FBC Boerne Youth
Messages from First Baptist Church Boerne's Youth Ministry. Visit us at https://www.fbcboerne.org/youth/
FBC Boerne Youth
DNow 2025 // Breakout: Anxiety from the Bottom Up - Tyler & Katelyn Sullins
Christian Counselors Tyler and Katelyn Sullins led this breakout session at DNow 2025: Changed, "Anxiety from the Bottom Up."
In this bonus podcast episode, we examine how anxiety isn't just a word; it's a common emotional experience that many face, especially youths today. We discuss the nature of anxiety, how it manifests, and practical strategies to manage it through cognitive reworking and bodily awareness.
• Defining anxiety as an overestimation of threats and underestimation of coping abilities
• Exploring various triggers of anxiety in daily life
• The importance of recognizing thoughts and their patterns
• Implementing top-down and bottom-up approaches to address anxiety
• Practical techniques such as grounding exercises and breathing strategies
• The significance of naming emotions to lessen their burden
• Engaging with the audience through shared experiences and a Q&A session
• Emphasizing community and dialogue around mental health
Welcome to. We're going to talk about anxiety today, but first we want to introduce ourselves because we're going to be talking for a little bit. Be good for you to know who we are. That is me up there and that is my wife Caitlin. So my name is Tyler Sullins and this is my wife Caitlin, and those are our three kiddos Eden, judah and Eli. Eden is now six she's a little bit older than she was there and then the other two are right behind them, so we had them really fast. Are any of you guys having kids anytime soon?
Speaker 2:Please say no. Okay, that's good though.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, that's a leader, so not any of you. So please don't do that. That will produce anxiety, wouldn't it? Think about it? So we are the Sullins family. We've been in Bernie's for a couple of years, no, almost three years. Mm-hmm, yep, from East Texas. And then I'm from Alabama, originally. Anybody Alabama fans out there? Great, all by myself, okay. Aggies, woo, okay, and then all the other weird animal schools.
Speaker 2:He's come into the light. He loves the Aggies. Now, he just didn't know. You know, and you can't blame people for ignorance. Really Love them so.
Speaker 1:Love them, love the Aggies.
Speaker 2:How'd we meet.
Speaker 1:We met at Pine Cove Anybody ever been there? Or summer camp. We met at a summer camp and fell in love immediately, for a sight. Actually took us a little bit of time, I really wish that was our story.
Speaker 2:I thought he would love me as soon as he saw the sweat drip down my you know, back in the midsummer. He just needed some coaxing. Sometimes I joke, I just needed to pray him into this relationship. Anyways, you've loved me forever. I know that.
Speaker 1:I'm confident now I'm doing that like every time. So don't Well, we're either going to have to plug it in or tell it not to do that.
Speaker 2:You're, you're saying like it'll keep doing it unless I keep keeping it alive.
Speaker 1:When you go to sleep, it's going to go to sleep. I'll I'll stay on it. We and meaningful place. We've, uh, been involved in church and um camping ministry for a long time. Caitlin worked at a church, I worked at a church, uh, but now we're counselors. So that's what we do full time and we work together. We work at river's edge, counseling and wellness here in town, um, and we love what we get to do. We have a bunch of people that get to do what we do, and so we lead, manage, guide, direct and also get to talk in the community about whatever we love. Fbc we don't attend FBC ourselves. We're at the bridge, but you wouldn't know that because we do so. Fbc is so cool. They just have so much going on, and we're grateful to get to be a part of MOPs and preschool and we're grateful to get to be a part of mops and preschool and what else do we do All the things, all the things.
Speaker 1:Anybody at FBC or other people that are like transplants. We just came for the free snacks. This weekend.
Speaker 2:You're here for the weekend. Love it Cool that's fun.
Speaker 1:So we'll be talking a lot about a topic that we don't. I don't get to talk a lot about in church, but I think we're becoming a little more used to talking about mental health. You're hearing it more in school. She's like she's amen, anybody else, amen, come on. No, just us, but we'll. We'll lead the charge. We're going to talk about something that's a little bit I don't know. Actually, you were breathing.
Speaker 2:Well, before we get started, I'm just curious who's in the room? High schoolers, okay. Middle schoolers, okay. Helps me just to know where we're at.
Speaker 1:Mature middle schoolers who could pass for a high schooler.
Speaker 2:So many of you. You know we were joking before we came like what makes a person choose a breakout called anxiety, right? You hear that, you hear that and you're like anxiety and me, we're tight. I'm totally coming to this one. She needs me, I need her, right? Or you looked around and you were like that cute boy's going to anxiety, so am I, or vice versa.
Speaker 1:So she's here today.
Speaker 2:Welcome, heyo. If you didn't know, that's what you're here for. We're actually going to be learning about anxiety and we are tight friends with anxiety. The two of us. Everybody's got their own story with emotions. We'll get there later. So everybody's got anxiety. Raise your hand if you've ever felt it, most of you. Okay, what is anxiety? Does anyone want to venture to tell me, yes, okay, grades can cause an overwhelm.
Speaker 1:I like this. It's a cascade. It's going to keep coming, keep going.
Speaker 2:I didn't need to stop it Okay.
Speaker 1:I bet if you just let her go for like 10 minutes she would never stop. She would just have all these things, and that's kind of what anxiety is like. Anyway, I don't know if anybody ever felt that.
Speaker 2:That's true. The hamster wheel Okay. So I heard a lot there, right, like this overwhelm, just like the sense of there's a lot I don't know how to make it stop kind of Could come from a lot of different places family, friends, school. I'm going to give you a couple different ways to think about anxiety. The you a couple different ways to think about anxiety. The words we use for anxiety is this an overestimation of a threat coupled with an underestimation of my ability to cope with it. So I'll say that again, I am overestimating a threat in the future. Whatever's coming, it's going to be worse than what I think it's going to be, but at the same time, I'm underestimating my ability to cope with it. I'm not going to be able to handle it. Another way of thinking about that is just like pretty much not trusting that I'll be okay if my what if comes true.
Speaker 2:Have you ever had a what if in your brain? What if this were to happen? Oh, I would not be. I see you nodding. You're like, yes, what if he comes over and talks to me? I will literally combust, right? I'm not a boy. I don't know what your what ifs are. What are your what ifs when you were?
