Anxiety is a dreadfully debilitating thing to experience.
  And yet it can be dealt with relatively easily and simply just by learning a few tricks.
  Here are some tips that you might find useful:   Act as if you are what you want to be - breathe deeply, hold you head high and walk with purpose.
 Act as if you really are the most confident person you know and act out what it is that you would like to be like.
  Focus more on outside you than inside and your mind will become less preoccupied with you and more interested in what is going on around you.
 So more interested in reality than the thoughts in your head, which are just thoughts.
  Talk - to friends, family, professional people.
 Talk through what you are feeling and what your worries are.
 A problem shared is a problem halved is how the saying goes - and it works.
 So, find the support.
  Performance - don't worry about how you are performing.
 People are rarely looking to see how you are performing.
 They, like you are too worried about their own performance to be looking at yours.
 Just do the best you can.
 Don't beat yourself up about performance.
  Enjoy - make sure you regularly do something you enjoy.
 If you like bike riding, reading, gardening, playing football, cooking or whatever it is you like to do, make sure you regularly find the time to do it.
 It is so easy to push these things to one side because you have other things you must do.
 Make these things you absolutely must do.
 They are immovable in your diary.
    The cold splash - if you suffer from stress or distress try this exercise when they are suffering a particularly bad bout.
 Fill a basin with freezing cold water, immerse your face in it for 20-30 seconds.
 What this does is to fool the body's reflexes into thinking something awful is happening and this slows the metabolism in order to safeguard vital organs.
 As the metabolism slows so the tension and stress disappear and the mind stops the knawing at the inside of your skull.
 Obviously it might be best not to do this if you have certain medical conditions, but for some people it works extremely well.
    Exercise - the other way to reduce stress is to burn up those stress producing hormones with some exercise.
 Aerobic exercise such as running, jogging, swimming, walking, cycling all work really well.
 It is an excellent way of reducing stress and will make you feel so much better overall.
  Music - this also helps to reduce stress and tension.
 20 minutes listening to your favourite music gives you a great boost.
  Deal with what is happening now - Many people get stressed about things which have either happened or are going to happen.
 Centering yourself in the present will help to reduce stress and tension.
 The quickest way to do this is to make use of all of your senses in your immediate environment.
 So the feel of the chair you are sitting on, the smell in the air, the view of what you can see.
    There has been much very good material written on anxiety and the tips above really just scratch the surface.
 One way to actively deal with your anxiety is to have regular sessions with a life coach.
Life coaches can help you just re-adjust your thinking and help you to realign the way you look at life.
 They can often give you very simple skills to use that really make a difference.
 Life coaching isn't expensive either and you can get it face to face, by telephone, or even by email these days.