I feel pretty in tune with the rhythms of this community, so I tried to predict what topics we (including me) would need as the year ends and a new one begins. I find that many of us have heightened expectations, yet lowered faculties from all of our demands, and that can lead to some anxiety. Today I’m talking with licensed therapist Kimberley Quinlan, an expert on anxiety disorders in her practice and on her podcast, My Anxiety Toolkit. This is her second time on the podcast, you can listen to the first interview here.
Kimberley breaks down several safety behaviors that you may be engaging in, and the way she describes perfectionism as one of them is spot on. Her advice for approaching the new year is to know your values instead of set goals, and be very compassionate to yourself. We both offer our personal experiences related to the topic, she shares some research on procrastination, and then ends with a challenge for you to put pen to paper and set yourself up for success as we move into 2023!
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TRANSCRIPT
Monica: Kimberly, it’s so great to have you back on about progress.
Kimberley: Oh, thank you for having me. It’s a pleasure.
Monica: This is a topic that is so timely, not just in terms of the actual landscape of time, but also for me personally. The new Year. It’s approaching and it’s fast approaching, and we all have lots of feelings about the new year. Some of us are excited, some of us are apathetic. Some of us are anxious. Some of us are like, meh, you know, but no matter what, we all have feelings, but we wanna speak to the people who are more anxious about the new Year for a variety of reasons, and I wanted to know why you think people find themselves especially anxious with this transition into a new year.
Kimberley: This is such a great topic. In fact I have found that this is actually the, the highest time people are looking for like an anxiety specialist, right? Because the onset of the new year, you know, what the New Year’s like, it’s all like, From a marketing perspective, it’s like, what diet are you going to go on?
It’s not, are you going to go on, it’s like, which one? You know, or you know, what are, what’s your resolution going to be? You know, or how much money did you spend over the holidays and how are you gonna recover from that? You know, or how, you know, how do you cope with the starting a new job or starting a new school?
So I think it’s a period of time where general anxiety is so high. And once you add that cultural and societal expectation of what New Year is supposed to represent, that can sort of tip us over into like, you know, really problematic degrees of anxiety
Monica: What do you find people plugging in there The new year represents that can relate. Okay. Change.
Kimberley: It’s change, but it’s a gen- listen, the self-help community is at its strongest it’s ever been. And the pushes you’ve got to do more and be better. Right. Which is wonderful. I wanna be more and do better. Like that’s wonderful. Except when, that’s the only message you’re getting year round. Right.
More, better, get stronger, get faster, right? Get healed is another big one. Like let’s heal you as if there’s something we need to heal from. When that’s happening year round, you can only imagine the additional pressure that that’s supposed to start at this like timestamp the first of the year, and that creates a lot of anxiety.
Anticipatory anxiety for people in, like, what is the goal? What should it be? Is, am I picking the right one? Will it get me the right goal? Will I stand by and stick with it? So there’s, there’s so many pieces that are, that are anxiety provoking and coming off the holidays we’re usually pretty triggered.
family we’re triggered and often we, we, it’s not helpful. Big year long decisions from a place of being triggered or going into a triggered period or season.
Monica: I did not even think of that element. Of course, so you, so you have heightened expectations and you have lowered faculties, at the same.
Kimberley: yeah. And you’re, you’re more likely to be, Dysregulated be, you know, we all regress over the holidays. I don’t know anyone. No one can be healed enough in my mind, where they go home to family and they don’t regress a little cuz it’s triggering. Right. And so I think that as a, as a season, I’m not talking about the holiday season, I’m just talking about a season in general.
As a season it’s probably not the best time to make resolutions. It’s, and, and I. You’ve gotta catch, you know, I’m an eating disorder recovered. I know I’ve talked with you about that in the past, is it’s, it’s not a time to make goals, particularly knowing that the marketing and the societal goals are going to be pushing thinness and success and beauty and, you know, all of those things that are constantly fed to us throughout the year.
Monica: That awareness is so important alone, right? That people do want your money, you know? And at the same time, like I love a season of change. I, I think I’ve shifted my expectations of what change can look like. So that’s why it feels more hopeful. But for years it was not a hopeful place. It was everything you describe.
So let’s, let’s talk about how anxiety for the new year can change our behaviors moving into the new year. And I was curious from your expertise, what you see that actually looking like. So this is more so people can pay attention and be able to recognize Oh.
