Episode 259: Anxiety is Your Friend with Natalie Kohlhass
Written By Kelli Walker
Join Kelli and guest Natalie Kohlhass, Licensed Professional Counselor, as they chat about how although anxiety can feel like the enemy, it is actually your friend (Kelli and anxiety are still in the frenemy stage, she's working on it).
Transcript
00:00.00
kelliwalkercoaching
Hey guys welcome to not another anxiety show I'm your host Kelly Walker and joining me today as guest Natalie Colehos hey Natalie yeah I'm really glad you could be here now.
00:07.90
Natalie Kohlhaas
Hi Kelly it's so nice to talk with you.
00:15.47
kelliwalkercoaching
Do you mind if I share a little bit more about you with our listeners before we ah go ahead and dive right in? wonderful. Okay, so Natalie Colhos is the founder and clinical supervisor of serenity tree counseling and wellness.
00:18.52
Natalie Kohlhaas
No, that would be great.
00:31.56
kelliwalkercoaching
Natalie did her undergraduate work at Oxford College of Emory and the University Of Georgia Her Master's degree is in counseling psychology from the Georgia school of professional psychology. She is a licensed professional counselor hypnosis certified trainer a specialist in brain spotting. A certified supervisor for professional counselors and a nationally board certified counselor natalie is a breast cancer survivor and while in care she suffered almost fatal complications. She was pronounced dead for 9 minutes and came back with more of a purpose this is when she decided to write her book. Hello anxiety. My old friend. Harness your invisible superpower is intermingled with stories of her 8 miracles as well as her professional research on anxiety and fear in it. She delves into how you can embrace your anxiety as your guide rather than your enemy. The book is already out on Amazon and at Barnes and noble and you can find natalie at. Helloanxiety.met um, so Natalie I you know I almost want to dive right into your very unique experience here. But I'll start I'll start a little broader and and we'll hone in and let you get warmed up here before diving right? yeah.
01:35.88
Natalie Kohlhaas
This is. Okay, sounds great.
01:45.99
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, so you know a reoccurring theme in your book is that people identify anxiety as fear and that's a misconception. In fact, you write that anxiety's our friend and quite often can be very helpful if we recognize what it is trying to tell us so. You know today I'm hoping we can talk about how anxiety can help us right? If if we embrace it, you know you make a bold statement anxiety is a friend and you know I'd I'd love for you to exaggerate you know you know, go into some detail. Yeah on that.
02:07.36
Natalie Kohlhaas
Yes, yes.
02:14.84
Natalie Kohlhaas
Kind of go into a little bit The yeah of course so you know it's interesting. Currently, there's so much outdated information about anxiety and what we find is people kind of lump anxiety and fear.
02:26.30
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
02:34.00
Natalie Kohlhaas
Together. Um, and they say that anxiety is actually aligning with fear. Um and what we're finding now is that is actually not necessarily true at all. Um, as we all know fear has one mission right? Its mission is to keep us safe.
02:49.62
kelliwalkercoaching
Um.
02:51.40
Natalie Kohlhaas
It wants to keep us emotionally safe and physically safe. But in that mission is nothing about us being happy.
02:54.39
kelliwalkercoaching
Are.
03:01.77
Natalie Kohlhaas
But Nope no is way safe right? And so interestingly enough anxiety while it appreciates that we are safe anxieties actually.
03:02.50
kelliwalkercoaching
No, no, there is not 1 job.
03:20.11
Natalie Kohlhaas
Attempting to get our attention because it wants us to step into our lives and to step into all the possibilities that our lives have and what happens is when we start feeling anxiety. We throw it in a closet. We close the door and we run away. Um with yes.
03:40.44
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah, it feels a lot like fear I Imagine that's why so many of us I mean at least I can speak for myself. Why so many of us respond that way because you know physiologically it feels pretty darn dangerous.
03:57.49
Natalie Kohlhaas
What and so right this is where we have the 2 different aspects. We have the feelings that go off in our body right? So and anxiety talks to everybody differently. Um, for some people maybe they feel it in their stomach like a pit in their stomach.
04:02.46
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
04:09.66
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
04:14.91
Natalie Kohlhaas
Ah, maybe their shoulders or their breathing changes or I think I heard you talking about how you could feel it right between your eyes their forehead. Um, and so anxiety talks to us using our bodies and it always uses something. That's very familiar.
04:24.14
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, ah absolutely.