Speaker 1:I don't have any. He didn't have anxiety, which is exactly what you would project if you had a lot of them, right?
Speaker 2:Okay, you look like you don't. Probably what if coach puts me in and I'm not able to do the things that's required of me?
Speaker 1:Yeah, anytime that I'm going to be evaluated in front of a group of people whether it's a coach, a teacher, females in front of a group of people, whether it's a coach, a teacher, females anywhere where I'm going to feel like I'm put on the spot yes.
Speaker 1:And then, of course, the traditional ones, like being in school taking a test. I'm really worried about that, and as you get older, you're wondering about what's happening next, like what's happening after high school and so forth, and so if we have most high schoolers, anybody graduating soon yeah, I mean that brings about quite a bit of anxiety, even for for guys too so what I'm hearing from you reminds me.
Speaker 2:Anxiety can can be produced from anything itty bitty to huge, it does not matter. You can have intense anxiety over the littlest thing, okay, but I do want to bring it down. So this is actually like hitting at y'all's lives. Huge, it does not matter. You can have intense anxiety over the littlest thing Okay, but I do want to bring it down. So this is actually like hitting at y'all's lives. Would anyone care to tell me something that they theoretically could be anxious about? Yes, grades 100%. Wanting a certain grade can make you anxious. What if I don't get it? What do I have to do? Yes, what my parents think about me, I hadn't thought about that.
Speaker 1:We've actually brought them in and they're going to come out and tell you what you think about in front of everyone. Could you imagine I'd be so worried?
Speaker 2:What my parents think about me. That's a huge one. Anything else come to mind? Sports, specifically just performance in sports. I think about that, the pressure that I feel when I'm having to, like, literally play in front of a crowd. How will I perform? How will I exist tomorrow when I totally fail and I'm embarrassed? Yes, anxious about friendships. Where do I fit in? Who are my friends? What do they think about me? Peer pressure it's very broad. I appreciate that there's a lot in there. Yes, yeah, feeling anxiety about, like, actually doing the right thing.
Speaker 1:Because it can feel like that. It's like it was that conviction. Am I trying to be better following the Lord or am I just overly anxious about that Like, so even deciding which is which? Like is this a good conviction, godly conviction, or is this like me just being anxious about everything?
Speaker 2:I'm thinking about this at this moment. I think when I was in, honestly, middle school and high school, I, when we were growing up, anxiety wasn't really a word, like people didn't. We didn't talk about being anxious. Everybody was, but we didn't have the verbiage for it. I don't think I didn't necessarily think I was an anxious person, but looking back, I 100% struggled with everything that y'all have mentioned. I even remember being post-college. We started dating and I knew, hey, this is at least the kind of guy I want to marry, maybe the guy I want to marry, but I'm not in control of that right.
Speaker 2:And I got offered this job in Arkansas. He lived in Dallas, texas, and I remember thinking through I've only been on three dates with him. How how can I guarantee that he's still going to choose me if I move to a different state? And that made me anxious and I remember for the first time kind of being like what do I do with this miserable feeling Like I can't make it go away and it won't stop? I tried everything. I drank Earl Grey tea, I did yoga, I painted, all the things. Things it's just present in everyone's life, no matter how big or small you are. So anxiety is a thing We've covered, that we all have it at some point, right, it's not bad.
Speaker 1:It is a thing, so what do we do with it?
Speaker 2:We're going to talk about two different ways you can go about it. Okay, I actually want you to introduce, maybe, what they are and how we go about it.
Speaker 1:We're going to talk about two things, and I think they're in this. Yeah, we're talking about the top down and the bottom up. Everybody say top down, bottoms up in a good way, like people used to say bottoms up and people would drink Um you don't say that anymore.
Speaker 1:That's not a thing. Top down. Top down is really literally your brain. Okay, show me your brain. Okay, we're going to talk about how we can use that and how that can actually help us deal with anxiety. But we are also going to go from the bottom up Like think about your toes to below your nose.
Speaker 2:I like that Toes to below the nose.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You can't put that on the spot? I?
Speaker 1:like that toes to below the nose yeah.
Speaker 2:You can't put that on? The spot Points for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've been in church since I don't know forever and I've only ever learned the top, and the top is an excellent way to combat anxiety. Like you have some anxiety and then you, we're going to even tell you some of these things today about how you can use your brain to help cope with what's going on. There is a little bit of challenge when it doesn't work anymore, when you're like, literally, I've prayed this prayer of Jabez, is that a thing anymore? I think it's over, but there was a thing, and I've prayed what David prayed, I've said the words out loud and yet there's still something going on inside of me that I can't quite explain. That's the bottom up. That's where we begin to teach. How do we use what God's given us in our body to help cope with that anxiety?
Speaker 2:So we're going to do top down, bottom up. I will start with top down. Okay, these are all things that you have probably heard before If you've been around church at all. These are ways that we can address our thoughts rationally and our anxiety and either outthink our anxiety to some point or we can at least meet it with truth and refute it. I want you to imagine for me that you were in a gym. Okay, it's just you. Lights are on. Very similar to how I feel right now. It's a dodgeball game. Visualize You're the only one on your side of the court, though 50 on the other side. Some of the boys in this room are like this is where.
Speaker 1:I thrive yes.
Speaker 2:How are you going to win that game? One verse 50. Are you going to win it by just like dodge, duck, dive, dip, dodge? I don't know if you can dodge all those balls. The only way I see that you could win this game is if somehow you go on the offensive and you start to take those people out one by one and then it becomes a fair fight, right, and so maybe you could win that dodgeball game.
Speaker 2:I want to talk about how we are offensive, if you will, in our fight against anxious thoughts. There's a lot of things you can do. One, catch the lie. We talk with our kids about this. This is just a way of questioning your anxieties. Okay, when we watch a movie, let's see. We watched Hunchback of Notre Dame the other week. It was terrifying. First of all, I had no idea. Won of Notre Dame the other week it was terrifying. First of all had no idea. Won't show my kids that again, that was an oopsies. But watch Hunchback of Notre Dame and at the end we go okay, kids, we're going to play this game.
Speaker 2:It's called Catch the Lie, catch the Light. What did you just see in that movie? That was light, that was bright, that we can latch onto. That's truth and they're able to say little things, right? Quasi was really kind to that girl. Oh, that's so good. He sure was. What did you see? That was a lie.
