Anxiety As A Signal with Elke Scholz

A New Way To See Anxiety

What if managing anxiety isn't only about calming the mind, but about reconnecting with the body, creativity, and the parts of ourselves that feel most alive? Today we are exploring anxiety from both a therapeutic and a deeply personal perspective, not simply as something to get rid of, but as something we can learn to understand and work with. My guest shares how creativity, body awareness, and self-trust can help us move from fear and overwhelm towards greater calm, confidence, and connection with life. So welcome to Connect, Inspire, Create, a podcast exploring meaningful conversations about life, work, creativity, and the ways we can explore fresh ideas. Let's slow down just enough to notice what inspires or intrigues us and how these insights can help shape what we create in our lives. So I am Carol Clay, a life coach offering gentle accountability for navigating change, trusting yourself, and creating what comes next. My guests join me from around the world to share insights on how they live, think, and navigate the wonderful challenges of just being a human in our world. And so joining me today is Elka Schull, a registered psychotherapist, certified EMDR therapist, expressive arts therapist, and an author of several books, including Loving Your Life and the Anxiety Warrior series. For more than 35 years, Elka has worked with people navigating anxiety, trauma, self-doubt, and emotional overwhelm. Her work is also shaped by her own experience of anxiety, which gives her both a clinical and a deeply human perspective on what it means to move from simply managing fear towards living with more energy, creativity, and self-trust. So Elka, welcome.

What a great introduction. Thank you, Carol. Thank you.

Lovely to have you here. And I the self-trust and the creativity are two things that have been falling, I guess, into my onto my radar, into my radar, into my space lately. So I'm looking forward to digging that, digging into that. But before we dive into anxiety and the work that you've done over so many years, I'd love to ask you a different kind of question just so that people can get to know a little bit something more personal about you. But if

A Surprising Meditation On Wheels

what would people be totally surprised to know about Alka? They would go, wow, never thought that.

The first thing that comes to mind is that I do long distance cycling. Ah, okay. All year round? Pretty much because I go to warmer climate in the winter. If I'm if I and if I'm on if in the winter before that, I uh work out on a trainer for sure because I don't want to lose what I've gained.

Yeah, that's yeah. Wonderful. Yeah, and I guess that's food for the soul, huh? The long distance stuff.

Absolutely meditative. Also, I believe in circulation and health, and I've cycled my whole life. Actually, I've done a little slideshow. My one of my first pictures is I was sitting on a bicycle, and in Germany in that time, it wasn't like now, you know, no helmet and tiny little metal seat with a tiny little leather belt between my dad's handlebars. That's delightful. Oh, it's a great picture. It's a beautiful picture. In fact, I can see it over there on my desk. And I I think I must have loved it because I've been cycling ever since. So I've got all these pictures and I've done long distance cycling and yeah, yeah.

Wonderful. Yeah, thank you. Fun, fun question. Absolutely.

When Anxiety Has No Name

Well, Elka, you you've said you've worked with anxiety professionally for decades, as well as experiencing it personally yourself. And I'd love to ask you, was there a moment when you just decided, hang on a minute, we need to approach anxiety differently?

Well, absolutely, because I did not even know I had anxiety. I had a lot of suffering. And it's debilitating when it stops you and makes you feel sick or dizzy or you know, migraine headaches, or as a kid, I stuttered. And I also, even in my 20s, I would lay in a field in a fetal position until I felt better, and I had no words for that. And it wasn't until after I after I produced a book, and you know, there's something in me that believed that and still believes there's a better way, and we don't need to suffer like this. And there was this mystery, and I I've always approached it as a mystery. And anxiety is a mystery because sometimes it goes away within minutes once we figure it out, or sometimes it lasts a whole day and day after day. And and for me, it was why why was this happening? What what is making it happen like that? So myself, my clients, my family, uh, that's where we came up with 11 layers. And yeah, sometimes they stack and sometimes they don't, and it makes a lot of sense.

And you've you've looked a little deeper to find a solution. So, what would you say that anxiety is actually you know trying

Anxiety As A Shoulder Tap

to do for us?

Yeah, great question, because it's not the enemy as terrible, and I I think it's the worst feeling. So anxiety is tapping us on the shoulder. And when it's at a lower level, like I give people a scale, zero to ten. So zero is calm, like you're on vacation, right? 10 is I can't put a thought together. And so usually anxiety in a healthy way is maybe two to three, somewhere in there, going, hey, pay attention. It may wake you up in the middle of the night, and that's okay because you want to listen to what it is, and it may say, Hey, check your bank account, go do some budgeting, or take care of this. And so anxiety is really it's a signal that that we want to bring in and we want to understand it, and that's how we begin to lower it. If we push it away, which as humans we want to because it's a terrible feeling, yes, we want to feel better, which is not wrong. However, pushing it away makes it worse, it'll make us sick, it distorts thinking, it also blocks learning and creativity. So it's it's not that's not what you want to do, and it's the opposite of what our culture uh teaches us. So to bring it in, and even you've got to know, even though I've done this work, you know, some days I still have that wave of anxiety, not as often, and it and I sure can deal with it quicker.

