How to Manage High-Functioning Anxiety with Gentle Fitness Routines

Aloha and welcome,

Did you know that sweat sessions at the gym might be amplifying your anxiety instead of crushing it? Many of us use exercise as a go-to stress reliever, but what if it’s actually doing more harm than good?

In this episode of Anxiety Ease, guest Molly McNamee, Fitness Coach who lives in California, delves into her transformational journey from using intense exercise as a stress outlet to developing a fitness approach that nurtures the nervous system.

Now she’s on a mission to help high-functioning anxious individuals find their unique fitness zen.

Tailored routines and daily, human connections make progress personal and doable.

Get your body moving with ease!
Dr. Lisa Hartwell

Watch Molly's free masterclass which breaks down exactly how to move your body and structure a workout routine to both lower anxiety and prevent future panic feelings associated with over exercising.

Connect with Molly here:

• Website:   mollymcnamee.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/itsmollyrae 
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mfit.workouts/ 

Episode Links:

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Get your copy of Dr. Hartwell's new book, Cultivating Professional Success: Even When High Functioning Anxiety Drives You To The Edge at www.drlisahartwell.com

Enroll in my FREE Hartwell Anxiety Assessment: www.hartwellanxietyassessment.com

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Transcript

Molly McNamee:
I know how crazy that can sound because like I said, I used to be that person who is like, I just need to go. Part of me. So working out, like when I felt anxious, I would be like, I need to go run some sprints or something. I need to sweat this stress away. Which again, is kind of what we're taught in traditional media. Like, you should sweat the stress away. It's helpful, but there is a different way to work out that's still effective for your physical goals, your health goals, but more productive for your anxiety.

Lisa Hartwell:
Aloha and welcome. You're listening to the Anxiety Ease podcast and I'm your host, doctor Lisa Hartwell. I'm a Hawaii licensed clinical psychologist, anxiety coach and retreat facilitator. In this podcast season, I'm going to be sharing mine and other human stories, lessons for my fellow brain nerds who love science like I do and our own life's journey to live life with more ease. I hope to give you doses of inspiration and let's just have a whole lot of fun together. The show notes and complete transcripts can always be found on my website, drlisahartwell.com, or directly through the link of anxiety dash ease.com. I greatly appreciate any reviews on itunes and please share this podcast.

Lisa Hartwell:
I look forward to spending this season with you. Aloha. So good morning, everyone. Well, it's morning here in Hawaii. Welcome to my Anxiety Ease podcast. I am super excited about having a guest again on my show today. She reached out to me on Instagram a few weeks ago and we came up with a time to just connect online and have a conversation. And this one's going to be a super interesting one, especially for a lot of my high functioning anxiety women in business out there.

Lisa Hartwell:
You know who you are because we are us, essentially. And Molly McNamee, I hope I'm saying that right. She's a fitness coach online and she's specializes in chronic stress and pain relief. And she told me that her clients call her the moving therapist because she helps them heal their anxiety through movement. And of course, this resonated with me. And, you know, I wanted to hear a little bit more about how you work with folks, Molly, in a way that's different and then also similar to how I do. And we were chatting a little bit before we got started here about, I always talk about I have such active women in my life. I am active myself, and yet that can take on different meanings for different people.

Lisa Hartwell:
And many times when I work with high functioning anxiety women, unfortunately over exercising or too much focus on that as a means to cope with anxiety ends up activating them in ways that activates their anxiety. So I am super excited about diving into this topic with you from a different perspective. And obviously, as we say with folks that have boots on the ground out there. But if we can, can we start with you kind of sharing with me a little bit of your journey and who you are and. And welcome to the show.

Molly McNamee:
Yes. Well, thank you for having me here. I'm really excited to have this conversation with you, Lisa, because I find that this topic is just not talked about enough. Because anyone with anxiety or any mental health issues is always going to be told, you should exercise. It'll help, which is well intentioned advice, but I think it's kind of dangerous advice as well, because there are a lot of wrong ways to. To work out, and you can easily make your stress and anxiety worse through how you choose to move. And that's exactly what happened to me. As you said, I'll share my story a little bit.

