It was an honour to chat openly and deeply with Drew Carson on my podcast, time for a mojo injection (tune in on spotify here), where he talks about being productive despite living with crippling anxiety. Drew had a traumatic experience as a teenager and went through a long period of time where he didn’t leave the house and has always used online as a way to meet people, including his wife. Whilst there can be a lot of negatives online (cough trolls on twitter, insecurity and comparison shopping), it was great to be reminded of the many positives. Drew has reached millions with his podcast and at radio haver and shares my passion to remove all stigma around mental health.
Drew likes to start his morning with meditation to gather his thoughts and become less critical of himself. I read a stat recently that said we have up to 60 thousand thoughts a day and that 80% of them are negative. It takes a daily practise to ensure our mind is a nice place to be. Despite struggling with crippling anxiety, he has published a book, written screen plays, launched a radio station and taken on lots of exciting creative projects. He shares my passion for writing, which I feel is a form of medication in itself.
I think anxiety has a knack for haunting deep thinkers and highly creative people who feel and care. I just want to remind you:
Whatever trauma you may have been through, it’s not your fault.
You deserve to feel well.
It is natural to feel scared but we are extremely resiliant beings. There is always hope and on the bad days, know we just need to hold on with the knowledge that things will get better.
The dark days can teach us so much. We can learn to become more comfortable with sitting in the dark, accepting that it won’t last forever.
Comparing yourself to others is a waste of time. You are more than enough as you are.
Bottling up your feelings increases negativity. We need to let our worries out in the open. Once we share, we can start to heal and learn to distance the thoughts that don’t serve us. Think of those thoughts as floating away once you let them out.
Self discovery and growth can be a dark and scary place at times but there is so much satisfaction when we can increase our levels of self awareness, both internal and external and move on from our mistakes to create a healthier and happier world.
You got this. Mojo.
Follow her popular podcast here, which is dubbed by her global listeners as ‘free therapy’.
Tune into her daily stories on Instagram @jojofrasermojo and Facebook @jojofrasermojo.
You can purchase her first book here.
