A huge amount of people suffer from anxiety every single day. This can range from a small amount of anxiety, to a crippling amount which causes them to think of nothing else. 

Anxiety is not just worrying, it’s a mental health condition which can, in its worse cases, leave a person house-bound, terrified, confused, and extremely unhappy as a result. If we want to knock down the barriers that are still unfairly wrapped around mental health conditions, especially in the workplace, it’s time to talk more openly about these problems and knock down the stigma that still exists today. 

What Does Anxiety Feel Like?

In order to assess how anxiety can affect your time at your office desks, we first need to think about how anxiety actually feels. 

Anxiety can be a niggling doubt which won’t go away, causing distraction and an inability to focus, it can be a rise and fall of worries, which peak and then trough, or it can be a full-on panic attack which causes physical symptoms and a sense of extreme dread.

Anxiety is a personalised and very individual thing and it varies from person to person. What one person will describe anxiety as may be completely different to another person. At the end of the day, however, anxiety can ruin your life in so many ways, including your working life and the time you spend around the modern boardroom tables. 

Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD) is becoming more and more prevalent in today’s society and the reasons why are unclear. It could, however, be linked to the rise in stress and the demands we place on ourselves and the demands placed on us by others around us. There has been a huge increase in workplace stress over the last few years and this can easily turn into physical symptoms and other mental health conditions, such as anxiety and depression. GAD is characterised by feelings of panic, constant and unreasonable worries, and in some cases, paranoia. 

When you think about anxiety in that way, you can clearly see how it could easily affect someone’s working situation. 

How to Manage Anxiety in The Workplace 

If you’re struggling with anxiety, it can affect your focus and your concentration levels, to the point where you can’t work without being distracted very easily. Your own thoughts and worries will easily take your mind away from the task at hand and as a result, you’re far more likely to make mistakes. Indeed, the very thought of this can be enough to worsen anxiety even more; it’s a vicious cycle that can have drastic effects. 

For a few hints and tips on how to manage stress and anxiety in the workplace and beyond, check out this infographic. 

Source - http://painmanagementtrends.com/tips-to-reduce-anxiety-and-stress-infographic/

Living with anxiety can be a long-term thing, but you will learn how to manage your own situation and your own triggers. The important thing to remember is that if you are struggling, you speak to your manager and seek help and advice. You may be able to move and work from booths, where you can focus and concentrate a little more easily, or perhaps think about flexible reworking options for a short while until you have your anxiety under control. Whatever works for you. 

Anxiety isn’t simply worrying a lot or panicking for nothing, and it’s not something you can turn off whenever you feel like it. Anxiety is a long-term problem which may be there all the time, it may come and go, or it may simply sit there in the background. In some cases, anxiety can flare up to severe levels and then disappear down to nothing. Again, it’s an individual deal, but understanding your own condition will give you the confidence to try and tackle it head-on, and avoid it controlling your life in the process.