More About The Toolbox

The Anxiety Toolbox is for Everybody!
The Anxiety Toolbox was developed to help us understand anxiety and stay on the helpful, motivating, and instructive side of fear rather than the destructive, painful, negative side. Depending on our understanding and coping skills, anxiety can either be like our dear aunt Mary; a friend and mentor —or like our crazy uncle Bob; erratic, inappropriate, and embarrassing.

The Anxiety Toolbox is appropriate for those with diagnosed anxiety conditions and well as those who have anxiety after a sudden loss and are in a state of bereavement. The Anxiety Toolbox will also help those who need to sharpen and enhance their performance in a competitive, demanding sport or career, as well as those who want a more fulfilled and lasting relationships.

Be a Star!
Golfers and baseball players are great fans of the tools in the Anxiety Toolbox, because their sports require not only skill and talent, but also calmness and sharp concentration. There is no room here for anxious thoughts or fear of failure. Knowing how to evoke the relaxation response immediately and at-will can be learned through multiple techniques, including biofeedback, breathing exercises, self hypnosis, guided imagery, visualization exercises, and others. All of these components are taught in the Toolbox in a way that can be readily incorporated into your daily life.

Climb the Ladder of Success!
What about careers that require sustained mental focus, ability to assess risk and make confident decisions? What about a job that involves public speaking and presentations to groups of people? What about an opportunity that involves frequent air travel or commuting over a suspension bridge? Would any of these situations make you uncomfortable? Enough to make you pass on the opportunity entirely? Would you see it as a challenge and be motivated to confront it, or as an insurmountable obstacle and seeks to avoid it? This will depend on whether or not you have the tools from the Anxiety Toolbox at your disposal.

Be Irresistible!
There is no more attractive feature to be found in a potential romantic relationship and mate than confidence and poise, without the hang-ups of inner turmoil and nervous mannerisms. Think about it next time you’re at a social gathering. Who are you attracted to? Who catches your eye and holds your attention? It is probably not the loudest or smartest or best looking person. Rather, it is the person with quiet confidence, a ready smile, a good listener who seems to have no cares other than to enjoy the moment and the present company. Their interaction with others is natural and effortless, because they feel completely at ease. You see them from across the room —they draw you in like a magnet- —you’re smitten! After you have tamed your anxious emotions, you will be that person who exudes confidence and inner strength.

Be a Better Person
Many (if not most) of our short-comings as human beings stem from the damaging effects of anxiety and fear-based thought systems on our emotional and spiritual growth and maturity. For instance, we’re supposed to learn from mistakes, not repeat them. But how often do we see a friend or family member (or ourselves) reliving a painful experience? Whether falling off the wagon once again, jumping back into an abusive relationship after just escaping one, losing a job because of inconsistent performance, or losing friends due to being “difficult”, most of our failures and disappointments can be traced to the effects of fear on our belief- system.

Repeating hurtful or self-destructive patterns of behavior that have previously led to social, legal, financial, or health problems is common when anxiety and fear is the driving force of our lives. When we are self-absorbed with anxiety, we cannot be good and helpful friends, spouses, parents, or co-workers. We will be too needy and unreasonable, constantly playing the victim and blaming others for our problems. Some will even blame God for their failures and miserable circumstances. Projecting our unhappiness outward on the world around us rather than looking inside and seeing its true source is common.

Emotional dysfunction will often cause us to spend our lives trying to cover our sense of inadequacy with the trappings of success, rather than seeking inner healing. We will use most of our energy and waking hours keeping up an outer image that we love ourselves, when deep down we hate ourselves. Taking responsibility, changing the way we think, and giving ourselves the love and respect we crave rather than expecting or demanding it from others is uncommon, but it is the path to becoming a better person.

How the Anxiety Toolbox Fits In
For some with difficult anxiety disorders, medications will be the first line of treatment. In my books I have discussed the use of medications, how to decide when they are necessary, and how to determine which drugs are most appropriate for your case. (They are available through Amazon.com by following the links in this website or through your local bookstore.) There are two cutting-edge methods of determining which medical regimen would work best for you. The first is a somatic symptom-based approach designed to find the medication that best fits your constellation of symptoms. The second is a method that uses a brain metabolic scan to determine brain dysfunctions and then find the medical regimen most likely to correct the problem. We have summarized these findings for you and your doctor in the Anxiety Toolbox Program.

Eventually most people find that, although pills may stabilize the situation, they do not give the deep sense of stability and control that is found by correcting the dysfunctional thoughts and perceptions, extinguishing and unlearning phobic fear responses, learning how to evoke your brain’s natural relaxation response, and learning effective social and personal management skills. These strategies work by either 1) the principle of using your higher brain centers in the prefrontal cortex to correct irrational programmed fear responses coming from the deeper, more primitive areas of the brain known as the amygdala and basal ganglia, or 2) the technique of experiential learning, which directly feeds new experiences into the brain’s deep fear centers to gradually lessen their anxious responsiveness. The Anxiety Toolbox will teach you how your brain can heal itself from anxiety conditions with the right formula of brain exercises, lifestyle choices, therapy, medical interventions, and alternative remedies. Many different options will work, and the Toolbox is designed to help you determine which formula is best for you, and then successfully apply it to you busy life.

Old and New; East and West
Some tools in the toolbox are state-of-the-art modern technology, while others have been around for thousands of years. All we have done is to organize them for you so that they are readily accessible, simple to understand, as easily integrated into your personal armamentarium against anxiety. We recommend that you seek the advice of an emotional health professional as the first step in conquering anxiety. The Anxiety Toolbox is not intended to replace the advice and thorough evaluation of a trusted psychiatrist, psychologist, or certified therapist. We encourage you to go over the CAST self-test, Personal Anxiety Assessment List, Personal Daily Planner, and the Anxiety Toolbox Program with them. We further recommend a complete examination and work-up by your family physician.

We recognize the value of modern advances in Western medicine, as well as ancient wisdom from Eastern philosophies and healing practices. We believe there is some truth and benefit to both Western and Eastern modalities, and that the fastest road to complete health lies in an individual, personalized synthesis of these healing arts.

Anxiety can often be treated by an appropriate medical regimen. Other times, it can be resolved by right diet, sleep, physical exercise, brain exercise, group and individual psychotherapy, attitude and behavioral therapy, and spiritual framework. Alternative Medicine adds the options of herbal and Ayruvedic remedies, acupuncture, Traditional Chinese Medicine, body work therapies, and several other helpful strategies.

Stop Anxiety Now
The Anxiety Toolbox will give you practical ideas, strategies, and skills that you can start working on right away and start feeling relief even the first day. It will dispel the myths and misinformation that fuel your anxiety. It will work on the misconceptions and misperceptions that make you vulnerable, and teach you methods that will allow you to control and manage anxiety whenever you feel those unmistakable sensations welling up inside of you. Remember that you do not live in a vacuum. If you delay or refuse to get help, you are not just hurting yourself, but everyone who cares about you.

The “Quick Fix Formula” that is included in the download gives you clear instructions and advice on how to gain reasonable control of anxiety within one to seven days. Implementing this program with the help of your health care professional will give you the stability needed to then work on the long-term solutions.

Let us know your stories and experiences on this road to emotional health, personal responsibility, and inner peace. Although we cannot respond personally to all messages, your thoughts and insights help us refine and improve our program. We will be with you all the way in spirit and in our books, programs, and website with suggestions and encouragement.