Manage it, right?

I just say, yeah, I just say, what are you trying to tell me? What's going on? And I go through the strategies myself.

Yeah, no, absolutely. Often we do, we you know, we we discover something that works for us, and then that's what we then want to share. But do you feel sometimes that there can be like no trigger and anxiety just appears, and there's not an association to something that triggered that?

When “Out Of The Blue” Is Physical

Yeah, that's why these uh 11 layers, because it's you know, we can go through the checklist, which I have in my book, and and it's interesting too, you're right. Different things affect different people, so it's not my formula, it's more like a smorgasbord of check these things. Is it one of these? Right. And and I don't know if I answered the question because I got yeah, no, that's you're just I'm asking, you know, sometimes there isn't a trigger, it just arrives. Right. So when that happens, let's say I've had a client come in, I've had actually a few times a client has said, you know, I'm fine in my life, we've been doing the strategies, and da-da-da. And that even happened to me, and then bam, just out of the blue, we have this massive anxiety attack. And what happens then, we go to substances, and it could be a food sensitivity, which is different than an allergy, is what happens, and it happened to me, it's happened to clients, and that's how I learned about it. And it actually was something we were able to remedy in a child that you know was having these explosive episodes the same time every day. And I'm just going, wait a minute, there's something else gotta be a link in here, right? 100%. And so, food sensitivity, what happens is your body, in their case, it was potatoes, which is a staple, right? So, what happens to the body, and in my case, it was avocados, mushrooms, and almonds, all beautiful foods, but my body doesn't like them. So, your body has to take extra energy to digest and move these through your system. So it's not an allergy, you're not going to have hives or anything like that. You could have maybe digestive issues, it also can show up as anxiety because you have no resilience to any kind of stimulation, and so a food sensitivity could erupt an episode. The other could be low iron, it also could be hormones or thyroid. So, thyroid can give the same symptoms as anxiety and depression. And so you want, so if you feel like everything's order in your life, and you're going, Why, why am I having these feelings?

Still happening, right?

Yeah, then definitely uh dig a little deeper. Yeah, you want to um cover the basis.

Learning To Listen To The Body

That brings me to this part. I mean, you talk about learning to listen to ourselves and that anxiety can show up in the body before the mind even has created a story. How can someone begin listening to their body without being hyper focused on like everything? It's something I just want to hear my body gently.

It's that's a great question because that's practice. And I do teach an exercise that I've learned and fine-tuned. It's the first exercise I teach my clients is a body listening exercise. In fact, I just did it today with a client this morning. And what happens is we when we were born, we already knew we knew what felt good, we knew what didn't feel good. And that and I'm keeping those terms very specifically because that's that was the contrast. However, what happens is as we learn and it's not ill-meaning, maybe sometimes, maybe, however, it's you know, we get told, oh, you're not hungry, I just fed you. Oh, you're not you're tired now, you're on a schedule. And meanwhile, that what that's when it begins, that you know, as even as a baby, uh you're not listening to your own body, yeah. And how can we? Because we're being taught that you know, we have to be on a schedule. And honestly, any mom that I've ever coached or helped, it's been a nightmare, and yeah, it doesn't work out. So, and then we get other messages as a toddler, you're not thirsty, you know, maybe a busy mom, you're not thirsty. I just you just had a drink, but kids, kids are always hungry, they're always thirsty. It's just the way they are. It's not, it's not a yes or no. And you know, so then they're already told, don't cry, this didn't hurt so much, get over it. We have these messages that we're hearing all the time. The good, better, worse, the you know, the greater, it's not so great. All these messages are going against our bodies, and then we pick up these social and culture beliefs, you know, that blondes are more fun, or red-heads are hot-headed, I can say that, I've got red hair, or you know, all these things or men, you know, toughen up. There are so many, I want to call them lies in these beliefs. And we start having this big space of do I, don't I, this self-doubt. And we even have cartoons, you know, with the little angel and the devil, and and these conversations in our head because of all of that, and we're not dropping into our hearts and our bodies.

So here, down here, this, yeah, yeah, not above that. Yeah, because you do, then you become hyper-focused, and one doesn't want to detract from the fact that your body's got a lot to tell you.