Speaker 2:This character thought that once he had all the money in the world he would be happy. That's a lie. Very, very little, right? Even toddlers can do that. But that happens in your thoughts all the time. So notice the anxiety that you feel and then question it. Does this have rational space in my brain to exist? Yeah, you keep moving it. Say the thought out loud or write it down.
Speaker 2:Tyler and I often do this. We're productive people. If you will get a lot done, hold a lot in our brain all at once and I know you do too. Think school, right, you have so much to complete, to do that it can be crazy, overwhelming. And then you just get stuck in this overwhelming feeling of like I don't have time to do it all. And then I feel overwhelmed and a little bit exhausted at that thought and then, if I don't do that, then I won't be able to go do this thing on the weekend, and if I don't do that, then I won't be a part of the friend group that I want to be a part of, and if that happens, then I'm not going to get asked to the dance and then I'll never have friends and, oh my god, okay, whoa, I've been there. But if you can pause it, write out what you actually have to do.
Speaker 2:Sometimes, overwhelming anxiety can simply come from not listing what is making us feel anxious. If you can write it down, it actually takes some of the power away from it. Memorize scripture this is the one I know you've probably heard if you've been around church. Right, memorizing scripture is actually a supernatural double-edged sword that does change how we feel and that's not really even rational. It's just the power of the Holy Spirit. But it is a tool that you have in your tool belt that you can use to battle against whatever's up here. Honestly, you got to be in the word to choose what actually helps you.
Speaker 2:Psalms are really important and helpful for me and my emotions. David was crazy emotional and he makes me feel a little bit more normal, but when I read Psalm 63, I read it and I go okay, he feels desperate. It's okay that I feel desperate. He is literally saying he's hungry and thirsty in his soul. I think I know what that feels like. And then what does he do? He says what's true about the character of God. He remembers what God has done in the past. Maybe I can do those same things too, and then that does change my heart and change my mind.
Speaker 2:Last one I just want to mention is pray. That's like a no brainer, but I bring it up to say. Sometimes we literally forget the one thing that we have within our grasp. That really is more powerful than any action we could actually do on our own. I think about the stories in the Bible when the disciples are with Jesus in the boat and they're like we're dying. Meanwhile he's just fed 5,000 people from nothing, gets in the boat with them and they just forget. All we have to do is ask this dude in the boat to help us, and he does. You have that power with you. If you are a believer, jesus is literally indwelling inside of you. You have everything you need.
Speaker 2:Last thing I'll say on top down how you spend your time might be affecting how you feel. So, especially with phones, they have like a direct line to our affections as well as our attentions. This is the phrase that I just keep bouncing around in my head what you think about, you care about, what you care about, you chase. What you chase, you become. What you think about, you care about, what you care about, you chase and what you chase, you become. So if there is something that's taking up a lot of time or attention or emotion in your life, just make sure it deserves that time and attention, because it is changing you and if it's giving you more anxiety than it is, help build you up into the person that you want to be. Maybe it doesn't actually deserve time in your life.
Speaker 1:And what we talked about when we were thinking about this was it doesn't actually have to mean anything about you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a good one.
Speaker 1:Well, like thoughts are just thoughts. Have you ever heard that A thought's a thought? Can you explain that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a thought's just a thought. So sometimes when I'm driving, I randomly think wow, how crazy would that be if I ran off the road and hit a tree? Okay, I say that out loud, with zero shame. I don't want to do that Like I like my life, I want to live. But the thought pops into my head how crazy would that be. Right, that thought does not mean anything about me, it doesn't mean I want to drive my car off into a tree.
Speaker 2:Things like that happen in your brain all day, every day, and if we give them our attention, they absolutely grow. So if you feed something, if you give it the attention, it will continue to grow and it will become this big monster that all of a sudden you're like oh my gosh, I have to battle this, when in reality I could have said my thought doesn't mean anything about me, it's just a thought. I actually like to picture it like an ant getting on the screen of my brain and just walking across and then it walks off. It doesn't have to mean anything about me. Anything else you'd add to that.
Speaker 1:It can be really overwhelming. If you have one of those thoughts and it's not just a weird one, like what, if I do that, that feels like a bad one. But if you have a weird one like, uh, you know what, if I just stood up in the middle of the sermon and like did something goofy, you know that just that doesn't really make you feel too uncomfortable.
Speaker 1:It's the ones that are like wow, that's kind of dark yeah, attached to my identity, yeah, like I mean we talk to people about all kinds of things being counselors, it's kind of a cool space and then people tell us stuff, stuff that you don't normally tell everybody because we have to. You know, we can't tell anybody about what those things are, but in general we'll have people share stuff. That's like, yeah, I'm glad you could get that off your chest. Also, that doesn't really mean that you actually want to do that. It doesn't really define you. It could be about your proclivities towards who you find attractive.
Speaker 1:I mean, I've heard people go well, I thought that you know their boy. I thought that boy was attractive. Like, does that mean I'm gay? I'm like, well, that's a whole identity conversation. But you had the thought and sometimes it can feel like, since I had a thought, then it's true, yeah, it must be true. But if we can catch the lie, we can catch it and just notice it. I think what we're going to talk about in a minute is just notice it and then see if it can pass on down the line, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a hundred percent.
Speaker 1:And not get so attached. Thoughts don't need to be sticky. You need it and not get so attached. Thoughts don't need to be sticky. What's the opposite of sticky Slippery?
Speaker 2:Slippery.
Speaker 1:Slippery thoughts, noticing them If they happen often enough. It's interesting, so we'll maybe look at it.
Speaker 2:The only thing I'll add to that before you jump in is that that goes directly in difference to what we normally do with our emotions, which is stuff them down, ignore them. They're not helping me. I don't know what to do with them, so I'm just going to make them go away. So I've been saying, hey, don't give them too much time or attention. Right, notice is where we're going to camp out. There is a skill that is literally called noticing. That is somewhere in that spectrum of giving them way too much time and attention and stuffing them so far down that you'll never talk about them. Take it away.