Molly McNamee:
I have always had anxiety in my whole life. Like, I was stressed out at five years old. I have always been an anxious person, but it was always manageable until five.

Lisa Hartwell:
That you were stressed about.

Molly McNamee:
I remember there is a very funny picture of me at my parents house because I grew up near St. Louis and we went up the St. Louis arch, and I was hysterical, panicking, crying. I was so scared and so claustrophobic. And there's a very funny picture of me. I'm like, I think this is the first time that I was stressed. I've been on.

Lisa Hartwell:
I've been in St. Louis with that arch. I don't remember being able to go up in that thing. Do they? Is it a ride or something?

Molly McNamee:
It's just like a very small elevator where you go up and you can go to the very top. Look out. My main memory of it was being frightened, so I can tell you that. But it is true. I can remember specific instances like that where I was very young and stressed, and I grew up as a competitive gymnast and dancer, and I would be so nervous and so anxious before every single meter competition. But my anxiety was always manageable until I was 1920. Like, I would feel nervous, I would feel stressed, I would be worried. But when I was 19, I had my first panic attack.

Molly McNamee:
That was right around the time that I started working out a lot, some weight, and I really wanted to lose it. So I was doing high intensity interval training every single day. I was spending hours at the gym every single day. I really wasn't resting at all. And after just doing that for a couple of months, I had a panic attack. But 19 year old me didn't know that it was associated with my workouts. So I continued training that way for many years, and I eventually started having one to three panic attacks every single day.

Lisa Hartwell:
Wow.

Molly McNamee:
Yeah, it got really bad. And I was trying to do all of the things that you're supposed to do. Like, I was doing all the mental health practices. I was journaling, doing therapy, breathing, going outside, all of the things. Nothing was helping. I just assumed something was. I was going through a bad spell, something was wrong with. But then I injured myself, like, completely separately, had to stop working out, had to change how I was working out.

Molly McNamee:
And then I realized I'm not having panic attacks anymore.

Lisa Hartwell:
Oh.

Molly McNamee:
And the only thing that changed was that I had slowed down my workouts. I was doing shorter workouts, low impact things that weren't as jarring to the nervous system, and I felt great. So I essentially, like, built my whole business, my whole life, around exercising a certain way. And then when I realized that working out that way was causing my panic attacks, I just flipped everything, and I changed my whole business to really be focused on helping people with high functioning anxiety work out in a way that supports their nervous system instead of adding to their stress and anxiety, which happens so, so often. It's really interesting, since I've started, like, sharing my story, how many people relate to this but don't realize that they relate to them.

Lisa Hartwell:
They just say, absolutely.

Molly McNamee:
Yeah, I started, like, running 5 miles a day, and I started feeling more anxious, and I'm like, hmm, funny how that works.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah. Yeah, look at the correlate. You know, this is going to be such a welcome conversation with so many people that I know because just the thought of dialing it back is such a welcome pause in so many of our lives to think that, wait a second. Can I, can I get the same results of what I'm, my goals are, whether it be weight loss or being toned or being, having heart health or whatever the goal is, it's an interesting concept to think, wait, I need to slow down to speed up, essentially.

Molly McNamee:
Exactly. And I know how crazy that can sound because, like I said, I used to be that person who is like, I just need to go. Part of me. So working out, like, when I felt anxious, I would be like, I need to go run some sprints or something. I need to sweat this stress away, which, again, is kind of what we're taught in traditional media. Like, you should sweat the stress away. It's helpful. But there is a different way to work out that's still effective for your physical goals, your health goals, but more productive for your anxiety.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah, no, I love that. You're making me flash on a memory. And I've been out of grad school now for dating myself, but over 24 years, and. And that was just with my doctorate, so let's not talk about what I did before school with that. So 20 something years ago, I remember coming out of class, and mind you, it is stressful to do any kind of grad program or medical school or law school or what have you. However, um, you. You tend to sort of get into a rhythm, and that's how you get through your eight years. Right.

