Challenging the Unpredictability of My Anxiety

Tension. Tension in my limbs. Tension in my torso. Tension in my chest. Tension in my neck and shoulders. Unbearable tension, as if my body were bracing itself for imminent impact with some as yet unidentified threat.

The threat is a tidal wave of anxiety or rather, a series of waves, threatening to sweep me away and drag me under. I try to regulate my breathing, but my efforts are hampered by the feeling that my short in-breaths are met with dead, lead weight lungs in my chest, while the long out breath is met with an obstruction in my throat, beneath my Adam’s apple that stubbornly refuses to be moved.

And so I submit. I don’t fight it or wish it to be different. I simply sit with it. I acknowledge I can’t change the weather, and I accept it for what it is: a passing storm. I let it be, sure in the knowledge that sooner or later the sun will come out and I can get on with my day. And so it is.

Before long, I’m off in the car, having reached a momentous decision regarding a project I’ve been working on since September: my beard. By October, it had grown out as far as I had ever allowed, but with my trip to New York in mind, I had the Turkish barber trim it back, in the style of designer stubble, after he’d cut my hair.

Since then, I haven’t touched it. What to do? Santa had been kind enough to furnish me with a beard grooming kit, but I hadn’t a clue what to do with it.

Numerous YouTube tutorials later, I realized what was required was a little beyond my skill set. Alas, a steady hand and a sharp eye are not among my limited attributes.

Then I remembered the cafe-cum-barber shop I’d stumbled across a few weeks back, when making my way from a restaurant to the theater. I knew then the only sensible course of action was to entrust my face-fluff to the professionals.

The whole experience was strangely meditative — calming, relaxing, almost therapeutic. The barber assured me actually doing it was more so.

It was good to have ventured out of my comfort zone and to have changed my routine, done something, gone somewhere different. Since my anxiety is entirely unpredictable, I might as well be too.

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