Techniques – Worry Time

What is worry? It’s a pain in the butt is what it is! It has your head spinning, you go back and forth with the same thoughts or a million of them. You feel out of sorts, you can’t relax properly.Your whole being is caught up in your mind. You can’t concentrate, your mind is always somewhere else. It is exhausting.

Unfortunately, worry is part of the human condition. We all spend a lot of our time dwelling on the past and the things we should have done differently. And the future what if’s? And things that are happening in our lives right now, like health, money, family, work.

Maslow, a theorist, believed that in today’s Western world, where our fundamental human basic needs are met, (by that I mean, food, shelter, water etc.) that we have turned our worries to other not so life dependent worries. Basically, because we HAVE to worry about something. So when food, water and shelter are all pretty much covered, we find other things to worry about.

I’m sure you can relate. Whether you are anxiety sufferer or not, everyone has their worries.

The problem is that worries can take over your life. This then has a truly negative impact on your present day. It takes the joy of the moment away, as we ruminate over the small stuff, and sometimes big stuff.

No matter what your worries are, they are undeniably troublesome.

For me as an anxiety and depression sufferer, my worries will quite often revolve around my health and well-being and how I am doing. But I will also worry about the most ridiculous things such as ‘Did I sound rude when I answered that text?’ or ‘I hope I didn’t offend someone?’. Its the small stuff that takes up alot of my mental ‘space’. The big stuff is a worry too but it’s the stupid little things that drain me.

I’ve learnt a few tricks along the way to help alleviate some of the worries. First is thought stopping. Then I try really hard not to over-think. I will discuss this as a technique in an upcoming post.

One of the best tools I found for troublesome worries is to allow yourself a set amount of time each day to worry. This is your ‘Worry Time‘. The aim here is to train your mind to not think and dwell on your worries at any other time of the day outside of your ‘Worry Time’. Now its up to you when your ‘Worry Time’ is. I would suggest that it shouldn’t be before bed. Bed time is a time when you should be winding down. I would set your ‘Worry Time’ for maybe mid afternoon or after dinner. You can allow yourself as much time as you need to a maximum of 45 mins. In this time you are allowed to think, analyse, ruminate over everything you need to worry about. But once the ‘Worry Time’ is up you stop. You then say to yourself for the rest of that day and for the start of the next that any worry that comes to you, you will write it down in a note book and think about it later in your ‘Worry Time’.

What this does, is first get you to write down the worry. Sometimes this is enough for you to realise its not worth the worry as you may realise its irrational. But if not, keep adding to your list all day as and when any troublesome thoughts come. When they come say to yourself ‘I will not think about this now, I will think about it later in ‘Worry Time”.

When you get to ‘Worry Time’, you take out your list. You look at the list with a fresh eye and decide which things are still bothering you and what you want to give serious attention. You will likely find that many of the worries from this morning, are no longer relevant. Or you may have worked a few things out. Hopefully, when you get to ‘Worry Time’ you wont have too much to worry about. But if you do, do it and do it intently as a means of trying to really work it out.

Some worries will never be resolved. Some worries are very serious and you can accept that these may be on your mind for some time until the sitution is resolved. Those things that you can do something about, then do it! If you are worried about a conversation you had and you felt you were out of line, then say sorry. Don’t avoid the worries. Take action on the things you can and resolve to forget the things that are beyond your control.

The key here is you are training your mind to not think of the worries constantly throughout your day. You allow them to float away as you are not allowed to think of them. And then, when ‘Worry Time’ comes, you will find that some of the things were not so much of a problem as you thought earlier that day.

In summary

• Get a notebook
• Decide on your worry time and how long it will be.
• When a worry comes outside of worry time, jot it down. Tell yourself you will NOT think about it right now. You will POSTPONE the worry.
• When worry time comes, take out your note book and address the worries.
• Once worry time is up. Close the book until tomorrow.

Worrying it seems, gives us a sense of control. Particularly in anxiety sufferers. You think that if you worry about something enough, you will get the magic answer, and the anxiety will go away. Sometimes this happens. But most of the time it doesn’t. The truth is, worrying about something rarely solves the problem. Living in the present moment with all your skills and talents, will likely resolve any issue that will present itself to you. Worry gives you a sense of control in a mad world. But its a crutch really. Once you realise that worrying achieves nothing, you will start to reap the benefits of not thinking so much, not being caught up in your mind all the time and this gives a freedom that is immeasurable.

I really hope you find this helpful. Its a simple trick, but by postponing worry, you actually avoid it and give yourself space and freedom to deal with the present moment without distractions.

Good Luck. Let me know how you get on.

Love and hugs K xxx