04:34.19
Natalie Kohlhaas
So It's familiar enough that it's attempting again to try not to get us into a place of fear where fear is different fear actually tells us stories all day long in our head and those stories are things about. How we can't do something We shouldn't do something. Don't do something. Um, it goes into all kinds of past information which we ruminate about or it talks about future information which we catastrophize on.
04:56.74
kelliwalkercoaching
2 is.
05:09.99
Natalie Kohlhaas
Or it is kind of an internal bully you know saying oh my gosh, You're never going to be able to get that or succeed. So don't try again. It's that whole talk of don't don't can't can't fear fear Threat Threat threat. Yes.
05:18.10
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
05:25.38
kelliwalkercoaching
Restrictive yeah, restrictive and small and yeah, like you say so fear has 1 job to keep us you know, physically and and emotionally safe. What would you say because I think a lot of us. Um.
05:27.90
Natalie Kohlhaas
Yes.
05:42.72
kelliwalkercoaching
You know, hence hence why I imagine you wrote a book like I think a lot of us misinterpret anxiety and and I know I did't again because it it can feel so similar physically. But what would you say is anxiety's job. What's anxieties I don't know.
05:51.40
Natalie Kohlhaas
What.
05:59.67
kelliwalkercoaching
1 maybe there's more than 1 job. But what would you say is anxiety's job. Okay.
06:01.30
Natalie Kohlhaas
So it actually acts as a gatekeeper. So it's watching over fear and when fear starts going off and starts doing its little talks and all the information that it spews at us all day long. Um, and there's something about what fear is saying that you either 1 not 100% correct or 2 is pulling you away from your values or 3 not allowing you to walk in.
06:31.37
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
06:37.96
Natalie Kohlhaas
To the opportunities that life is offering you These are the times when we will feel anxiety how will react exactly So it's kind of monitoring what fear is saying and what's going off.
06:45.56
kelliwalkercoaching
It's almost like we're feeling the discrepancy a little bit anxiety sort of the discrepancy. Yeah.
06:56.57
Natalie Kohlhaas
And again, if any of those things are happening. It's going to do. It's darned us to try to get our attention right? And of course those people don't like it right? Tell everybody. It's like having a really loud obnoxious friend following you around all day long. Yes.
07:02.22
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, now.
07:09.88
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah, yeah, that likes to kick you in the gut every once in a while listen? Yeah yeah.
07:16.00
Natalie Kohlhaas
And the reason it does that is because if for whatever reason you're actually listening to fear and you're gonna go in the wrong direction of course a good friend is going to be the one who's like I'm gonna have to tell you the bad news. Don't do that. Don't let know sorry something about that is not okay, um.
07:27.00
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah, yeah. Um, yeah.
07:35.00
Natalie Kohlhaas
Oh no, no no girl that's sad that no, you need to go and that's not what you value right? and so it's there constantly monitoring and trying to get our attention so that we can recognize hey if my friend is so upset right now. What the heck is fear actually saying to me that's making them so upset and it wants us to kind of stop um, ground ourselves and then of course ask these questions get curious and then make our own decision because the 1 thing anxiety.
07:56.17
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah.
08:12.41
Natalie Kohlhaas
Does not appreciate is fear making decisions for us because when fear makes our life decisions. Our life gets smaller and smaller and smaller.
08:27.59
kelliwalkercoaching
yeah yeah I mean a hundred percent that that is the truth I think I I wrote something it was a little while ago now, but it was like um you know am I am I choosing comfort over happiness or am I confusing. That's what it was like am I confusing comfort with.
08:44.69
Natalie Kohlhaas
Yes.
08:45.60
kelliwalkercoaching
With happiness and um, yeah, it it sounds like anxiety although many of us at least again myself I didn't initially respond or react this way but it sounds like anxiety wants us to tune in rather than tune out even though that's what again myself and I know so many of us.
09:05.80
Natalie Kohlhaas
Fear. Yes.
09:05.33
kelliwalkercoaching
Can it can feel really overwhelming or like we're not equipped to tune in but it sounds like the idea is instead of tuning out instead of disconnecting. It's really anxiety is an opportunity to sort of reconnect and tune in with ourselves.
09:19.00
Natalie Kohlhaas
Yes, so I have a little visualization I often take my patience on so I'm going to have you kind of go along with me in this. Okay so I want you to imagine that you're standing in the middle of a table surrounded by people.
09:29.25
kelliwalkercoaching
Sounds good.
09:38.39
Natalie Kohlhaas
Ah, you can already tell that this can be a little unnerving just thinking about that. Okay, no, no, you're going to go there. Thank goodness. We're not going to use that technique. So what we know is each person at the table has access to all of your thoughts.
