Nervous: What to do about feeling nervous?

Have you ever been in a situation where you felt nervous and didn’t know how to handle it? Maybe you sometimes feel nervous before an important presentation at work, a first date, or a job interview.

It is normal to feel nervous in these types of situations, but if this feeling is frequent and affects your daily life, it may be time to do something about it. In this blog, I will discuss being nervous and different ways you can use to deal with feeling nervous and regain control of your life.

What is nervousness anyway?

Nervousness is actually a very distinct term. For example, athletes sometimes report that they don't worry before a competition, but they do suffer from nervousness[1]. For example, you don't worry about your preparation, but your worries are more focused on the future. On whether everything will actually work out now.

In addition, nervousness is also more linked to how your body feels[2]. Rationally, in your mind, you know that you have done everything possible to deliver a presentation well, for example, but still your body indicates that you are nervous.

This deals with nervousness in an acute stressful situation.

But even when you are in a stressful situation for a long time, your body can feel a little nervous. Then, for example, you drop something faster and you are more skittish than when you don't have a stressful period at work or at home, for example. So it's a kind of physical reaction to something happening outside of yourself that appears chaotic to you, for example (source 2).

Symptoms of feeling nervous

You can recognize a nervous feeling therefore by:

1. Increased heart rate
2. Sleeping poorly
3. Stomach Pain
4. Concentration Problems
5. Muscle Tension
6. Dizziness
7. Sweat
8. Blushing
9. Knot in the stomach
10. Vibrate
11. Anxiety
12. Doubt
13. Uncertainty
14. Breathe faster (high in the chest too)

What to do about feeling nervous

There are several things you can already do yourself against feeling nervous. For example, you can use a breathing exercise to pause or eliminate your physical reaction, so to speak. You then inhale deeply through your nose and exhale through your mouth. At that moment, also try to breathe through your belly instead of through your chest. Do this for a few minutes while trying to relax your body.

Slow breathing, as in yoga pranayamic breathing, helps you reset the nervous system[3] and thus reduce feelings of nervousness.

Aren't you in an acute stressful situation, but are you suffering more from nervousness due to stress in general? Then doing something relaxing for a while can also help well against this feeling. For example, you can distract yourself with a nice book or by listening to music you like.

A walk in nature always works wonders for reducing nervousness, too. For example, research shows that if you go for a walk during your lunch break at work it helps to reduce nervousness and to feel enthusiasm and relaxation again. In the study, participants walked for 10 weeks, three times a week, for 30 minutes during their lunch break. So you don't even have to do this daily[4].

Meditation and yoga also help you take a break from thinking about what makes you nervous.

In a Chinese study of medical students, for example, it was found that students who practiced mindfulness meditation for 30 minutes a day for a week afterwards suffered much less stress and nervousness than the group of students who did not[5]. Even doing the dishes mindfully can help you reduce nervousness[6].

Yoga helps combat nervousness by making you feel good, improving your mindfulness, and strengthening your self-compassion. It also affects your brain and helps reduce stress hormones[7].

Hypnosis against feeling nervous

Maybe you've done all these exercises before, but it's not helping you get rid of your nervousness.

In this case, there may be a little more to it, because many of the emotions and physical reactions you feel are felt because you have certain beliefs about life and how you think you should function in it.

In that case, it may be helpful to work with a hypnotherapist to see what they can do to reduce your nervous feelings.

For example, research on school children aged 13 and 14 who are nervous before tests shows that hypnotherapy works very well to reduce that nervousness before the test. In the study, the children received eight hypnosis sessions in the month prior to the test.

The teenagers learned relaxation techniques and received positive suggestions for their subconscious minds. For example, they received suggestions on time management and boosting their self-confidence. Even their attitude toward the tests themselves was altered by hypnosis, causing them to view the tests more positively. Their results also improved significantly after receiving hypnotherapy[8].

So hypnotherapy is definitely something to try out if you suffer from nervous feelings before tests or other important moments that can cause acute stress.

One of the first exercises they use to help you is relaxation, because this is also necessary to enter a deep state of hypnosis.

For example, there may be a visualization exercise in which the therapist encourages you to imagine a place where you feel completely safe and calm. This can be a place you have actually been, or it can be a place you create with your imagination. This exercise can even be taught to you by the hypnotherapist so that you can perform it with self-hypnosis.

In addition, hypnosis can then be used to find out why you get nervous. At the Hypnosis Institute Netherlands we do indicate that asking the why question as a hypnotherapist is not helpful, so this is then asked with a kind of detour.

For example, you might first be asked in what kinds of situations you experience nervousness. Is it mainly at work or school, or do you also feel this way when you go out or are with family and friends? What actually happens in situations that make you nervous? And do you have certain thoughts that keep coming back every time you get nervous?

By answering these types of questions, the hypnotherapist can assess the type of beliefs that cause you to suffer from nervous feelings and then do something about them.

You can also be encouraged to express certain feelings you are repressing. This can already be very relieving and this also helps the hypnotherapist to help you get rid of nervous feelings even better.

For example, do you have thoughts about whether you are good enough ? Then suggestions to make you more confident can already have a great effect.

Because you are in hypnosis, you are more likely to take those kinds of suggestions for truth in your subconscious. These can be suggestions such as:

"I can do anything."

"I'm good enough."

"I have charisma."

"I am loved."

These are just examples. Depending on the beliefs that make you nervous, a hypnotherapist may give you other suggestions.

Sometimes, however, things are a bit more complicated than that. In that case, regression can be performed. With regression, you go back to the very first moment when you felt so nervous. This is often a moment from your childhood, because that is the time in your life when you begin to figure out how the world works and how you’re supposed to function within it.

Next, a hypnotherapist helps you "fix" this moment. After all, your beliefs are still as they were then in your subconscious, and with hypnosis you can update those unconscious beliefs so that they better fit your life today[9]. You'll find that you'll already be experiencing much less nervousness.

When nervousness comes through your social circle

Do you suffer from nervousness with friends and family? Then an exercise with the social panorama can help you be less bothered by it.

The social panorama allows you to visualize where certain people in your life stand for you. You indicate this to the hypnotherapist who can then drill down to what people are doing in that place and what it would take to put them in a different place. Perhaps someone you don't want there is too close to you and someone you want to be close to is a little further away.

Visualizing putting people closer and further away can already do a lot to change unconscious behaviors and unconscious feelings, so you don't get nervous at family parties, for example.

So hypnotherapy can certainly help if you suffer from feeling nervous and if other ways do not help you get rid of this unpleasant feeling.

Want to learn more about hypnosis? Then come to the free online master class.

Would you like to help others with hypnosis? Then sign up for one of our seminars or training programs. You can take the courses in a classroom setting or live online.

Do you need help dealing with your nervousness? Then visit bestetherapeut.nl

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