21/11/2025
Anxiety goes up and down like a ball- a useful metaphor for children ↕️🧠
If we can teach a child that anxiety goes down as well as up, this will help them feel less afraid of facing their fears.
Use the simple ball action in the video to show them how it works. Or use their own anxiety metaphor, a rollercoaster, an elevator....what else goes up and down....how do they picture it? 🤔🧠
Children are more likely to understand symbols, metaphor and stories over more detailed psychological concepts. This is mainly due to their cognitive development and most children cannot understand abstract ideas or think about their thoughts until the age 10-12 when they reach the ‘formal operational stage’.
Intense feelings of anxiety last for around 20/30 minutes but we tend to back out in the first few minutes and teach ourselves that avoidance makes us feel better; but this is only a short term solution.
If children can understand that anxiety drops without avoidance, that it doesn’t keep going higher, and that they won’t get stuck in an anxious state but that it will come down again when their adrenaline runs out; this will help give them the confidence to try. 🌟