09:41.42
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah, I'm not naked right? ah.
09:57.76
Natalie Kohlhaas
Experiences and feelings that you have ever encountered in your entire life now the doors open up to this room and a manager walks in they have a piece of paper in their hand and there's a topic on that paper. They throw the topic down on the table. And the topic says Kelly is not good enough to succeed now immediately all the people around the table start digging into your past and they start talking about why this is true. They go well, you know Kelly had a hard time with this and she felt overwhelmed with that.
10:20.10
kelliwalkercoaching
Oh yeah.
10:36.80
Natalie Kohlhaas
And oh my gosh she could have done better in this in the past you start getting glassy eyed overwhelmed not knowing what to do when suddenly the doors open up and your very very best friend and the entire world walks in yes healthy.
10:49.96
kelliwalkercoaching
Oh I can feel the relief My shoulders just dropped like who in a good way.
10:55.54
Natalie Kohlhaas
You right? They run over to the table they're trying to get your attention but all of the people around the table have started getting louder and louder and you actually can't hear your friend now all the people at the table have started talking about the future and they're saying.
11:08.56
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
11:14.28
Natalie Kohlhaas
Well, you know if that happened to the past This is most certainly going to happen in the future You. At this point are dear in the headlights Your very best friend has reached across a table. They've been trying to grab your feet and pull you off the table. They can't take it any longer because they see what's happening to you so they climb on up onto the table. Grab you by the shoulders. They throw you out of the room. They slam the door behind you. This is what we know as a panic attack.
11:38.22
kelliwalkercoaching
A her.
11:47.67
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah, absolutely.
11:49.91
Natalie Kohlhaas
Yeah, and the person who came in and placed the topic on the table was fear and the very best friend who walked in to rescue you is anxiety.
11:56.97
kelliwalkercoaching
Fear. Yeah.
12:04.95
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah, and it's like you said like the fear is so loud and again like we're so wonderful as humans like the confirmation Bias I feel like plays a big role as soon as fear. They just need to have like the starting sentence and the confirmation bias like just fills fills in the rest right? exactly like the negativity bias and confirmation were confirmation. Bias were beautifully together to review all the evidence and.
12:23.18
Natalie Kohlhaas
Nice This goes off great. We're just look for information only. What only that? yeah.
12:39.19
kelliwalkercoaching
Find what feels like supporting information I Guess my question would be how how can we be or how can we cultivate this like discernment because the fear is so loud and it is so overwhelming and.
12:39.23
Natalie Kohlhaas
Excnatic.
12:55.80
kelliwalkercoaching
In that moment with those like anxiety tinted glasses. It feels so real and like you mentioned the best friend is quieter right? like present but a little quieter. How do we sort of cultivate or um, you know grow this ability to discern.
13:03.58
Natalie Kohlhaas
I want.
13:15.10
kelliwalkercoaching
Between fear and anxiety since there can be somewhat of like an overlap at least you know, physically experiencing like how do we discern.
13:24.89
Natalie Kohlhaas
So one of the things that we work with here is we do work on you just recognizing soon as you feel anxiety in your body. Um, of course the awareness being able to increase your awareness before.
13:32.17
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah.
13:42.86
Natalie Kohlhaas
Your friend has to throw you out of the room is our goal. Okay, so if you recognize and you feel your friend pulling at your feet or you know punching on your stomach or you know rocking your body or something or they're doing something to try to get your attention.
13:44.96
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah, yeah.
14:02.75
Natalie Kohlhaas
That's when we work with our clients and having them recognize I can actually step off the table myself and those are what we call grounding techniques and that course there's a lot of really good ones out there. 1 of the things that we always work with initially.
14:10.81
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah.
14:20.10
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah.
14:20.10
Natalie Kohlhaas
Is of course doing the breathing because you know the breathing is going to help the parasympathetic nervous system get online calm the system down so we can think for a moment and interestingly enough I find most people don't actually know how to do correct breathing. When they're having you know anxious thoughts or they're going in to a panic. They think that they just have to you know, take in a couple deep breaths and they may do that 3 times and they're like okay that didn't work. Um, and there's actually a technique where I again I have a little.
14:49.37
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah.
14:57.75
Natalie Kohlhaas
Story I Often tell my my clients where they're being chased by a tiger and then when we finally get into our cave when we push the rock in front of the cave this is when we start breathing the breath that lets our bodies know we're safe which is where we're going. Oh. Oh My gosh I can't believe we made it. Ah, we're finally in our cave right? So It's these very very deep breaths where we feel our spine and our lungs pressing against each other.