I’m falling into that trap, or, oh, I’m feeling this way even though I didn’t realize I was,
Kimberley: Right. So in general there are, when a human brain interprets danger or concern or a lack of safety, we call that anxiety, right? Your brain is interpreted there to be a perceived danger, and what our brain does is it sends out some hormones to your body to prepare you for this perceived danger. And I say perceived meaning it doesn’t have to be dangerous.
Your brain just has to perceive it that way. So the new year could be a perceived danger in our mind if there’s a lot of anxiety or fear. Pressure or expectations associated to that. When that happens, we prepare for either fight, flight, freeze, or fall, right? These are behaviors we engage in to reduce or remove the anxiety that we have.
Now, what does that look like? In general, we will. Often engage in what we call safety behaviors. These are not, there’s no judgment for you doing these. Everybody does them and we can do them in different degrees. So one is just straight up avoidance, right? Like it’s too overwhelming. My brain is set off an alarm.
I’m just gonna shut it down. Not doing it. Not even gonna think about it. Don’t want to, don’t wanna, wanna consider it. And that to some degree can be helpful. But usually too much avoidance means you’re, you’re end ending up falling behind on things. It’s impacting on your functioning. Another safety behavior that we may do is the opposite end, which is to be in perfectionism, right?
Or people pleasing. Right? And we’re doing that to control the environment. So that we don’t have to experience our own anxiety, right? This happens in the holidays, , it doesn’t work and it’s exhausting, right? That the people who go into people pleasing or perfectionism or often. Are, you know, exhausted and beat themselves up because you can’t really maintain perfectionism and people pleasing.
It’s actually not that well controlled, even though it feels like you’re in control. You’re actually out of control often when you’re doing those behaviors, and that can actually increase the amount of anxiety that you experience. Another one is we do a form of people pleasing, which is called reassurance seeking.
Which is where. Consult with a lot of people or we consult with Google on whether we should or shouldn’t do a certain thing. And that can be in the form of over researching. A lot of people do a ton of like, How many people spend, how have I heard, who have anxiety? Who would say like, well, I, you know, I feel, I feel pressure to lose weight for the new year, so I’m gonna set that goal.
It’s not even in line with their values. But then they spend 12 or 14 hours researching whether they should get an elliptical or a bike , you know, like, or you know, or should, you know, Should I take a French class or a Spanish class or so forth? Like, it could be simple like that, or it could be like, oh, should I leave my job?
And they spend a lot of time. And then the, the other big one is, is hard to catch, but it’s probably the most problematic, which is just simple rumination.
Monica: Mm.
Kimberley: when we are anxious, we, because we don’t feel like we have control and there’s so much uncertainty, we just get stuck in a cycle of rumination and we, in the moment that we’re ruminating, you might say, why would we put ourselves through that?
But the thing is, when you’re ruminating, it gives you a false sense of control. And so we feel like we’re solving the problem. But we’re actually not, right? We’re actually creating so much more and generating so much suffering. And so there are things to look out for and be aware of as you move through the holidays and into the new year.
And I actually always encourage people, like, have that be the thing that you’re focusing on, just catching. And you don’t have to beat yourself up. Just be like, wow, I caught myself ruminating there like. Isn’t that interesting? How, you know, I wasn’t sure how a certain person might perceive me, so then I spent 12 minutes ruminating on all the options.
Right. And ca just catching that alone can be huge.
Monica: And that’s why we are airing. Mid-December you know, so people can pay attention to that. And I, I’ll re I’ll refresh their memory here. You talked about safety behaviors being, some of them being avoidance, perfectionism, people pleasing, reassurance seeking and rumination. I love that your, your, your tip there is to just start.
Being able to identify when it’s happening and notice it, because otherwise I think we go down that shame spiral of blaming ourselves for even acting this way, especially if we’re in the avoidance behavior. I think we tend to double down on the shame there. But none of these are. Functioning. None of these are working.
So now let’s move towards the people who are like, I’ve identified it,
Kimberley: Yep.
Monica: I know what’s going on, so now what do I do? How do I still move forward with like the possibility of a new year, but not the anxiety?
Kimberley: Right. Sometimes there’s a couple of models you could use. So you could first really look at first identifying your values, right? Is that’s, I always say to people like, don’t make a goal list for the new year. Don’t make a resolution list. Like, just get really good at knowing what your values are and they will guide you for the rest of the year.