Speaker 1:So, caitlin, what we've talked about is the top. Now we want to go to the bottom, because the top is something I think you're mostly aware of from just if you've been in the church world or even just around an adult who thinks like from 1975 or 1990, somewhere in there, if they were born around, then they probably think about emotions like Caitlin just said, like could we just not? You know, they get to this point where maybe they've told you can you just get over it? Have you ever heard that? Like just, can you quit, just stop it?
Speaker 1:There's a really fun video. I mean by fun, I mean it's fun for therapists, because we're therapists, and so it was like this old guy who only his only trick in being a therapist was when people came in, he would just yell at them and tell them to stop it. And I think that's true of some older adults, it's even true of our own cells as we think about ways that we've gone about trying to stop this anxiety that happens to us all, it's going to happen. Uh, the the other approach to add into it. I'm not saying we need to delete the top, we need to keep the top, but sometimes we can't even get to the top till we go to the bottom. Okay, so we're going to go bottoms up to get to the top, because this stuff you got to be able to do it at some level. But what happens when you get to the end of that whatever like okay, let's imagine you're in school, you're in third period.
Speaker 2:It's the worst period.
Speaker 1:It is the worst and I don't know how the ABD day day goes, but let's say it's the next class right after that and it's not lunch, okay, and you don't have any time and you just realized it's my anatomy test. Anybody ever had an anatomy test like three people? Great, anybody ever had a biology test?
Speaker 2:okay, we're still in the ninth grade. I love, love it.
Speaker 1:That's when I did that, or algebra, whatever, but let's say it's anatomy, because that's the worst, because you have to memorize all this stuff and you totally forgot. It's skeleton day and I have no idea where the tibia is. And it's third period and what's happening in fourth period.
Speaker 1:And you literally can't get out of your own skin to go somewhere else to study for that, because it's happening. And what happens before even you get to like the planning phase of this? You haven't even gotten there. That's kind of a cognitive process in the top of your brain. What's starting to happen to your body? Can anybody? Maybe you feel brave enough to just say this is what happens to my body when that kind of scenario happens oh, baby, stomach hurt Anybody. Yep, mine already hurts. Got two stomachs, both hurting Anything else. Yes, you were going to say, yeah, you were looking down. No, no, right here. When you get anxious, yeah, what do you feel in your body?
Speaker 2:Right now. What do you feel Is he?
Speaker 1:calling you out. Maybe your face gets a little red. Ooh, that's a good one. Maybe you're. You know what he's still wondering Is he pointing at me? No, he's pointing at you.
Speaker 2:You did great. When I'm anxious, I sweat.
Speaker 1:Maybe you sweat Any sweaters out there.
Speaker 2:I sweat so much sweaters out there I sweat.
Speaker 1:Anybody's sweating right now? Let's do we want to check? I'm like I wore this sweater soaking wet. She's so anxious. No, anything else. Yeah, you get the jitters. Oh, chest hurts. I thought you were like that makes me jittery when the chest hurts literally in your chest it feels like what it hurts, like it's painful. Yeah, what about you? Okay, so I did get jittery, I didn't make that up.
Speaker 2:I heard you.
Speaker 1:Jittery, sweaty hands. Are her hands sweaty right now? Nope, not anxious. Your body listen to this. Your body knows, sometimes before your brain even gets a hold of it. Your gut knows what's going on. It starts churning, your heart rate sometimes increases, your blood pressure goes up, your eyes may dilate, or maybe they get really hyper-focused and do everybody got anybody ever got the wah-wahs, the?
Speaker 2:wah-wahs.
Speaker 1:Everything around you is like wah-wah-wah-wah-wah.
Speaker 2:Charlie Brown, that's great.
Speaker 1:Like you have no idea what's happening and then you like realize I have no plan. That's where we talk about the bottom up, because we need to be able to figure out what we're going to do. And most of you, you do something. We're just trying to figure out a better way to deal with all the jitters and the heart rate increases, the blood pressure goes up. The cool thing is that God made us that way and he's not like oh crap, what did I do? I made them with a body that actually remembers that it needs to get away from bad things and run to good things. So we're going to talk about how do we help the bottom up. When you become hyper aroused, there has an excessive activation and energy in the form of the fight or flight response. You guys have heard fight or flight before. Fight or flight is when your body starts to respond to a threat. If, right now, I brought in, what do I want to bring in?
Speaker 2:A saber-toothed tiger.
Speaker 1:Yes, from prehistoric times.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Resurrected. Here it is. What do we know about saber-toothed tigers? They're scary.
Speaker 1:To me they are, I am scared of them. And if they came in and we were both in here we're all in here I'm totally going to feel some stuff Literally the same thing that you guys are talking about and when that happens, we are no longer in our window. Everybody, make me a little window right here, just kind of like that. That's your window and inside of that window are all good things, like it's okay, I can fail this anatomy test because I know that the teacher is very kind and will allow me to fix it. That's right here, in this blue area.
Speaker 2:Where the unicorn's hanging out because, that's where unicorns are.
Speaker 1:Only unicorns. Yep. Window of tolerance is the optimal zone where you can deal with stress from everyday life. That's the place where you want to be. You don't want to get too high or too low.
Speaker 1:Hypo-arousal would be kind of the sinking down and it's like almost you just melt. You're like, but you're getting the wah-wah, but you're really spacing out because you don't know what to do. Freeze response, emotionally flat, lack of energy and response. We all kind of have that natural one that we go to and, depending on what's happened in your past like if you've been through a lot of trauma or you've been through a lot of transition, or you've had a ton of just rough stuff happen in your life this window it actually shrinks a little bit. So in order to get the bottom up to work, we need to work on ways to get our window of tolerance to open up so that we can actually deal with life on life's terms, because life doesn't slow down, it keeps.
Speaker 1:There's another test the next week and there's another quiz, and there's another person who said a thing and now didn't get invited to that party and uh, but they post about it on Snapchat and I have to look at that. Now I'm feeling FOMO like it never ends. So we need to widen our windows. Everybody say that with me. Widen my window.
Speaker 2:Help me widen my window.
Speaker 1:How do I do that?
Speaker 2:Can I pause you real quick?