And you can trust your body. I tell my clients, you don't have to trust me. I'll, you know, you don't even have to trust this talk. What you want to do is trust yourself. Like if it's sunshine, you know, today we we have had a lot of rain, so the sun came out. It's like just go and trust yourself to sit in the sun for a minute. Trust yourself or trust yourself that you gravitate towards certain colors. You don't have to do anything else, and that's how you start. You start with the little things, even in the grocery store. Trust what you're, you know. Maybe you want to buy raspberries. Go buy raspberries, it may not make sense, it doesn't matter.

Yeah, the body is asking. There's something I might need, a certain something, mineral, vitamin, something that might come in.

You know what I discovered. I love to forge, and I have choke cherries. I was researching, they are full of vitamin K. Who knew? Right. So it's so fascinating to me as our bodies, you know, want they want certain things. And as yeah, we've got to trust it 100%, 100%.

Yeah. So you talk about the 11 steps. Is that in your book, Loving Your Love, or the Anxiety Warrior series?

Definitely anxiety warrior. I talk about these layers, and so substances, physiology, reality, social and culture beliefs, self-doubt, perfectionism, negative thinking, highly sensitive. And then I leave memories and trauma at the bottom because those ones usually need some coaching and some care that's beyond our skill set. Though I do try to include that in the list for sure.

Okay, but yeah. And I know

Creativity As Emotional Regulation

you're also an arts therapist, and I I think that is so, you know, creativity. I was just talking to somebody earlier today, and I love to sort of start my morning off with setting aside a little bit of time for creativity before diving into, you know, as we when we work from home, it's so easy to kind of go, okay, you show up in your office and you dive straight into everything. But I find that, you know, just gently starting, and whatever that might be, you know, even if it's that you like creating your marketing and you you're playing around with images, it's still aligned that creative side of you. You don't have to be an artist necessarily to touch on creativity, right? For sure. You know, thinking about that, drawing, writing, you know, writing in our journal, movement, or making something, how does that help us regulate emotion?

Beautiful question of my life. So the arts, and you you you know this, is the arts taps into, I want to just say the other half of our life. Like we're talking, it's verbal. And you know, we have math and sequences and all those things where the arts gives us the imagination, the spiritual, the creativity, this formlessness, the liminal space. So the arts completes us, and yeah, it gives us so much. And the other piece of the art, which is we don't have to understand it, it transcends whatever we're experiencing in life. Right. And so expression or I remember a time where I was doing lots of watercolors, and my son went as a 12-year-old went to live with his dad, which was important for my son. However, my paintings were all in muted grace for a whole year. And I was surprised, and afterwards, I looked at that collection, and I just went, wow, look at what I was processing was a lot of grief. And so the arts help us, whether whether we're conscious of it or not, right? We we are processing and transcending. Uh, it's priceless.

Yeah, but uh, you know, often sometimes people might say, but I'm not creative. And I think, but everybody has yeah, a little touch. I'm my mother was an artist and she did beautiful work. And I use that same thing. I go, I'm not creative. But recently I started traveling with a just a tiny little sketchbook. And when I'm sitting somewhere by myself and having a coffee or doing something, instead of being on my phone, I'm now just trying to pencil draw the scenery in front of me just for my memory. Yeah, I'm not gonna show it to anybody because it's like, no, I'm I can't draw, but it's just it's it's a beautiful way. And I think you know, creativity can you mentioned in some of your notes, it can help us access parts that anxiety tends to shut down.

Yes, and the other lovely thing about sketching, what I notice, and I I wonder if you have, because I've traveled different places, when I look at my sketches, I'm right back there. It brings us this intense presence of uh experiencing the world. And and you're right, we in expressive arts, we do not need to be anything except human. And I think what happens, and that goes back to some of these beliefs, is you know, we don't need to choreograph to dance, we don't need to create a song to drum, we don't need to like for painting, it can be expressive, which which we did when we were children. Exactly.

Heart Truth And Building Confidence

And you can lose yourself in that and stop the spiral of the negative thought pattern. Moving to your book, loving your life, is following your heart the same as following your truth.

I'd say so. There's my book. Look, there's a big heart on it.

I love it.

Yeah, because I I think people use different language of dropping into their heart, dropping into their body. And there's studies that say the heart has more neurosceptors than our brain does. So I when your heart, I mean, look at the language. My heart hurts, my heart opens, my heart is bursting open, my heart is crushed. We use that language all the time. And when you listen to your body, when you listen to your heart, it's gonna guide you to a passionate life. It's hands down, it you and when you do that, when you're truly authentic to yourself, you're gonna be healthy and happy and passionate. It's it's just natural.