Lisa Hartwell:
And I remember in the beginning, coming down the hall one day, and one of the gals in our class was doing jumping jacks and literally jumping in the hall, up and down, boing, boing, boing, in between the class, and I looked at her, I thought, gosh, I wonder what she's doing. Maybe she just needs to move, because they were long classes, you know, the two and 3 hours, and we always would go for walks in between and such. But I was thinking, huh, that's. That's an interesting way to cope with in between. And somebody pulled me aside and said, no, actually, she's got. She's having a panic attack over there. And I thought, oh, that's. That's interesting.

Lisa Hartwell:
So, you know, taking a panic attack, taking all of that energy, and I can understand the thinking behind it, which is you're speeding up. Let's just kind of almost, like, tai chiing it. Let's just take this. This energy that you have with anxiety, and let's Tai Chi it and move it in a different direction by speeding it up, and it will essentially burn itself out, I think, is the thinking of, like, dissipate it. Right. Let's move it. And I want you to kind of share with my listeners a little bit about what is your thinking or philosophy behind what's truly going on when people think, oh, if I could just do this. And you can't see me because you're listening, as opposed to watching me on camera, but I'm shaking my hands.

Lisa Hartwell:
Right. Like, a lot of people think, let me just, like, shake it off. Shake it off. And as much as there's the swifties out there get that concept of shaking it off. What does it mean when it comes to anxiety, though, and you try to shake it off.

Molly McNamee:
Yeah. So I would say I have kind of two answers to that. When you're in the moment of having a panic attack, like if it is at the point where you're not, just like, you know, feeling kind of anxious, if you're in the moment, you're having a pan attack, your heart is racing, you're feeling all of the things. Part of me wants to say. If something works for you, stick with it. If it's working, if you have some sort of coping mechanism that helps you get through that panic attack, I don't want to say stop doing that if this is the one thing that works for you. But it's interesting you say shaking it off because I do think, like, shaking, rubbing your hands together, like changing your physical state to change your mental state, there is a big connection in that. The jumping jacks and the doing something high intensity during a panic attack seems wild to me because it feels like that would be making it worse.

Molly McNamee:
Your heart's already racing. You're doing something that, like, actually physically makes your heart race more. It seems like it's not going to slow it down. That's like my mentality. But shaking your hands and rubbing your hands together and doing some grounding movements that put into perspective of, okay, I feel like I have no control over my body right now. You do something that allows you to gain control, like shaking your hands, rubbing your hands together, or even like, if you're familiar with yoga, doing a tree pose where you're just balancing on one leg. Like do something that helps you feel really grounded while you're having that panic attack. It helps you come back into your body.

Molly McNamee:
That can be really helpful. Doing something that causes your heart rate to spike more. I wouldn't recommend it. But again, if you're in the moment of having a panic attack and this is the only thing that works for you, then you may want to go back to it. But if you are just feeling anxious, you're just an anxious person. You're not in the act of having a panic attack. Regularly doing workouts that spike your heart rate and spike your nervous system, add more cortisol to your body, they spike your nervous system. It's actually putting more anxiety into your body.

Molly McNamee:
So it's, from a science perspective, not actually very helpful to do things like crazy. Jumping for 20 minutes once a day just right, help with your anxiety because that's going to be pumping more anxiety into your body. And then it becomes sort of an anxiety that has nothing to do with mental health in a funny way, because it's just your hormones are messed up, your nervous system is confused. Your gut health is in flux, and those things can't really be solved with journaling and therapy. You actually need to get in there and fix your hormones and calm down.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah. Vicious cycle begins, right? Where one activates one system, that activates another system, and then they start impacting each other. Yeah, it's a very interesting concept. I know when I don't see much panic attack in my private practice anymore. However, it is a common thing for folks to, when they're on that higher end of clinical anxiety, as opposed to just high functioning cyclical stuff, is the whole paper bag technique. Right. Which is putting that paper bag around your nose and mouth, taking those deep breaths and slowing the breath down. But then I always do some teaching with it, so they understand that when we are in a non flow state of anxiety, we actually don't have enough oxygen.

Lisa Hartwell:
We're literally holding our breath. You can't get enough oxygen in if you're doing the rapid breathing or increased heart rate. And so therefore, by increasing our oxygenation state, by doing that. Rebreathing. I remember I worked in the ER in flight nursing for years. Right. So there was lots of people with panic attacks coming in thinking they were having a cardiac event.

