Today is December 15 and the Navigate the Chaos question to consider is “How often do you work on your mental health?”
Navigating the chaos is stressful and often creates anxiety or depression.
Translating your dreams into reality requires you to work on your mental health so you can manage your anxiety if it appears during your journey. Actors, politicians, musicians, athletes, artists, and a host of other successful people have learned to work on their mental health.
Actors Anthony Hale, Emma Stone and Amanda Seyfried and professional athletes Marcus Morris and Brandon Brooks are just a few of the many examples of people who have learned how to work on their mental health and manage their anxiety.
Anthony Hale is an American actor and comedian. He is known for his role in the Fox comedy series Arrested Development as the neurotic Buster Bluth. He also voiced Forky in the animated comedy Toy Story 4. Hale played Gary Walsh on the HBO comedy Veep and won the 2013 and 2015 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series. In an April 2019 interview for GQ, Hale discussed his struggles with anxiety stating “I've struggled with anxiety for a very, very long time. There's no cure, so it's finding little tools.”
One of the tools Hale uses is to divert this attention away from himself and onto someone or something else. As Hale recalled:
“There was this one particular time I remember. I was about to do a talk show. And right before they called my name and the curtains were about to go up, I had this wave of dread. A panic attack was coming on. I had just started doing talk shows, and I still didn't feel like I belonged. I was like, ‘Okay, I have a choice. I'm either going to bolt, which is what I want to do, or…’ I remember somebody telling me, ‘Get your eyes off yourself.’ And so, there were these two guys who were pulling the curtain. I just started asking them questions. ‘Oh, where are you from? Tell me about what you do. How's it working here?’ Whatever I could do to get my eyes off of myself. And then they pulled the curtain and I went out. It might only have been a few seconds, but it saved everything.”
The lesson Hale offers is important to remember as you work on your mental health. His tool to ‘get his eyes off of himself’ only took a moment, but it was an important one that helped him manage his anxiety.
Like Hale, fellow actor Emma Stone has also learned to work on her anxiety.
During an interview at the Child Mind Institute in October 2018, the actress opened up about her anxiety issues and her first panic attack as a 7-year-old.
According to Stone: "I was at a friend's house, and all of a sudden I was absolutely convinced the house was on fire and it was burning down. I was just sitting in her bedroom and obviously the house wasn't on fire, but there was nothing in me that didn't think we were going to die.”
Soon after her first panic attack, Stone started seeing a therapist who diagnosed her with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD).
In therapy, she created a book she called, "I Am Bigger Than my Anxiety," in which she drew pictures of a "little green monster that sits on my shoulder." The monster -- her anxiety -- would grow whenever she listened to it and would shrink whenever she didn't.
When Stone began acting at age 11 and discovered improv, she realized for the first time that "my feelings could be productive." Being a part of the "team" at her local children's theater also kept her from isolating herself with her anxiety.
"I believe the people who have anxiety and depression are very sensitive and smart. The world is scary and there's a lot that goes on and if you’re attuned to it, it can be crippling. But if you don't let it cripple you and use it for something productive, it's like a superpower."
Today, she manages her anxiety with therapy, meditation, being with others and keeping busy. She also makes it a point not to be on social media. "That would send me into a spin," she said. "I don’t need to be getting constant feedback on who I am."
Prescription medications are another tool others use to manage their anxiety.
Actor Amanda Seyfried said in an interview
“Yeah. I’m on Lexapro, and I’ll never get off of it,” the actress told Allure magazine regarding the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) that’s commonly prescribed to treat generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) and depression. “I’ve been on it since I was 19, so 11 years. I’m on the lowest dose. I don’t see the point of getting off of it. Whether it’s placebo or not, I don’t want to risk it. And what are you fighting against? Just the stigma of using a tool? A mental illness is a thing that people cast in a different category [from other illnesses], but I don’t think it is. It should be taken as seriously as anything else."
The Mamma Mia! and Les Miserables star has been open about her anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), which shares characteristics similar to anxiety disorders.
"You don’t see the mental illness: It’s not a mass; it’s not a cyst. But it’s there,” she continued in the interview with Allure. “Why do you need to prove it? If you can treat it, you treat it. I had pretty bad health anxiety that came from the OCD and thought I had a tumor in my brain. I had an MRI, and the neurologist referred me to a psychiatrist. As I get older, the compulsive thoughts and fears have diminished a lot. Knowing that a lot of my fears are not reality-based really helps.”
Actors Hale, Stone, and Seigfried work on their mental health as do athletes such as Marcus Morris and Brandon Brooks.
Boston Celtics power forward Marcus Morris grew up in a North Philadelphia neighborhood rife with gang violence — a place that he says has contributed to his anxiety and depression. In an interview with ESPN Morris said "At that time, I didn't trust any white people because I didn't know any white people. Honestly, I didn't feel like I could trust anybody — not even the people in my neighborhood, who I knew my whole life.”
Growing up, he loved playing basketball with his twin brother, Markieff. But when he joined the NBA and started jumping from team to team, he felt increasingly anxious, turning to sleeping pills and marijuana but not finding much relief.
He says that seeing a mental health therapist made him feel calmer, happier, and more productive. Morris also says that daily meditation helps him feel centered. anxiety and depression.
"I know lots of guys who are dealing with some kind of anxiety and depression -- not knowing if they have a job next season, not knowing if they're going to get traded. It's so stressful. Everyone is pulling at you. They want your time, your money, a piece of your fame. If you have depression, you should be trying to get rid of it instead of bottling it up and letting it weigh on you and weigh on you and weigh on you."
Like Morris, Philadelphia Eagles All-Pro guard Brandon Brooks has had to work on his anxiety. In a November 23, 2019 game against the Seattle Seahawks he left the game in the first quarter because of an anxiety attack.
Brooks, who played only 12 snaps in a game the Eagles lost, 17-9, has battled anxiety for years and missed two games in 2016.
Brooks signed a four-year, $54.2 million contract extension two weeks ago, and he said the pressure of living up to that deal triggered this recent bout of anxiety.
Brooks said “I’m good. I’m in a much better place. The biggest thing I feel terrible about is when my team needed me I wasn’t there. I had a handle on it for 2½ years now, and I guess the silver lining is I’m definitely on the right track, but moving forward I have to plan out ways to ensure that a situation like this doesn’t happen the remainder of the season. The important part is when you have an issue, seek help and attack it. "
Noting just how frequent anxiety is among fellow NFL players Brooks said
"It's been a lot of guys around the league who have reached out to me about it. It's a lot more guys than you can imagine. I'm not going to put anybody's name out there, I've never been that type of guy, but just know it's a lot of guys that go through it — for a lot of different aspects, not just the one that affects me, but for a lot of reasons."
Anthony Hale, Emma Stone Amanda Seyfried, Marcus Morris and Brandon Brooks are just a few of the many examples of people who have learned how to work on their mental health and manage their anxiety while Navigating the Chaos of life and work.
How often do you work on your mental health?