Using Nintendo Wii to Recover from Anxiety

Creativity is a wonderful skill to have, especially when talking about anxiety recovery. If one thinks creatively and outside the normal realms of where people are usually willing to think, one can imagine a nearly infinite number of methods for recovering from social anxiety.

One creative and possibly more fun method of recovering from social anxiety is via playing Nintendo Wii, or any other video game system. XBOX 360, which has usage of headsets and involves extensive usage of verbal communication in order to play games competitively online may be a better choice, but the point is that any one gaming system can be used to reduce one’s social anxiety.

How can this be done? For some people, even the thought of being around other humans, including virtual representations of living humans, is quite scary. Using the game Mario Kart Wii as an example, some people might be terrified simply of the fact that they can race against other people online. These other people might be much better than the socially anxious person, and the socially anxious person may be terrified of the fact that he or she will look terrible and finish in one of the lower spots, looking like a complete failure to other people who are more adept at the game. When the person is actually racing, his or her thought processes will be dominated by fears of failure which can include making small mistakes in navigating the kart around the course, and the resulting anxiety from these mistakes will cause the user to make more mistakes, with the end result being that he or she will make more mistakes and generally finish towards the bottom of the rankings.

What can one do in order to combat social anxiety in such situations? This is easy; for example, the person can work as hard as he or she can on simply being in the moment, having fun, and letting go of the outcome. After all, many people play the game many hours per day, while this new socially anxious user has just started, and in order to be competitive, this anxious person will need to practice and learn how to handle a vehicle, navigate the courses, and use items in order to knock other users off the track. In sum, the game is a skill like anything else, and it will take time and hard work if the person wants to become successful at it.

Basically, the whole process is repeatedly playing the game and changing one’s thoughts about how the game might go. And, as one continues to practice and work away at becoming a better Mario Kart player, he or she will continue to lose anxiety and gain confidence in his or her skills. It seems that only so much confidence can come from practicing and knowing the game however. The other part of anxiety in relation to this is the social part, where one knows that other people are in fact watching his or her performance in the game. While practice is very helpful, one will also have to work on focusing his or her thoughts on playing the game and being part of a fun experience, as opposed to being a part of a group of other people who are evaluating his or her performance as a Mario Kart player.

So, in specific, if a person begins to think that,“Oh no, other people are watching me and I finished last this race. Now they think that I am a retard. I better quit playing so that I don’t embarrass myself anymore.” Instead, the person, when tempted to think this, should focus on thinking,“Hey, I am working away at this game and getting better. Some failures are just going to happen no matter what because even the best players finish last sometimes.” Or, if the person is tempted to think, “Uh oh, I screwed up on that turn and now everyone is going to think that I am a moron because I missed that simple turn,” he or she should instead focus on thinking, “Hey, mistakes happen and I am learning here. I am having fun, and now that I know what mistake I made, I can correct it. Everyone makes mistakes, and it is okay for me to make mistakes too. It’s a part of learning.”

If a person uses this type of cognitive behavioral strategy, he or she can in fact use any of the major video game systems as an effective tool for reducing social anxiety. The neat thing is that reduction of anxiety during this game seems also to carry over to real life because one is changing his or her thought processes, and if one uses the previous example of making a wrong turn in Mario Kart Wii, he or she can remember that making mistakes in social situations are okay and are part of learning too. The idea of focusing one’s thoughts into anxiety-reducing forms can transfer from any situation to any situation.

The one pitfall for the socially anxious to be aware of is that playing video games is only part of a good anxiety-reducing diet. Video games can be used by those with social anxiety as a way of avoiding social situations, and this can certainly happen if one is not weary of his or her video game usage. Try to keep the level of video game usage to no more than ten hours per week. When gaming is used as a way of avoiding social situations, anxiety can skyrocket out of control, and gaming can actually turn into an addiction and ruin one’s life if left totally unchecked.

In sum, basically anything can be used to reduce anxiety if one thinks creatively about the situation. One should simply construct a plan for using the particular situation to reduce anxiety and then implement it. Good luck to those who continue to work on their social anxiety!

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