Molly McNamee:
That was me at 19. Yeah, I looked right on in, being like, certainly this is a heart attack. And, girl, you just have anxiety. I'm like, oh, it's never manifested.

Lisa Hartwell:
Like this 19 year old. Yeah, exactly. And you made me think about that. Yes. There are the, you know, or holding ice, or there's all kinds of techniques for at least getting that panic attack to where you feel like you can think straight and breathe again and coming back. And that is a different type of anxiety than what we're kind of alluding to here, which is using exercise and over exercising as your antidote for anxiety. And let's kind of lift the hood off of that one a little bit more about how do we rethink, essentially, our way of approaching our fitness and our health in a way that isn't counterintuitive and not no longer helping our anxiety. So I kind of want to pull that apart a little bit more, if you wouldn't mind helping me do that.

Molly McNamee:
With what you would absolutely love to. Interesting. I was talking with a nutritionist the other day about how anxiety is kind of like when someone has lactose intolerance, for instance. Like they're just living their life. They can live and do whatever they want, but if they have dairy, then it messes up their body because they have something in their body. That's saying this is a bad thing. If you have anxiety, there's something sitting in you always that's like, you know what, I'm existing here, but if you put something into your body or do something with your body that triggers it, your body's going to say, no, no, no, this is bad. So your workouts can very easily become that thing that's, oh, no, no, no, this is bad because if you are an anxious person, there is a chance, for one, there's too much cortisol in your body.

Molly McNamee:
And if that is the case, one of the best things you can do to lower your cortisol is breathing. And it's exactly what you're saying. Like, taking deep breaths when you're anxious helps you get back into your body, but it also helps lower that hormone in your body that's overwhelming your body at this point. So if you're doing workouts that promote breathing instead of promote being out of breath, it's going to be much more beneficial for you. So that's one of the first things I encourage people to kind of switch instead of looking at workouts that are going to make them feel really winded, where they can't speak and they're like bending over, gasping for air. That's actually not going to help your anxiety from a science standpoint. But if you do workouts that are a bit slower, where your movements are connected to your breath, you're taking deep belly breaths and you don't end it feeling like you're gasping for air and on your last breath, instead, you feel more energized by it, then that's going to be much more beneficial for anxiety journey.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah, that's so interesting because a lot of people think, well, if I'm not feeling badly, it's not helping me.

Molly McNamee:
This is so true.

Lisa Hartwell:
Most people don't like exercise. I had somebody tell me that the other day, I don't like exercise. It hurts too much. I don't like being out of breath. I'm like, well, find a different kind of exercise that doesn't make you out of breath.

Molly McNamee:
It is so true. And I'm a fitness coach, so lots of people come to me saying, I've tried a lot of things and I just don't like working out, but I want to lose weight, so tell me how to do it. Like, this is usually the first conversation I have with people and I say, well, we don't have to hate this. And then it's really exciting for me as a coach for when someone comes to me saying, I'm actually excited to work out now, or the fun question is, they say, I don't feel incredibly sore and, like, exhausted all the time. Should I be doing more? It feels like enough. And I'm like, this is the goal. We want you to just feel strong in your body and more energized in your body. We don't want to feel sore and exhausted every day.

Molly McNamee:
We want to feel good.

Lisa Hartwell:
Is it. We have. What a concept.

Molly McNamee:
Crazy.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah. Yeah. I felt really sad for my son because he put his toe in the water in 7th grade for cross country and had such a negative experience about the physical feelings, and so many of them did. Yeah. So when he decided to not continue that, I was all in support of not continuing with cross country. Let's find you something else. And he's a great swimmer, and he can walk really fast. He.

Lisa Hartwell:
We have a 90 pound puppy, two year old puppy. So he. He's, uh, that's his exercise to walk him around the block. And that's fine. Right. It's. It's for what works for you. And the difference between doing exercise and having a fitness protocol that works for you just for health is different when you're using it to manage your anxiety.

Molly McNamee:
Yeah.

