Exercise

Exercise is the "universal antidote" for releasing the tension of high
anxiety.

Children should be encouraged to exercise. Anxious children in particular will find that regular exercise reduces their
overall anxiety levels.

The benefits of regular exercise include:
• improved concentration
• increased energy
• a toned body, which makes for a positive self-image
• decreased anxiety
• decreased hostility
• mood elevation
• increased immune response and resistance to illness
• better sleep
• good control of body weight
• overall relaxation

Positive spin-offs of exercise for the scared child:
Keep your fearful child exercising and tell him that exercise gives him strength, flexibility and cardio-respiratory performance. This means that if the worst comes to worst, he could run faster than any old monster or big black dog.

Drawings

Everyone has a natural ability to express feelings through images, and many of us can actually draw well. (At least you lucky adults who didn't have a scary teacher criticise your drawings can probably still draw!) Encourage your child to draw her most scary thought. You may then be able to empathise with just how real and how powerfully scary her fears are. Then it's
time to help the child express her own power over the fear. Ideas include:
1 Burn the scary picture
2 Cut it into pieces and scatter them in the wind or over a cliff or flush them down the toilet.
3 Tip paint or nail polish over it
4 Draw it over and over again, but getting smaller each time, until it disappears!

What else? I'm sure that you and your child can have fun bossing fears through drawings and deciding what else to do with and to them.