by Alan Baker
Think about it. When was the last time you made it through a day without being anxious about something and suffered the unfortunate result of sweating profusely because you couldn’t control the way your body reacted to the stress. Even the cavemen had anxiety in their lives. The thought of a wooly mammoth bearing down on you as you raced for the security of the cave with nothing between you and him but a little stick pointed on one end is enough cause to make you sweat profusely. We’ve come a long way from the caveman days, but we still have plenty of situations that cause anxiety and the resultant sweating. The unannounced summons by your boss to the inner office (”Please close the door behind you.”), to the kids not being home when they were supposed to be, to your wedding day—all of these are stressors in our lives that can overwhelm rational thought processes and cause our bodies to react and sweat profusely.
So now the question arises, what can you do about these stresses in your life and get this sweating problem under control. One of the first methods that comes to mind is biofeedback. You can control your breathing and your heart rate after you learn the ways to do so, and as a result you can calm yourself when stress begins to overtake you and stop the sweating before it gets out of hand. And then there are ways to get a handle on your everyday life; such as following a schedule that can be broken down into daily happenings and can be used to keep your comings and goings in order. Nothing causes stress more quickly than to have your life spinning out of control and you are watching it happen without being able to do anything about it. But don’t forget, also, that routine exercise can play a big part in reducing your stress and consequently your anxiety sweating, because when you feel good physically, and you are fit; then your mental outlook is much more positive also.
The next step in trying to control anxiety sweating is to get your life in general under control. Don’t let your finances get out of whack to the point that you can’t bear to look at the desk with its mound of bills and dun letters and as a result your heart pounds and you chew your fingernails and you sweat. And your work schedule. Balance the hours needed to be spent at work with the hours needed to be spent at home. Life keeps on trucking and you will miss out on a lot as well as ruin a lot of clothes with unnecessary bouts of sweating because you let work control your total life and not just be a part of it. And have a schedule of what needs to be done when you are home. Don’t keep putting off jobs around the house; work at them on a regular basis and you will see how less stressed your life will be in a very short time.
One big factor that can cause unbelievable stress in many people’s lives is their relationships with other people and how they handle them. Your marriage may leave a lot to be desired, or maybe you have been recently widowed, or your co-workers on the job are not the type of people you want to deal with on a daily basis. Any of these scenarios can cause stress in your life and you are then at the mercy of your emotions which in turn will lead to an active bout of anxiety sweating. Just step back and take a good look at how your interpersonal relationships fit into your life, and for anything that causes a negative reaction, get to work on it. Take some decisive action and make sure you evaluate just what part of your life your relationships with people plays, and work on that angle so that you can change whatever factors need to be modified and made positive so they no longer pose a threat as a stress producer.
So when we think of anxiety sweating, what comes to mind as to what is going on in your body to produce all that stress and then all the profuse sweating. We have not progressed very far along the genetic trail since our ancestors were cavemen, and our bodies react the very same way for us today as theirs did way back in the dawn of time. There are only two reactions that are programmed into our makeups, and those are determiners as to whether we stand and fight the thing that is stressing us out, or should we head for the hills and make a run for it. Our bodies feel the stress and immediately send a message to the adrenal glands in our bodies that begin to pump out adrenaline so we are armed with the chemical ammunition we need to take care of whatever it is that is bothering us. But, if we don’t have control of the external causes of the stress, we react over and over again producing much anxiety and the sweating that goes along with it.
But, don’t despair. There are many ways to relieve yourself of stressful situations without making your body go through all that. Plan time to take a walk, and truly involve yourself in the walk. Listen to the sounds around you, look at the colors, smell the smells; let yourself bond once again with the most basic of needs we have as humans, to be one with Mother Nature. That old adage rings true when someone advises you to “stop and smell the roses”. Life is more than schedules and alarm clocks and deadlines; it is pulsing with excitement and fun and happiness. You just need to slow down and let it happen. Keep your life on as even a keel as you can muster in your own little corner of the world and you will find that the better you feel about yourself and your way of life, the less you will be subjected to bouts of anxiety sweating because you are in control.
All being said and done: life is full of excitement, happiness, danger, and stress. You are the one that needs to take control and keep your life in balance so that the negatives don’t outweigh the positives. When there is too much negativity in your life and you have a hard time seeing the silver linings, then it is time you took stock of your way of living every day and examine it closely to see where you can make changes for the better and can make it a more positive experience. Opportunities are all around you and are there for the taking; you just need to recognize them, and recognize that you need to make changes that will allow you the freedom to grab some of them before they all pass you by. Life is one big parade, and there is no better way to live it fully than to stop standing on the sidelines with your anxiety sweating consuming you, and step into the line of march, get in step, feel the rhythm of the positive drum beat, free yourself of worries, and go for it.