Lisa Hartwell:
So let's talk about that a little bit more, because I always talk about with my clients in essentially learning theory, which is, how do we associate this thing with that thing, when we can learn that personal association, that individual association of what you're doing, how you're thinking, what you're doing, what you believe, and how that is connected to what you want to happen, then we have the magic. Then we can actually create that formula that works for you as an individual. But when folks have themselves wired that this helps me with my anxiety, and then all of a sudden, wait a second. Why do I. Why does it keep coming back? Now it's not helping anymore, or in fact, now I feel worse. What is your sort of. I'm wondering two things. One is kind of the assessment phase of when you recognize when it's connected to anxiety versus a fitness program.

Lisa Hartwell:
And then, number two, if you can maybe share three kind of top tips that people can have as a takeaway and understand when they. I want them. I kind of want them to walk away with this aha. Like, oh, that's what I'm doing. I think I hear what you're saying, but I'm wondering if there's something concrete that you can kind of offer the listeners to walk away with that they have that aha. Moment and, yeah, this is making so much more sense to me, why I don't feel well anymore.

Molly McNamee:
I would love that for everyone listening to this, too. So, starting with your first question, that, like, assessment phase is.

Lisa Hartwell:
You called it.

Molly McNamee:
Calling it that because that's sort of what it is. And this is really an interesting and confusing phase for a lot of people because we can often write off anything we're feeling, as everyone feels this way. Right? But this is where I think having a. I call it a vibe check journal that you keep and you write in each night where you're just like, this is my energy today. If I'm bloated, this is like I was snacking too much. Like, have a little vibe check Journal of. What did I do today that, like, either felt really great or felt really bad? And, like, energy, how your body's feeling, your mood, these things are good to track. And then I would say there are four to five things that I commonly see people experiencing if they're in this stage where their workouts are causing them to feel more anxious.

Molly McNamee:
And the first I'd say is fatigue. You're tired all day, you're awake all night. This is big sign that something is going on. And again, this is one thing that people could say. Everyone feels this way. Everyone struggles with sleep and everyone's. But if everyone feels this way, then everyone has a problem.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah, right?

Molly McNamee:
No one should feel this way.

Lisa Hartwell:
Right?

Molly McNamee:
That's a big morning sign for me. If you're tired all day, but feel awake all night, if you're snacking mindlessly, someone would call this stress eating. But you may not think of it as stress eating. You may just think, oh, I'm just always snacking. I can't stop myself. If you find you're snacking, you're not hungry, um, you're just eating. That could be a sign that there is more stress in your body than you are aware of. Also, general motivation.

Molly McNamee:
If you feel like you're just not motivated to do much, this is another big sign that there's probably too much cortisol in your body. If you are having to force yourself to get stuff done, if you're having to force yourself to, like, I need to get off the couch. I just. I need to do this. And maybe you can force yourself, but you go through that process of, I have to do this. The motivation isn't really there. And then if your heart is racing at random times. And this was, like, my biggest warning sign, and this is the most obvious one for anxiety, but I was waking up having panic attacks.

Molly McNamee:
When I was like, at this peak, I would just wake up in the middle of the night not really knowing why I was waking up. And then my heart would start to race. And it wasn't always a full fledged panic attack, but if you notice your heart just racing at random times.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah.

Molly McNamee:
Another sign that something's up with your nervous system and your workouts could be causing it or it just. If you're not working out, if you're like, I'm listening to this, I never work out, but these things are happening to me, then there is that underlying anxiety. And if you are feeling that, then doing workouts to sweat the stress away and really pushing yourself in that workout is going to make all of that worse for you.

Lisa Hartwell:
There you go.

Molly McNamee:
Those would be those warning signs I would look out for. So if you're going to keep, like, a little vibe check journal, as I said, it would be valuable for you to just write down what's my mood? What's my energy? Did I sleep? Has my heart raced? Like, just keep track of those couple of things. Also, being especially bloated can also be a big sign because your gut health is very related to your mental health as well. So this could be a sign that, like, something's going on in your body. Something I hear often from people who I have conversations about this with is they tell me, like, mentally, they feel fine. They're not stressed about anything specific, but it seems like their anxiety is worse than it's ever been. But mentally, they're like, what is. What is upsetting me? I don't know what is stressing me out, and they can't figure it out.

