The Anxious Truth - A Panic, Anxiety, and Mental Health Podcast · Drew Linsalata

How Do We Use Mindfulness In Anxiety Therapy? (Part 2) | EP 319

·34 min·2 clips

Mindfulness is "the gym for attention," not a way to erase anxiety.

The episode opens by framing itself as part two of a longer conversation, and it sends listeners back to episode 318 first. From there, Lauren Rosen and Joanna Hardis stay with the same question: how do mindfulness and mindful acceptance actually get used in anxiety therapy? The answer keeps coming back to practice, not performance. You do not wait until panic is already peaking and then decide to become fully mindful. That is not how it works. The conversation keeps making room for the obvious objection that anxious people want to know what to do in the moment. The reply is that you have to notice the moment before the moment, when autopilot starts pulling you away. If you never see the choice point, you never really get to choose. That is why the therapists keep pushing the bottom-up idea. Build the skill when the body is less flooded. Then it has something to stand on when the bigger wave hits. The episode also pushes back on the idea that presence only matters during a panic attack. If mindfulness matters, it matters in ordinary life too. One example is almost comically simple: leave your cell phone in another room for a while. The point is not the phone itself. The point is noticing discomfort and seeing how you respond to it. That is the real training. The conversation keeps returning to objective observation without judgment, because that is what makes acceptance useful instead of vague. Accept what is here, stop fighting the parts that cannot be controlled, and work with reality as it is. The closing note is simple enough: small moves count, and recovery is built out of a lot of them.

As heard by us

Mindfulness is framed as a skill to practice before panic takes over.

This second half of a conversation among anxiety therapists stays focused on where mindfulness and mindful acceptance fit in treatment. The point lands plainly: once anxiety has taken over, the mind is already on autopilot, so the better move is to notice the choice point…

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Why you'd press play

You want mindfulness explained as a skill you practice before panic takes over.

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