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:I think people are familiar with hyperarousal, maybe Like I'm so jittery I'm anxious, I notice I'm sweating, my body's reacting big, like I'm out of control. Both of these happen. Not one is good or bad. We just tend towards one of them generally. Some of you, however, might tend toward hypoarousal, in the sense that maybe the more anxious you get, the more you withdraw from life. Like the sadder you become, the more numb you feel, like life isn't kind of as exciting anymore. Because I'm anxious, not because I'm sad. It's like a misplaced feeling. Does this make sense? So you could be either at different times throughout your life?
Speaker 1:And it can almost look like depression, right, because they're friends, they go hang out together, anxiety and depression. They like play games together and when one of them's really working, the other one kind of takes a backseat and they can switch around so they're good like that.
Speaker 1:They're good like that in the most terrible way. The good news is that God didn't leave us suspended in the midst of space and time without any sort of ways to deal with these things. But we've already tried to top down, we've tried to outthink it and it's gotten kind of tough. So Caitlin named one thing, which is to be able to name the thing that you're anxious about. So I want you to write this down because it's a good little trick, it's a little life hack for anxiety. It's called name it to tame it. So if you're taking notes at home for those of you watching on camera, name it to tame it. Some of you are like are we actually live streaming this? We aren't, we're not. Name it to tame it. Name it. What are you naming your emotion? Vineyard vines.
Speaker 1:What's one emotion you felt in the last seven days that was kind of troubling, maybe on not so fun. Yeah, thanks for sharing. You felt nervousness. Anybody else ever felt nervousness? Right, when you feel it, you notice it, and we've already talked about what we felt in our body. We felt the jitters and the tension and literally my chest hurts. I felt nervous. So you say it. You say it out loud. The next thing is you're going to want to say what it's about. Okay, now you didn't say what it's about, but I'm going to ask somebody else. Don't tell me the emotion. Just tell me. If you had an emotion, what was it about? Did you have an emotion this last week? At least one, yep, yeah, you can't move away.
Speaker 2:She's looking behind her. She's like dang it, Did you have an?
Speaker 1:emotion this week? Yeah, maybe one or a thousand. Okay, don't tell me what it is, but what was?
Speaker 1:it about my future. We could pair those together. That'd be perfect. I felt nervous about my future. You name it to tame it. So when you name it, you're actually giving words to something that feels a little mysterious, but you're saying it out loud.
Speaker 1:So what I want you to do right now are you guys mostly sitting beside somebody that you feel like wouldn't murder you in your sleep, somebody that you feel like wouldn't murder you in your sleep. Some of you are wondering now if you're going to get shivved on the way home. Here's what I'd like you to do. I'd like you to turn. You may have to use threes, but I want you to do just this. I want you to name an emotion that you felt, and here's the deal. Some of you are going to be like I felt despondent. You're like okay, that's pretty deep, it's okay. Some of you are going to be like I felt happy, right, somewhere in between.
Speaker 1:Those extremes is where I want you to go. Don't go too deep. Don't be like I was suicidal at 4 am, like whoa, whoa. Come tell me that, come. Don't be like, oh, suicidal at 4 am, like whoa, whoa. Come tell me that. Come. Tell me, yeah, it's extreme. Don't go there. This is not the place for that. Afterwards, please tell your leader, or tell me. I want to just like a middle of the road one. I feel about what? And here's the last thing that I want you to think about yourself is what do you need? And when I say go, I'll give you about 30 seconds. This shouldn't take very long. You'll be really loud and I'll come back on the mic and say shh, and that's when you'll go. Shh, it'll be perfect. Okay, you have 30 seconds to tell somebody that you don't think is going to hurt you an emotion you felt and why Ready set, go.
Speaker 2:I love it. Can I put you on the spot? Maybe, I would just be curious if they could hear you like can you do it for us? In the past week, something that I felt about what and I needed blank, so I'm gonna make him do it. He just made y'all do it, some of you. It's like, oh, so fun. I love talking about how I feel some of you were like literally never thought about doing that, so ew oh, I'm just I'm asking him.
Speaker 1:In the past week, I have children and so they always produce emotions in me. So it's like finding which one um I. I think the most recent one was when my second his name is Judah the lion of the tribe, and he this is this morning, I'll go. This morning he wouldn't listen, came down whatever, he's a five-year-old kid and he produced in me such anger and vitriol. Simply by looking at me it's hard to imagine how it is.
Speaker 2:But that's what his face looked like. Have you ever had anybody?
Speaker 1:look at you, like even your friend, like no, it's only five year olds and they just they're the worst. So I'm justifying every action I have post that. But I picked him up because we'd already had many interactions and then I took him in the room and I I wanted to spank him. Every part of me wanted to spank him. We spank Sorry, he's five, though it doesn't really help. I wanted to, though he don't care. So I sat him down and I think I felt overwhelmed and angry about the situation and what I needed to do. What I needed was to breathe, and I'm telling good things on myself because I'm on stage, so I want to look good. So I did the right thing and he sat in his beanbag and I sat in my beanbag and I asked him what was so upsetting to him and I needed first before I could even get to that part of my brain that was like smart and an adult I needed to breathe. That's all I needed in that moment was to breathe.
Speaker 2:It's great, Even as I like watch him tell you how he felt. I noticed he tensed up. He actually slowed down. It took him a while to get there, to really be like Ooh, that okay. Now I'm remembering how I felt and I'm feeling it all over again, Like it's uncomfortable to do that on stage. It's uncomfortable to do that in your life sometimes. So thank you for being vulnerable and showing us Name it to tame it.
Speaker 1:Did everybody participate as well? Did anybody hear something weird? That their friend said that they want to shout out in front of everybody? Please don't do that. I'm just kidding. No, she's like I will. She's like I don't mind embarrassing my friend. No, she's like I will. She's like I don't mind embarrassing my friend.
Speaker 2:Oh, we did that, we just did that.
Speaker 1:This is well we kind of did that that's true, yeah so, when it comes to working from the bottom up, we want to do two things we want to lean in and we also need to know when to back away. There there's times and a lot of things in life where you need to lean in when you're like, okay, like this person is digging my vibes, right, I don't know how you would say that in these common this yeah, you don't say digging my vibes anymore.
Speaker 2:How would you?