Molly McNamee:
If you can't figure it out, that means it's just a body thing you need to sort out. Like, obviously, still keep up your mental health practices, but you got to figure out what's going on with your body, whether bones or your gut, or if you are exercising, you may need to switch how you're exercising. So those are the biggest things I would look out for, is the assessment stage.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah, no, I love that. I really love that. Yeah, that. That's an amazing sort of summary of, um, how to think through this process. When you first start to see a client. I know you have an online practice. Is it exclusively online, or are you working with folks in person as well?

Molly McNamee:
It's exclusively online. It used to be hybrid in person online, but it's now fully online, which I actually love because it allows me to work with people just from all over the place.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah, that's amazing. Can you share that with my listeners? So how does it work with you with, when they are interested in sort of hiring a fitness coach, how does that even look? Because your process is going to be very different than with somebody at the gym who's standing right next to them showing them form and how to lift and do burpees, for God's sake, you know, or something. What?

Molly McNamee:
Burpees?

Lisa Hartwell:
I didn't think so. Yeah.

Molly McNamee:
So as far as my business, I have a couple of things. I do have a group membership and one on one, but all of it is really grounded in conversation. So what's beneficial about working with a coach online versus at the gym is you essentially have me, like in your back pocket on your phone, always. So when I start working with someone, there is a lot of conversation and that's how it starts. Anyone that works with me, whether they're a one on one client or they're joining my membership, I sit down and I talk to them. And some of the first things I ask them are tell me about a time when you felt really great, and then we analyze what their life was then. And then tell me what's going on now. And then we notice the differences.

Molly McNamee:
And then I start to navigate what type of routine may be best just based on their current situation. Because I firmly believe that everyone needs a personalized routine, because even people with high functioning anxiety, there is such a vast difference in all of those people's lives that they can't just have one basic work and have that work for them. So it starts with conversation, and then my philosophy as a coach is less is more. So I usually have people starting off with much less than they want to agree to do. They usually want to be working out four, five, seven days a week. And I say, no, we're going to start with two or three. And they're going to be quite short workouts and we're going to really be gentle to your body because if you throw a lot at it, that's instantly going to spike your nervous system and likely cause panic attacks, because that's, that is what I hear people saying a lot is they start working out a lot and then they have their first panic attack or they just feel more anxious. So I really have people start off really slowly with legitimately, like ten to 20 minutes low impact workouts, no jumping around two days a week.

Molly McNamee:
That's almost how I have everyone start. We start with that and then we slowly build on that.

Lisa Hartwell:
And that is amazing, my philosophy.

Molly McNamee:
So working online, it is a lot of video based. I've been recording workout videos for over a decade, so I have a big library that I help sort people through to create a schedule that works best for them. But it is. I text with all of my clients and all of my groups. We're talking every day and we're getting on Zoom calls and talking face to face. So there's a lot of conversation to help me craft a personalized routine for the people that I work with.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah, very individualized. Yeah, that's a nice. And then they can also, as far as the membership part, they can do it when they need, when it works for them, as opposed to, you know, meeting up with a group when the group classes or, you know, going to the gym when the gym is open or what have you. So that's amazing. Well, I've just really. I love that you reached out. I think this is an amazing tool in our toolbox to think about how to offer a different way of thinking in all of the clients that we all work with and looking for partnerships. If there's anybody who is addressing the mental health side or growing your business side, but you still feel like you're getting stuck and trying to weave in the exercise thing, but then the exercise feels like it's making it worse, there's this interesting holistic view vantage point of what we can all contribute to.

Lisa Hartwell:
So I really appreciate you coming on today and really clarifying this concept and this philosophy with folks. And like I said, it's going to bring a lot of relief to people say, oh, wow, wow, this is amazing. I can get the same result by doing less. I just love that idea.

Molly McNamee:
I hope so. One of my biggest pet peeves in the fitness industry is it's pretty much like, go, go, go. Like all. It's. Everything you see online is join this challenge where we're going to start working out every day and walking 10,000 steps a day. And I just want to shake people gently and say, don't do this. This is going to make everything work for you. So if I could, if people can walk away with this, having an aha.