Right? If you’re stuck in a situation where you don’t know what to do, Don’t consult with fear, consult with values. What do you value? What would the non-anxious you do in this situation? And that in and of itself can be. Such a quick transaction, right? It goes from being like back and forth and trying to figure it out to just being like, okay, I, I, the New Year’s approaching, what values do I wanna honor this year?
And it doesn’t have to be a goal, it doesn’t have to be a set of activities that you start engaging in. It’s just every day I’m gonna check in on how am I doing with the value of my health or the value of family, or the value of my spirituality, my value to Be a good citizen like it. There’s no right.
Don’t even, and again, don’t even get hyper moral about values like your value. This, like I’ll tell you, I’ve probably said this once before to somebody, is one year my value was to care less. Like that was my biggest, like we could call it a resolution, like it was to care less because I was caring to a degree that was debilitating, and so I just was at the value of lightness and a little bit of carefreeness, right? That was the value, and I had that lead me through the holidays and into the new year and all of my anxiety melted away, right?
Monica: incredible.
Kimberley: You know, it doesn’t have to be grand is another huge piece here. I’m gonna encourage you to check in social media and comparison.
Can really get us to thinking that we need to be grand. Like I’m just so tired of having to be grand, like it’s this, I’m over it. Like I’m so tired of having to be and having the message of like, even as a therapist and as a coach myself, even as like this idea of like, be your best self. No, like, that’s too grand for us human beings.
Like, that’s anxiety provoking. Let’s actually just like, let’s catch the narrative there and just be like, and, and the last piece is, is it helpful? Is it helpful? Is this the thing you’re anxious about, right? The, the, this outcome that you’re afraid of? Cuz remember, fear is always about future.
Monica: Mm-hmm. Huh.
Kimberley: It’s always about the thing you don’t wanna happen in the future, or a feeling you might have to feel that you don’t wanna feel in the future, and, and your, your job is to go, is it helpful for me to try and continue to attain that?
Is it even attainable? Right? And then from there, where do we land? Sometimes I wanna honor something that we don’t talk about. Is when it comes to the new year, and this was true for me, I’ll, I’ll share an example is when I had an eating disorder, the most powerful I ever felt was the day I set the diet.
That was a powerful day. I felt so in control. I felt like I, it was so hopeful, you know what I mean? And the year that I decided, or my therapist and I had decided against that I actually had to grieve a lot of stuff that year. Right. When we don’t push and we don’t set all these unrealistic goals, I actually had to grieve sort of the idea of losing the grand high achieving perfect. You know, look at how amazing that person is at cuz she can achieve her goal. Like I had to do some grieving of that and let some feelings show up and, and some people that’s, that in and of itself is, is hard. So I just wanna make sure people understand as we acknowledge and step away from fear and instead we sort of do behaviors based on values.
You might have some other feelings show up and, but that’s.
Monica: And that’s when I want them to embrace the mantra that I love. You introduced to your community and you, you shared it with us at Austin. You’re on. It’s a beautiful day to do hard things. Sometimes that hard thing is not following the script.
Kimberley: Yeah.
Monica: It’s setting down the goals and resolutions. It’s, it’s getting in tune, like you said, with your values and what you want and need this year, which might just be a word of the year, or it just might need to be, I’ll give myself two months and then I’ll decide about how I’m going to have goals this year.
It’s giving yourself time.
Kimberley: right, right. I, I would just add, I think it’s also important to remember, and this is more about like the resolution season is January 1st is also just. Like a Monday
Monica: Mm-hmm.
Kimberley: like, I dunno what day it is, but like, let’s just say it’s also just like a Thursday and, and let’s actually just take all of the emphasis of it being the day to set goals.
Like it’s just a Tuesday.
Monica: This is today.
Kimberley: doesn’t have to even be a day that you set a goal. Like we could actually just wipe the whole canvas clean and say it’s just a Tuesday.
Monica: I love that you gave that example. It makes me think of the first time. Three or four years ago, I got, it was my first time actually moving from that place of apathy, which was for me, I’m trying to like, I’m flipping back to make sure, like avoidance. Yeah. I basically was avoiding goals and improvement for years as a way.