Speaker 1:say that like if somebody's yeah, you've got the riz and they're feeling the riz and then the riz, and then we have both risen and the riz double riz. So you're feeling the Riz and then the Riz, and then we have both Riz and the Riz double Riz. So you're moving in. There's times in life to lean in to something with anxiety. There's times to lean in and do exactly what we just did, pay attention to it, name it so you can tame it. And then there's times to do what we're about to talk about A lot of things which are like you need to back away from that for a bit because it's a lot. Has anybody ever told you like that's a lot? Nobody's ever told you that good, you have good, good friends, but sometimes it's just. It just is a lot. I want to give you some tools to handle the that's a lot kind of stuff. What is this?
Speaker 2:well, this I brought up because in our so we've talked about leaning in, you're engaging with your, you're naming it to tame it right, but when it's in your body and this hasn't worked we just need to learn how to distance ourself from it and back away. Tyler has talked about hey, there's this window of tolerance that shrinks when anxiety goes up and you can't handle as much. So part of backing away is learning to expand this window of tolerance a little bit. Some of the things that you can do are listed here, right? We're going to get into some practicals of what it might look like to return to a window of tolerance, make it bigger for you when things are too overwhelming.
Speaker 1:That's great context, okay Next, oh, so many cool things. Okay, what I I want you to do here, because you don't need to write all these down. Did they take all your phones?
Speaker 2:you have them so you have one.
Speaker 1:Take a picture of that right now. I skipped that oh, we are.
Speaker 2:Feel free to walk up there too, if you need, and then go back to your seat, because there's a lot on here we're going to walk through it. We're going to talk about it for a bit. I think this is the fun that's weird to say, but maybe the fun stuff of anxiety, Because I think it's really easy to get stuck in the hard when you can't win and anxiety won't go away. But this gives you tools in your tool belt.
Speaker 1:I want everybody to take off your shoes.
Speaker 2:Ooh, stinky, you're ready. I'm taking mine off.
Speaker 1:They're already off Perfect. 30 off perfect. That's my favorite we're gonna do the first one.
Speaker 1:We're not gonna go through literally every one of these. Everybody got your shoes off. Did anybody forget to wear good socks? Yeah, all you're gonna do want you to take your feet, and this will involve some like focus. Right, so you need to kind of like, yeah, just for a second, because when it comes to doing this kind of stuff, it's all about just noticing what's happening in the here and now. Just noticing what's happening in the here and now, rather than what's happening in the there and then and in the future. And we get to future tripping. We need to be where our feet are. Anybody ever heard that? You can write that down. That's a good one. Be where your feet are, and this is a tangible way that you can actually feel where your feet are. You take your feet and you just rub them on whatever surface is below you. It's best when you're actually outside in the grass and you can actually feel the blades of grass.
Speaker 1:When we talk about being in school and you're having the anxiety from the test or the next thing unless it's a totally weird thing to take off your shoes, that's something that nobody really will notice and you're just trying to ground. The word is grounding, and a lot of the things that you'll see here are called grounding because, literally, you're putting your foot on the ground. You're not trying to do anything crazy, you're just trying to notice it. As you move your foot on this carpet, I notice the prickly nature of it. I noticed that it actually sends up some good vibes all the way to my spine. That's because our body's connected and what we're aiming to do is tell our central nervous system something like don't get so excited, calm down when you take off your shoes and feel the ground. It's grounding. You're actually feeling what's happening in the present and it's soothing. Did anybody experience any soothe, or was it totally awful?
Speaker 1:Y'all have really cold concrete, but hey you did good, and it's a weird thing, because we don't often think about taking care of ourselves in that way. We often think about that being a negative thing, or maybe we use food to take care of ourselves. There's, we often think about that being a negative thing, or maybe we use food to take care of ourselves. There's some things on there about that, but there's a lot of ways. That's the first one, caitlin. Once you get to the second one, or whatever, you pick one.
Speaker 2:Okay, forecount breathing. I do that all the time. I'll add onto this right, we are talking about anxiety. I'll remind you, it's an overestimation of a threat and an underestimation of my ability to cope with it. It is mostly future oriented. So when we get stuck in our anxiety, it is up in our head and out here, and I'm not existing on this planet, literally right here where I'm standing. Does that make sense? So when Tyler's talking about grounding, noticing what's in your body, it's a way of taking power away from the anxiety, away from the brain, and going. Let me actually address the body that's freaking out, and if I can dial that down from a 10 to a two, then I'm not actually as anxious. All of these are ways to address that physical part of us.
Speaker 2:So, four, count breathing. Here's I'm just literally going to do it with you. Think about a box with four sides. Here's how I do it With me. I'm going to count to four and you're going to inhale, so ready. Inhale One, two, three, four. Exhale Two, three, four. Keep. Exhale Five, two, three, four. Keep. Exhale five, seven, eight and rest. Two, three, four. Okay, we're going to do it one more time, now that you know what we're doing and you're not, like, can't breathe. Okay, so you're just taking a breath in for four, exhaling for eight, resting for four. Close your eyes. If you're distracted, ready, inhale, exhale and rest. Easy as pie. You're doing that silently, no one knows.
Speaker 1:I didn't even notice.
Speaker 2:You didn't notice that we were breathing. When you control your breathing specifically in this manner, you have the ability to decrease your heart rate by 30 beats per minute in two minutes. Okay, so isn't that crazy?
Speaker 1:That's a lot. What does that even? Why does that matter? What if I want an elevated heart rate? It's fun to do that.
Speaker 2:When your heart is elevated, all of your oxygen then is being forced to where your body is sending your blood, and you are no longer in control, necessarily, of regulating that heart rate. What else would you add to that?
Speaker 1:Sounds like if I slow my heart rate, that's a good thing for my anxiety. Having lower beats per minute, that's going to help me not be so anxious about a test or a relationship.
Speaker 2:You know, what's crazy is the way I actually learned that I had to go through something called an active shooter training. Many of you might've had to do that at a school, I don't know, but in times of crisis, we have to know how to handle that threat and that crisis. They taught us how to square breathe in case some huge threat is happening and I need to be able to make a good decision. The first step in me even being able to make it a good decision and engage with my brain is addressing my breath, because my breath controls my heart rate, which then connects to my brain.