15:15.44
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah, yeah.
15:34.84
Natalie Kohlhaas
And then we hold the breath and then we go ahead and do a very long Exhale and when that happens um and it has to happen over and over and over again it presses on our vagal nerve sends the you know information up to the brain.
15:35.53
kelliwalkercoaching
Nice, long Exhale Yeah, absolutely.
15:53.41
Natalie Kohlhaas
Um, my gosh Kelly and Natalie are safe. They made it now they made it back to the cave. They're there and the other piece I think that people don't recognize is even when you're doing that technique and the technique is completely. In alignment with your body. It still takes your system about 20 minutes to reset and the reason for that is everything goes off so quickly is traumatic. It's traumatic is exhausting.
16:15.39
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
16:22.50
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
16:27.25
Natalie Kohlhaas
Um, and so our bodies know we need to actually get everything back online slowly and gently and I tell my clients. Yes, exactly innocent a gentle right? And the other thing is our body if we were chased by a tiger.
16:33.49
kelliwalkercoaching
Yes, the love language of a dysregulated nervous system right? That's slow and gentle.
16:47.19
Natalie Kohlhaas
Ah, last thing is our bodies wanted to go. Okay, well we're fine. Let's go move the rock and leave you know it. It wants us to stay there for a little while and set and hopefully the tiger will then walk away, go away after 20 minutes and then we can go out.
16:54.44
kelliwalkercoaching
So yeah.
17:05.53
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
17:05.76
Natalie Kohlhaas
And we can be safe again. So it is you know all there's all different types of grounding techniques. Of course we usually start with the breathing. Um, but that helps the person step off the table and then recognize what is the topic and why would this topic be upsetting. My. Friend right? So The topic is you're not good enough I'll tell your friend is not going be happy with that topic.
17:26.23
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah, do you have an example? yeah.
17:32.87
kelliwalkercoaching
Ah, yeah, absolutely do you now? Do you have any? um you know personal examples that you can share like I know going through um cancer and having this near death experience and I imagine like. Fear anxiety. These things came up like do you have any personal stories you want to share or like aha moments or anything like that. Yeah.
17:56.21
Natalie Kohlhaas
Oh sure and I go through a lot of these in my book. Um, because I want people to recognize um where I was how I've come and how I've put all of my techniques into play and I give a lot. Tech Nas and Hello anxiety. My old friend because I'm one of those people then when I read a book I'm like okay but what do I do tell me what do you do? I Do the.
18:22.57
kelliwalkercoaching
Right? Yeah, how do I actually rewire my brain like reading about it doesn't actually rewrire rewire my neural pathways like what am I going to put into consistent repetitious practice that's going to get me where I want to be yeah.
18:39.11
Natalie Kohlhaas
Exactly exactly. So I start off ah with a lot of those right off the bat because again I don't want people to wait to the very end until they get that information.
18:46.26
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah, right? and not that the cognitive piece isn't helpful like you know it's like how I think about biology or science classes where there's a theory in a lab portion right? and the exercises are like like.
18:59.72
Natalie Kohlhaas
I.
19:03.27
kelliwalkercoaching
But yeah, that's wonderful that right off the bat that yeah you you share that that we don't have to wait to the end of the book.
19:06.96
Natalie Kohlhaas
Exactly please? No, you don't have to wait to the end but 1 of the things like when I got diagnosed with breast cancer. Of course part of that diagnosis just in itself. You know the word.
19:26.49
kelliwalkercoaching
I was going to say fear must have been coming up.
19:26.79
Natalie Kohlhaas
Produces a sense of fear right? So right? So again, right? So in that that's gonna be appropriate So when we have appropriate fear strangely enough we actually don't feel anxious. We just feel afraid.
19:33.62
kelliwalkercoaching
Right? yeah.
19:40.96
kelliwalkercoaching
Anxiousksh. Yeah, it's so much more clean I don't know how else to explain it than it's like cleaner than sort of that catastrophizing or ruminating or it's just cleaner. We know how to work it. Yeah.
19:48.17
Natalie Kohlhaas
Yes, yeah, nice things. So messy right? That's messy, messy, messy stuff right? Um, and so of course you know it's going to prompt some of that.
19:57.28
kelliwalkercoaching
Right.
20:01.85
Natalie Kohlhaas
Um, but then I you know I'm an anxiety person having had anxiety my ah whole life I Think most people have experienced it at some point. Um but anxiety people like control right? So we you want to have some type of control. Um, and.