To make myself feel safe with anxiety I had about not being able to meet this perfectionistic standard, right? So I had worked on lowering the standard, having better expectations, getting in tune with who I was, so all the things you’re talking about. And then I was ready. I was ready for more. I was ready to be stretched.
I was ready to reach for things and ways that I had not allowed myself to for years. And I got this goal planner that was more intense and I found myself avoiding. Too, but this whole history of everything you talked about kicked in and it was end of February. I was like, it’s okay that I’m figuring this out now.
Like I can just cross out the, the first couple months and I can start now. And I officially began in March.
Kimberley: right.
Monica: That alone became a revolutionary year for me because of that decision, not because of all the things I achieved that year. I don’t even remember what I achieved. Probably like nothing in the eyes of the world, right?
But it was, it was just that permission that it was okay that I didn’t start on time or in the right way.
Kimberley: right.
Monica: So I, I apologize for giving that long personal story, but.
Kimberley: I loved it.
Monica: Let’s, let’s now speak to those people who are in that ready space. There’s those who are need to the healing, right? Who need to just give themselves time and just say, we don’t need to do goals or resolutions or even words of the year.
Let’s let it go, but let’s now speak to people who are ready for that more piece. They’re feeling more stable and regulated in other ways. Just any tips for them about how they can still do this in a wise way.
Kimberley: Yeah. So I love the word and. Right. I love the word and because when I, when you say the ones who are ready, right? We, we usually immediately go like, let’s go then. Right? Like, come on down, let’s do it. , let’s do it right? And yes, like let’s do it to the degree in which you have a margin and the margin’s important.
Right. Like as you go to start anything, before I start anything, I go, okay, what’s the margin? Do I have a margin for things not to go well? Right? Because we know we don’t regulate well when we don’t have a margin, right? So I would check for that. Like, do you have a margin? Let’s go.
Monica: Is that, let me clarify. So it was margin it is it, I’m sure it’s based in a couple things. Is it just like, what’s my capacity right now or is it also like circumstance driven? Like what’s my time? Okay. Mm-hmm.
Kimberley: me to determine whether I have a margin to do something would be be checking in with my body. Like, do I have an energy store to, to move forward in this thing? Like, do I really know my why do I really know what the reason I’m, do I like my reasons for wanting to do it right? Cause sometimes we’ll go, okay, I’ll, you know, I’ll learn French, you.
But it’s like, do you, are you just doing that because you said one day you had to learn French by a certain age, or do you really want to, like, do you like your reason for doing it? So, so you’ve gotta know your why, but then I will pull up the calendar and go, do I have a margin for this? Right? Like, is there a margin for if my child is sick, right?
Like if, and of course that doesn’t mean you’re always waiting for a catastrophe to happen. You just wanna be really compassionate in your approach here, that it’s measured and it’s, it’s coming from a place of stability and you, you know, you’ve got your feet on the ground. It doesn’t have to be perfect here either, right?
Like we can start messy, we can start messy. But I think it is important just to check in that, cuz again, often we make goals that aren’t really that realistic. . Right? And so that’s first piece like is, are your goals, smart goals, or however you like to set goals and have you got a margin and all of that?
And, and the end of part is, are you able to have it be messy, right? Because we don’t live in a black and white. You know, real world, it’s usually going to be both. And so can we appreci it with this? And you know, so here is what I do. This is 99% of the work I do is can you do it scared? Can you do the thing?
Cuz usually we’re like, I can’t do that because I’m scared it’s one or the other. I’ll do it if I’m not scared. I won’t do it if I am scared. So we’ll go, okay, you’re gonna do it and you’re gonna do it. Right, you’re gonna do it and you’re gonna do it messy if you’re a perfectionist, right? So just thinking about what your and is can be really helpful as you in sort of move into the new year.
And that’s where the nuance is. And if you can embrace the nuance, you’re set, like you’re so much more likely to stick to your goals and you’re more likely to do it kindly. That’s the.
Monica: I like that you’re emphasizing do it kindly too,
Kimberley: Yeah. Well,
Monica: compassion.
Kimberley: well, we have, let me speak to that really quick, is we have research to show that self-criticism is the least motivating factor people. All around the world are relying on self-criticism as a motivator, and it’s actually the least successful motivator. It significantly increases procrastination by 80%.
Right. So, so it’s, it’s not helpful. It decreases outcomes, it decreases people’s ability to perform. We know this based on science. Of athletes and high achievers. So self-criticism is actually like a total buzz kill , you know what I mean? Like, it’s like you’ve got a ball and chain. Why would you carry that on purpose?