Speaker 1:I like it. Are there any military active duty people in here? Good, so I can say whatever I want. Now I don't actually know if this is true, which is why I'm testing, and if it's untrue you can go Google it later and find it. But I think the way that they teach in sniper school is exactly what she just said. If you want to shoot the enemy target and he's more than 700 yards away, any slight movement will create lots of problems for shooting the bad guy, and so having that slow breath, calming breath into your belly and out it, actually in the same way that it helps a person focus and shoot the bad guy, maybe Call of Duty is a good example. I remember Call of Duty. They do like this when they get winded. Did you ever play that?
Speaker 2:Yes, they would do like this.
Speaker 1:But if you slowed down, he slows down, he slows down, he's less anxious, he's more able to do what he needs to do.
Speaker 2:If you are able to exhale for longer than you inhale, you will not progress in your anxiety.
Speaker 1:That's helpful for anxiety attacks too, Cause I think that's what scares a lot of people is like I'm having a heart attack. You get so overwhelmed and you have what we call an anxiety attack. Anybody ever read about those in?
Speaker 2:a book Panic attack, anxiety attack.
Speaker 1:You call it an anxiety attack, a panic attack, and being able to breathe out longer than you breathe in Yep, literally with my kids.
Speaker 2:I'm like you got to blow the candle out. I make a candle, they're freaking out. I'm like, just blow the candle and we they can't. So you have to slow down and the longer you can breathe out, the more regularly you become. You're not at risk for this panic attack anymore.
Speaker 1:Pretty cool trick. Okay, this is the one that I like. Somehow that helps you with your anxiety. Cuddling, oh, you guys should not cuddle until you're married. Okay, then you can use that skill. Married, okay, then you can use that skill. Maybe, uh, no cuddling at D now at all. But there is something about physical touch, right? Even dudes do it, right. Uh, the bro. Hug Anybody do the bro hug.
Speaker 2:I think I know how.
Speaker 1:Okay, she doesn't know how I know the problem.
Speaker 2:I thought it was going to be like this.
Speaker 1:Is it this one? No, it's this, and then this it's like the shoulder.
Speaker 1:Why did we just do that? Why do humans do that? Do you ever think about that? Why do we shake hands? There's something about that. It's both helpful for human, just relationships, and it's very helpful when your body gets dysregulated. This is what God made you. Is that you want that touch to affirm that, hey, you're okay, I'm okay, we're all right and you can try to hug yourself, but sometimes you're just like that changes it. Don't be afraid, whether you're male or female, to be like I think I need a hug. Caitlin says it to me all the time I think I need a hug. I don't often say that a lot, but I truly do need it, so she just gives it to me. Being able to do any one of those things is so powerful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the cool science behind that is that what your brain needs to regulate is an up dose of oxytocin, and oxytocin is what's actually released within your body when you experience physical touch with someone. Isn't that crazy? So like I'm not addressing my anxiety at all and I'm touching him and it's actually gonna calm me down because my body is releasing the hormones that I need in order to regulate my brain. That's what all of these things do. Yeah, he felt it go out of him. That's what happens, too, with all these foods. The reason this is so helpful to eat these things, things that are good for your brain is because when you eat them, they produce those chemicals that your brain is actually hungry for when you're experiencing those heightened emotions. It's all connected. It's so cool.
Speaker 1:When most people come to our office and they say or their parents bring them because they're like my daughter is so anxious or my son's so anxious and I don't understand why, and we look at these things and they're not doing any of them. So we have to kind of relearn how to do those things, because typically we're trying to start up here and so all these things exist kind of as like hey, these are really good ideas that people don't have access to because they're so overwhelmed.
Speaker 1:Let's do one, maybe two more, and then we'll kind of ask for questions. Okay, the one that you were asking about. Okay, it's weird, this is a weird one. You guys want to do a weird one? Okay, we're going to do, which is exactly what it sounds like, because we're going to make those sounds with our mouths and it's going to reverberate into your body. I think I need a volunteer who's not afraid, who's not going to. You asked for it, so I want you and you yeah, let's get to it.
Speaker 2:With the pink hat. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So come up here.
Speaker 2:Oh, he wants it.
Speaker 1:You're going to basically just demonstrate all of this for them. Up here Right up here on stage.
Speaker 2:Give them a round of applause.
Speaker 1:These people are brave people so brave Because these people are brave people so brave. So what you're going to do, what you're going to do is you're going to y'all have to watch them, because you're going to do it in a minute, but they're going to demonstrate first. You are going to say I, so just say I. All right, it's going to be louder next time. Then you're going to say uh, I heard it.
Speaker 2:You can't hear me, they're already ready.
Speaker 1:Y'all are the demonstrators, so you got to be a little bit more forceful. So, uh, okay, so y'all be quiet, let them do it.
Speaker 2:I can mic you up if you want me to.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're going to mic them up actually On the count of Like, truly, you're best.
Speaker 1:Aya, okay, okay and if it's not good enough, I'm going to have you guys keep score Zero to ten. Zero is no good, ten is the best. You're going to rate her and you, you want to. You want to rate him Zero to ten. Okay, if it's not a 10, I'm going to make you do it again. So you may as well go all out. Okay, and she's a harsh critic, I'm pretty sure. Okay, so I ready On the count of three. Yeah, she's got to remember the words. It was I. Uh, right, okay, you in there, you in the zone. He's ready. You should not only feel it in the back of your throat, but it should feel into your chest and your belly. Okay, ready. One, two, three.
Speaker 1:Ay-yi-yo he was so loud. You can be harsh, it's okay. The first one, the second one, we'll give her a little bit of grace. So they said that the number was a five. Give me five more units of whatever, and then we'll let you go to the. What you did was a five. They want a 10, apparently. So you're going to move it up to here, okay.
Speaker 2:I think. I think what they're looking for is more like oh, she did it.
Speaker 1:You want you, can you do it? Oh, she's got it yeah. Did y'all rate Brady, let's get some snaps going right here.
Speaker 2:He had a six. That's good.
Speaker 1:Ready One, two, three. She wasn't sure, just you. Yeah, okay, you're going to watch One, two, three.
Speaker 2:Ah, everybody give her a round of applause. Brady, you did win. You got a six, you got a five.
Speaker 1:We're going to let him show us the real way Goes to the men.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you ready. You want an opportunity to get four more points.
Speaker 1:It's the amount of microphones that's necessary to do the sound. On the count of three you know what you want me to do with you. We'll do it together. On the count yeah, ready. One, two, three.
