Ep. 141: A Mindfulness Tool to Help with Coronavirus Anxiety

Welcome back to another episode of Your Anxiety Toolkit. In today’s podcast, I want to provide you all with an easy mindfulness tool to help with coronavirus anxiety.

These are tough times, I know. It is overwhelming and there is a lot of information out there. In this episode, I would like to encourage you to step away from the tools that everybody is giving you right now and hopefully provide you with an easy tool that will help you in the deepest, darkest, moments of struggling.

Now I am still going to strongly encourage you to reduce your consumption of news and to receive your news from one reputable source for a limited amount of time per day. I also want to encourage you to get support right now. Reach out to your people, every single day.

In this episode, I also want to give you this mindfulness tool to help with coronavirus anxiety that you may have heard me mention before. It is actually a four step mindfulness tool known by the acronym, RAIN.

The R in RAIN is for RECOGNIZE. This tool is to get you to slow down or stop and be in the present. Ask yourself, “What is it that I am feeling? What is it that I am thinking right now? What is it that I am experiencing?”

The A in RAIN is for ALLOW. You are going to allow what you have recognized and you are not going to judge it, just allow it to come and go.

The I in RAIN is INVESTIGATE. I think this is really important right now. Investigate involves engaging with your deep sense of curiosity. It involves looking at things as if you have never seen them before.

The N in RAIN is for NURTURE. You have recognized what you are feeling, you’ve allowed what you are feeling, and you have investigated it with a curious mind. What is left over, you nurture. You provide yourself with a huge dose of self-compassion.

Help Manage COVID-19 anxiety and stress with this mindfulness and self-compassion tool. A FREE custom-made PDF worksheet to help you manage anxiety, doubt and uncertainty. https://www.cbtschool.com/RAIN

Please read this helpful article that explains how OCD and anxiety disorders can be complicated by coronavirus fears. https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/ocd-and-anxiety-disorder-treatment-can-be-complicated-by-coronavirus-fears/2020/03/13/6b851d60-63ce-11ea-acca-80c22bbee96f_story.html