Chris Evans has always been open about his experience in dealing with anxiety. As he successfully overcame his anxiety, he gained much wisdom that we can also learn from. Here are the things that we could learn from the ASP co-founder about dealing with anxiety
Defining Anxiety
1. “Like most of our anxiety in life, it’s about these fears of what will happen.”
2. “Anxiety in general is predicated on living outside of the moments. [It’s] analyzing the past, and worrying about the future.“
How to Combat Your Anxiety the Chris Evans’ Way
Here are the helpful ways that you can apply to ease up your anxiety:
1. Fear and still your mind
“A lot of the fear that breeds anxiety never really happens, and it’s your own making”
“When you’re able to still your mind, and be present in your body, those fears melt away.”
Experience and exposure enable you to hone your ability to still your mind.
2. Dwelling on worries and fears
“When you choose not to dwell on them [fears], to look for them, to read or absorb them, they do disappear.”
“If you took a glass of water and you put a handful of salt in it, and took a sip, it would taste terrible. But if you took that same handful of salt, and put it in a lake and sip the lake, you wouldn’t taste the salt at all. The salt is your pain, your fear, your sadness. Be the lake, you know what I mean?
So, don’t dwell purely on your fears or pains.
3. Constructing reality and silencing brain noise
“You do have the opportunity every day to construct the reality in front of you, and that starts with being present.” Learn how to stop your brain from making noise.
4. Permanence
“It’s always about the level of perspective you’re looking at it from…”
“Depending upon how you’re looking at the world, if you make your world small, your pain can feel loud and big.”
“This idea of permanence to your story is a fallacy.”
5. Your thoughts are not you
“If you recognize that you are timeless, and that your thoughts are not you, and that you’re bigger than all of it, the pain melts away.”
6. It will be okay
Believe that “Everything is always gonna be fine, always anyway, always anyway.”
Interview clips from:
- Chris Evans on “Lightyear”, Anxiety, & The MCU. (2022) MTV News
Ciele 