Speaker 2:Take Kaylee, and I are going to do it for you. That was a good one. This is not just a general silliness. They are confident. They are confident in their ability to eye it, not for this one, we may get you on the next thing.
Speaker 1:Let's all do it together. On the count of three, we're going to say I, and then, on the right after that, we'll say I, okay, ready, one, two, three, I. I Now give yourself a round of applause. That was very nice, very nice.
Speaker 2:It's very George of the Jungle.
Speaker 1:Something fascinating that happens when your body kind of vibrates a little bit. It sends some good signals down to your central nervous system that says we're cool, Nothing to worry about here, and it expands your window of tolerance. Let's pick one more.
Speaker 2:Well, I will actually say this. So there's a lot on here that are great things to do when you're not anxious. All these things can be employed after the fact, right, but so much of actually learning to regulate your body and battle anxiety is about taking good care of yourself. Slash, maybe, getting there before your way out of your window of tolerance, something that is wildly helpful for me. I'm super artsy. If I can create something in my normal daily life, it's like 100 points against anxiety overtaking me, and it has nothing to do with like, oh, I'm not even thinking about being anxious, but if you can create something, if you can do art, maybe you do dance, move your body, listen to music, what else I mean? Yeah, oh, okay, it does say pet a pet.
Speaker 2:If you're allowed to get a pet, I say do it, um, but that again it's. It's oh, this is our sweet puppy. Yeah, he died this year. It was really sad. It's how I remember him. His name was River. He was the best ever, um, hey, seriously, though, like I know, you can literally go pet animals at the shelter every weekend. Just show up. They'll let you play with puppies for an hour. Like, do it and see if it helps your mental health Okay.
Speaker 1:That's a lot of stuff and, as you look at it, does anybody have by show of a hand and it will answer a question about any of them? That don't make sense. You're like what does that one mean? Yeah, oh yeah, it's a. It's an interesting one.
Speaker 1:I used this in a courtroom one time of all places, because I had to go and testify on behalf of a client and I was so, so nervous, like I'm an adult man.
Speaker 1:It happens, it doesn't go away, and so I was like how do I fix this? There's this technique that allows your body to sort of regulate by tapping, and you can tap different ways and I'm not going to show you all of them. The one that I use was right between my collarbone and I think it's really nice, like when you're about to take a test or something, and it's kind of low key, like nobody sees you doing it, so you can just kind of tap right there. Right, I pair it with breathing. You can also tap right between your thumb and your pointer finger, right there. It's not like a fast tap, right, if you were wanting to tell your central nervous system, which is shooting out impulses, right, if you wanted to tell it to slow down like it's. It's just a a silent way to kind of take care of yourself, like and breathe, and kind of slow yourself down you'll notice that your tap goes slower as you do it on your thighs.
Speaker 1:Every other one, like bilateral to learn something every day if you're sitting the the video that I watched. It's on youtube. You guys can google it youtube. It was like somebody finding different places in their own head that one might be a little bit more obnoxious if you're sitting in class and somebody's like you know, like okay, well, maybe you're just like low-key doing it down here. There's different pressure points that, uh, I don't know if it's chinese medicine or what, but it seems to work and I'm all about using what works. Other questions that was a great question on the tapping. There was one over here somewhere.
Speaker 2:Maybe yeah.
Speaker 1:Did you have somebody in mind? Okay, probably not that person. Is he on the internet? He's not an influencer, he's a real human find somebody who, looking somebody in the face, like having eye contact in general, probably don't look at somebody that's going to make you nervous.
Speaker 2:Like let's call him a safe person.
Speaker 1:Safe person. He's on the internets. Can you imagine that? Yeah, that would not make me calm and you guys broke up.
Speaker 2:I'd be like. This is worse if I have to look at you in the eyes.
Speaker 1:Love it. Any other questions? Back there In your vines. You have a name. You have a name. What was it? Fair enough.
Speaker 2:There's a question up here. Is there any? Oh yeah, Go for it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's an app, it's free. It's an Australian voice. And meditation you've probably heard about it. Meditation is good. To meditate on the word of God, right To find a passage of scripture I've hidden your word in my heart that I may not sin against you. I know the plans I have. You probably have done some of that kind of stuff. Meditation in this regard is being able to pay attention to your own body of stuff. Meditation in this regard is being able to pay attention to your own body. It's not so that you can get into some weird you know maybe Buddhist kind of mentality. It's not like that. It's just for the sake of breathing. That's what that is, and it's a nice Australian voice. If you like Australian voices, it would be good. Any questions in general about what we've talked about today? This would be the brief Q&A.
Speaker 2:Well, actually we don't know the schedule after this.
Speaker 1:I don't know what's next.
Speaker 2:We will release you after this. I think you'll go back, okay, after? Yeah, after this, we will release you.
Speaker 1:Any other questions? Comments concerns poetry I don't know any poetry. Well, we certainly thank you guys for being willing to ask one more question. It sends the blood into the extremities and it gets your heart rate going in a good way and like an exciting way. It's good for you. Has anybody ever taken a cold shower, like on purpose, like super cold?
Speaker 2:I hate them.
Speaker 1:Is there a reason why you did that? Because it felt awful or because it felt awfully good? It's kind of both. Yeah, Cryotherapy, that kind of thing. All right, guys, I'm going to that's all we got.
Speaker 2:Let's pray. We're going to Baptist church.
Speaker 1:We're going to pray and we're going to thank the Lord that he made our bodies and that he's not surprised by the fact that we're able to use stuff to deal with the anxieties of the world.
Speaker 1:So we'll pray and then you can do whatever it is that you need to do. Alrighty, lord, what a gift for these folks in the room that they get a chance to hear that you're not surprised by anxiety, you're not surprised by what's happening, and that we can cast our cares on you. We can use the top of our brain to do that and, if needed, we can get our body regulated, get back in a window of tolerance, so that we can truly do that what you've called us to do to live lives on purpose, with intention, to share the gospel, to love our neighbors as ourselves, thank you. To love our neighbors as ourselves, thank you. I pray that you'd bless these guys as they go back to their host homes and that they would have intentional conversations, that the leaders would have energy that they need to continue on. We're grateful for the work that you're doing in this space. Amen, amen. See you guys.