20:08.29
kelliwalkercoaching
Right. Oh God Yeah, Absolutely absolutely I'm gonna pin down anything I can. Ah yeah.
20:21.86
Natalie Kohlhaas
We can do and of course getting a diagnosis like that immediately the whole floor gets pulled out from under you um, doctors take away control not that they're necessarily meaning to the process removes all types of control.
20:27.50
kelliwalkercoaching
Absolutely yeah.
20:35.40
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, right takes away control. Yep.
20:41.40
Natalie Kohlhaas
Um, just you know the timeline that you have to approach things again. You have no control over all these aspects and so course with that My anxiety started going um girlfriend Ah hello friend. Yes.
20:57.80
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah, ah, where's the control.
21:00.87
Natalie Kohlhaas
Okay, like we need to like take a step back and really recognize what we need to do so um, you know I really listened to my anxiety and followed what again I knew were my values and my values were.
21:06.14
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
21:17.55
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
21:17.60
Natalie Kohlhaas
Didn't want to lose myself I didn't want to be diagnosed and just be seen as a disease or a concern or a worry or whatever anybody wants to put a word onto it. Um I Also knew that my values were around my family and my friends.
21:24.33
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah, yeah.
21:34.82
kelliwalkercoaching
Yep.
21:34.85
Natalie Kohlhaas
Um, and so I was going to need to reach out to support and I also knew you know my value was being a therapist. Um I have a lot of information about how the brain works How the brain wires neuroplasticity and so.
21:54.75
Natalie Kohlhaas
I Also needed to ensure that I was going to be able to stay in as much of a positive mind frame as possible and those people who were not able to get on board with that I love them very much but I just knew I couldn't have them around me.
22:10.23
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
22:13.35
Natalie Kohlhaas
And so those are the ways I was able to find my control and because I listened to my anxiety I was able to find those ways of how I could control the situation in the limited possibilities that are available. Um.
22:18.46
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
22:31.47
Natalie Kohlhaas
But maintain myself maintain my connection maintain My you know my support system and the people that I wanted around me.
22:34.10
kelliwalkercoaching
Your values. Yeah, so absolute I mean that's because it makes Sense. We I mean as humans we all need some semblance of control to feel like safe and and grounded and it sounds like it was like you know it. Sort of cultivated this flexibility or like you know, kind of force this flexibility like okay where where can I focus on sort of leaning into control. You know, leaning into control for that groundedness that save again. We All need it to some extent like.
23:09.80
Natalie Kohlhaas
Yes, exactly definitely not for right? Yes, yeah.
23:12.60
kelliwalkercoaching
It would none of us feel very well if we feel completely unhinged. Yeah yeah, Ah, thank you? So Thank you so much for sharing that is is there any other um last takeaways or anything you want to. Say or or leave people with apart from you know, read the book because it's going to go into so much detail like you said like share these strategies that we can actually like bring into our daily life and and repeat and cultivate to to see these new neural pathways and to.
23:46.44
Natalie Kohlhaas
Like yes.
23:48.48
kelliwalkercoaching
Experience these new neural pathways but any parting bits of wisdom or anything.
23:52.20
Natalie Kohlhaas
So I would like everyone to really recognize when their friend is talking to them and please don't throw your friend in the closet and shut the door and run away from them. But you don't keep your friends that way.
24:01.61
kelliwalkercoaching
Um, yeah.
24:06.80
kelliwalkercoaching
It's not how we treat friends. But.
24:11.85
Natalie Kohlhaas
And I just want everyone to recognize if you are listening to fear what happens is you actually end up running away from your life and so if they could stop listen run from the negative thoughts and actually run into their lives. That is the direction that anxiety is desperately trying to point us towards.
24:33.55
kelliwalkercoaching
Yeah, and like you said it sounds like it's okay to start slow and gentle with this shift or change. Yeah, well thank you so much Natalie for taking time to hop on the show and.
24:41.80
Natalie Kohlhaas
Yes, definitely.
24:50.40
kelliwalkercoaching
And share your experience and your knowledge with us you too. So that's our episode. Thanks so much for tuning in today if you're enjoying the show please subscribe and take a minute to write a review on Itunes that we can reach and support more people.
24:50.86
Natalie Kohlhaas
Thank you so much. It was such a pleasure talking with you today.
25:06.90
kelliwalkercoaching
If you're looking for one-on-one coaching or have a question you'd like answered on the show. Please visit, notanotheranxietyshow.com and until next time remember be kind to yourself.
