.
Begin healing from your chronic stress and anxiety!
Other Counseling Services at Compass Healing Project
At Compass Healing Project, we provide a holistic approach to therapy, incorporating a variety of modalities to address a wide range of issues. Alongside helping you address and heal from your chronic stress and anxiety with somatic therapy, we also offer EMDR, Clinical Sexology, hypnotherapy, ketamine-assisted therapy, and embodiment practices. These therapies are effective in treating anxiety, depression, PTSD, grief and loss, sexuality concerns, and relationship challenges. For more information and to get to know us better, visit our blog. Our Colorado and California clinics are staffed with caring therapists who specialize in trauma resolution, emotional healing, and integrative therapy here to help you thrive.
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