The goal here is we know self, self-compassion has way better outcomes for motivation and getting things done. Right. I personally call it the kind coach. Think of a basketball coach who knows your strengths and knows your weaknesses. They use your strengths to motivate you, and they’re aware of your challenges and they, they go into cheerleading around your challenges.
So if we can be a kind coach to ourselves, that’s the person who, that’s how we, that’s how people become high performing athletes and Olympians and, you know, Performance in any field.
Monica: And yet, So often thought, and I think still think growing up that the, it was the other way around is what it’s like the, the pure grit. Do it now. Come on. Don’t you know that that kind of mentality is what we used to think creates progress. I, that statistic is amazing.
Kimberley: well, and here’s the thing, and we’re here to talk about anxiety is there is some people who do well with. You know, I’ve had lots of clients go, Kimberly, I actually have a lot of evidence that’s worked for me. I’m a lawyer and I beat myself up the whole way through law school and now I’m a lawyer, you know, and I make a lot of money or whatever they say.
But here is what I say to them is, we have researched that self-criticism sends a message to your brain that there’s danger and then your brain sends out anxiety. So if you wanna be anxious, like, It’s cool. Yeah, you got to the top of the mountain, but do you wanna do life anxious? Do you wanna keep sending out hormones throughout your body, like you’re injecting them into your body?
Is that how you want this to go? Because it does increase anxiety.
Monica: And that’s something I know you and I have talked about in the past too. You know, those times you are able to do the. And you know, if the all or nothing model, the perfectionist model, the self-criticism model, there’s a price being paid and that’s one of them. And it’s pretty big and it’s pretty all consuming.
And I love that your work is so devoted to this and that we were able to translate it to this specific time of year in a way that is so one helpful, both deeply and practically, but also. Hope giving. Overall, this gives me a lot of hope and as part of it, it gives me a lot of license to be curious about what I need and want this year that’s allowed to change.
Do you have one small way listeners can begin on this if they’re ready to just try any of this once, one small way.
Kimberley: Mm. I. One, I don’t know if I can keep it to one. I’ll do my very best.
I think that, I think that the main message is, what I would have you do is sit down with a piece of paper blank and draw a line down the middle and on the left just list off all of your values, even if they’re silly. Like if you value fashion and you, you’d have some judgment about that.
Like just still write it down or you value you know. Coffee or silliness, like I just write them all down. Right? And, and be nonjudgmental about that. And then look at the list. And on the, the right hand side is look at the, the values that anxiety has you coming from on the right hand side. So like we’re talking about like anxieties.
If, if anxiety was a little guy on our shoulder, what is his values? His. What is fueling the anxiety? It’s usually like, you know, profit or success or competition or whatever. Perfection. And then just look at it and say, which one, if I looked at these, which one, what emotions show up for me? When I look at the list on the left, what emotions show up on the list on the right and then you move towards your values.
It’s very like, again, I think it’s really asking yourself what would the non-anxious me do?
Monica: Hmm. That’s another good mantra. I’m writing that down too. Beautiful, Kimberly, I love that. That’s a great way for them to start and it applies to whatever part of this anxiety spectrum they’re lying on in as they come up to the new year and whatever practical steps they need to take, that is something that applies to all of them.
I would love to direct people to your podcast and to your work. How about you tell people where to.
Kimberley: Sure. Yeah. I have a podcast called Your Anxiety Toolkit. I do, I specialize in all the real hard anxiety , right? The, the i, I specialize as, I’m a therapist. I specialize in pretty severe cases, but the podcast is mindfulness and self-compassion based is, you know, a 300 episodes. Back to back, you know, this kind of conversation.
So that’s what it’s all about.
Monica: Incredible. And we’ll also make sure we link to your Instagram as well, which has a lot of you sharing your wisdom. And also this community. This community is so beautiful of people who are doing hard things
Kimberley: things. I, that is exactly it. We are all about doing the hard things.
Monica: And I’ve benefited from it so much personally and also like as a mom of kids who I am continually trying to learn more about this even though I’ve dealt with anxiety in my past, not the chronic, like all consuming level that you, you often help people with the most. It’s been super helpful for me. So I thank you for your work and for your time today.
Kimberley: Thank you so much for having me.