Molly McNamee:
Moment where they say, there's another way, that's really exciting. And I think it is important to also note you can get, like, your physical results this way, too, because if you're working out and you're like, well, I need to work out this way because my mind feels bad and I want my body to look different. You can solve both with a less is more approach. It doesn't have to be more. In fact, the more may be what's stopping you from reaching your physical goals.

Lisa Hartwell:
Well, there's a reason why I named this podcast anxiety ease, because I really want folks to be able to partner with their anxiety and know that it can be an easier process because we all have it. We're all human. Um, but there is. There is some magic behind the neurons of what's going on in all of us that we can just have it with much more ease and calm. So I appreciate you. Can you share with my listeners how to reach out to you if they want to, you know, use you as they, and hire you as their fitness coach and follow you and all your interesting. I know your stuff online is amazing to learn from. Where's the best way to reach you?

Molly McNamee:
Yeah, well, thank you for asking that. I really appreciate it. I would love to be just like a friendly resource for any of your listeners because I know anxiety can feel really lonely. So I've created free resources, free groups for people to join and get a part of to get some support so that they don't feel so alone. But if someone is listening to this, one of the best ways to initially get into my world is I've created a free anxiety toolkit which really breaks down exactly what workouts to be doing, exactly how to structure routine with those workouts, and sort of the whys and a little bit more science than we talked about today of why you should be doing that. So if you want to kind of take control of your stress in that way, in this toolkit, I teach all of the lessons that have helped my clients start sleeping through the night, stop stress eating, stop having panic attacks, and just feel better with their anxiety. So if you're interested in that, I believe a link will probably be in the show notes, but it's on my website, which is just my name, mollymacname.com anxiety. So if anyone is interested in that, you can sign up for that.

Molly McNamee:
It's totally free. And I'll just be another good resource for you that can help you navigate the ever confusing world of wellness. A bit more clarity into how you should specifically be moving. If you are someone who's dealing with quite a bit of anxiety, or even functional anxiety, it's just always kind of simmering in there. This will give you answers, so check that out if you're interested. And then otherwise, yeah, I'm on all of the social media platforms. My Instagram you can find and just come chat with me whenever.

Lisa Hartwell:
Perfect. No, I will definitely put all that in the show notes. And what is your Instagram handle. By the way, I don't remember.

Molly McNamee:
My Instagram handle is m like molly fit, fit. Like fitness period workouts.

Lisa Hartwell:
Oh, easy.

Molly McNamee:
The name of my company. So find me there. And yeah, I post frequently. I always try to just, like I said, bring free resources to people because I know how confusing and frustrating the fitness world is. I, yeah.

Lisa Hartwell:
Hope that this helps people 100%. Love it, love it, love it. Thank you so much for coming on today. I appreciate you. I appreciate everything you're doing for the, all the folks that we brought into our world to help. It's amazing that we get to do this.

Molly McNamee:
Thank you for having me. This was so much fun and I hope everyone found this valuable.

Lisa Hartwell:
Yeah, thank you. You have a great one. Well, that was a very fun interview. Again, if you'd like to reach Molly McNamee, she can be found@mollymacname.com dot mollymcnamee.com. Anxiety, that website gets you to her free masterclass, which breaks down exactly how to move your body and structure a workout that both lowers your anxiety and prevents future panic attacks. If that's what's going on for you and her Instagram, just to kind of for clarification is Instagram and course.com. But it's mfiT, as probably Molly mfit workouts. And this is Doctor Hartwell.

Lisa Hartwell:
I hope you have a fabulous weekend and we will see you on the next show. Aloha.

Lisa Hartwell:
Okay, that's a wrap for this week. The anxiety ease podcast is produced by myself and the music is provided by Pigsabay.

Lisa Hartwell:
For more episodes or to get in.

Lisa Hartwell:
Touch anytime, you can visit my website, drlisahartwell.com. And if you do like the show, please leave us a review on iTunes. It really helps us out a lot. Also, if you want to see where you fall in the continuum of your high functioning anxiety, head on over to the link that's found in the show notes hartwellanxietyassessment.com.