I just with you saying that, I sort of think, you know, love heals, love heals you, love heals the world, love heals others, that our heart is incredible. Yeah, that's for sure. We talk about this, and one of the things is self trust. And I think that you know, stepping into that arena and kind of look for people to learn more about that is so, so important because we're so.

powerful in our own individual 100 yeah so what helps someone begin trusting themselves again the first thing that i guide people to do is to uh listen to their body their bodies are their best guide their bodies are the best barometers and the beginning again we do an exercise it's a that yes no exercise and we listen to what lifts our energy and what crushes our energy or suppress it or lower it and life all day long we're doing this all day long whether it's a little disappointment whether we're hungry whether you know we have this flavorful coffee that's just bursting in our mouth all these things are lifting and lowering and not that it's negative or we judge it the important thing is just to trust it because Carol let's say you and I and we have eight more people in a situation we're all going to feel differently.

Yes and none of it's wrong it just is and yet we put on this judgment we put on and you know we analyze or diagnose we don't have to do that we can just say wow you know when this happens this is where I go and you might just say yeah however I love that it excites me I'm going the opposite this is fine great and I mean we're all so different exactly it's it's recognizing we're humans and each one is is walking their own journey you know we often think that oh all the thoughts that are inside our head and anxiety like that other person's got it so together they're not even you know they don't have no they're dealing with exactly the same doubts and the same questions so that would bring me to confidence and do you feel confidence comes before action or do we build confidence by taking small actions?

Ooh and I have a thought on that I'd love to hear what you say so it's it's me first is it ah okay because I want to hear yours is it action first or confidence first I think I think when you do a small action like let's say you're listening to your body and here here's a lovely little example and because I learned this when I went to school and and my facilitator he said practice with little things so just listen to that little voice and it would say you know go do this Aaron first before you go do that Aaron because I'm very systematic in my hands. And so listening when you listen to that niggle or voice and you'll be so surprised and every single time there's some beautiful synchronicity you will you know there'll be somebody where I've been trying to get a hold of them they're standing right there in the in the grocery line or someone I haven't seen for a long time they're right there like they it's just beautiful or there's some kind of gift or discount or whatever happens and you're just sitting there or the parking spot you know I'm that I'm the parking spot queen I just visualize there's going to be a parking spot. So listening and when those little tiny wins that are not I wanna and my my teacher would say the same they're not going to change your life you know whether you go here or whether you're gonna get a hold of that person anyways or whether you go that direction what what it gives you though is those little actions when you listen then then you go oh that worked okay and you as you listen more you're gonna get more confidence in that and part of that too I want to add is slowing down. If we're like boom boom boom right we're gonna miss we're gonna miss it. Yeah and and other another little hint is the morning is such a precious time and when and and I can go into the neuroscience of all of it and I won't but that special time taking your time in the morning and having a morning ritual and a morning practice whatever that is and and being in that space because that is a special that alpha that before you get into that fast world which I mean we're in now we're in beta we're in high functioning that's when these these little things effervescent up and it it'll be like all so and so touch base you know it happened to me the other day just yesterday actually I was with a client and I thought oh I wonder how she's doing I've been thinking about her and here she had I didn't realize I was checking another email address which I only use for Zoom and there she had emailed me four days ago and I went and I had just finished emailing her and we were saying you know we're so connected that we've we've got to trust these things that we're hearing right and so it's just lovely.

It's again an affirmation right if not I'm with you on the the confidence comments by taking small actions and celebrating that that's yeah as each one happens and to just you know even in the evening I mean I believe the morning ritual important and I think at the end of the day to just take a moment and go, you know, what can I celebrate from

Free Tools And Closing Thoughts

today? Because sometimes you have a bad day but there's always something hidden in the underneath that so where to find you for my people I have lovingyourlifebook.com yes I have your YouTube link your channel that I'm going to share and then I have you on LinkedIn and then I believe that you have a is it called proven calming techniques they're free yeah people can go into the website and okay they're beautiful actually of proven techniques that will calm you in minutes. Oh okay perfect so I'm gonna make sure to pop that into the the the show notes and so I'm just trying to pull up my little notes here so that I can make sure that I've got everything where to find you and that that proving proven calming techniques is on the lovingyourlifebook.com is that correct yep yep all right yeah it comes in as a pop-up perfect so I'll make sure that everything is there and thank you for just having this conversation with me today and just sharing that there's some different ways that we can look at anxiety and it's not only just reducing it or shoving it to the side but that it's important to reconnect with ourselves our bodies and the creativity side of things. So appreciate you sharing.

Well thank you and thank you for doing this work it's so important and that we're adding value to your listeners. I love it. Thank you.

So thanks to those that are listening to Connect Inspire Create and life doesn't always unfold the way we imagined we all find ourselves navigating change uncertainty loss or simply wondering what comes next. So as a life coach I believe in gentle accountability learning to trust ourselves take the next step and continue to create a meaningful life in a way that feels right for us. You can connect with me on LinkedIn at CarolCleg or you can find out on my website at how to work with me or how to connect with me. And make sure that you click on these links that'll be in the show notes so that you can find out more about what Elta does and until the next time may your choices bring you joy