“They’re driving me crazy!” is the judgmental outcry of someone who is losing both the communication battle and the war.
But when you get right down to it, only YOU have the right to drive yourself crazy. Are you unduly upsetting yourself by doing too good of a job at worrying today?
YOUR MENTAL REAL ESTATE IS PRICELESS
Personally, I do a great job of worrying, and I challenge anyone to match my finesse at making myself miserable when I believe stressful life events are spinning out of my control. I’m also hesitant about giving an antagonist “a piece of my mind” because my mental real estate is priceless.
But some people truly have learned how to be world-class worrywarts. (In my case, I even worry about how much I worry–which has a double-whammy effect by bringing my mood down AND keeping my nerves constantly and chronically frayed).
Why would anyone put themselves in a vise of stress? Why would people upset themselves unnecessarily? What can you do to quell the worries that are running away with your mind?
“WHY” YOU WORRY
The core problem: The harder you try to make worry go away, the stronger your worries become. Worry is a negative inner voice that promises and beguiles you: “If you can’t control certain situations and if you can’t control events or people-worrying (me) is the way to go.”
PUTTING YOURSELF IN A VISE OF STRESS?
The absolute best way to make yourself anxious is to ask huge unanswerable questions like these when you feel life events, others’ actions or interpersonal communications have spun out of your control:
- WHY did it happen?
- WHY did this happen to me?
- WHY does this always have to happen to me?
- WHY do I worry so much?
- WHY doesn’t life go the way I think it should?
- WHY do I feel crazy?
- WHY do I keep doing this to myself?
- WHY can’t I stop worrying?
- WHY can’t I let go of needing to change others?
- WHY can’t I accept the way things are?
- WHY can’t I let go of being so negative?
- WHY can’t I just be happy?
Why keep playing old worry records that have lots of needle scratches. Why keep listening to worry-filled scripts in our heads that sound like fingernails on a chalkboard? You don’t really believe that worrying makes you have any more control over life, unchanging difficult people or of stress events, do you?
WHY YOU WORRY: PART II
A few of the emotional and mental impacts on asking unanswerable “WHY…” questions:
1. You frustrate and overwhelm yourself because BIG questions don’t really have satisfying answers. Funny example: “Why wasn’t I born a different gender, into a different family, in a different country, in a better historical period?”
2. You generate worry-laden energy when you repetitively talk negatively to yourself. Example: “Why didn’t I get that job/date/promotion that I wanted? Is fate against me? Am I being punished? Why doesn’t life ever turn out the way I think it should? Why don’t nice guys/gals ever finish first?”
3. You will take blame on your shoulders. Example: “Well, it must be my fault! I suppose I deserved this to happen. If I were a better person, this wouldn’t have happened.”
4. Blaming yourself blows your change chances. Blame focuses your mind on what you can’t change, and keeps you from focusing on taking control of what you can-namely your brain activity that includes positive goals that are easy to materialize. Blame is like holding onto an anchor and trying to swim across the ocean.
5. Superstitious thinking is encouraged and escalated. Fear loves to reproduce itself, but fear fears facts. When fear is the focus, you will bargain with yourself, others and God – and in the process, you’ll unwisely and passively expect the protection of angels instead of taking matters into your own hands to change things.
6. You will undermine happy, content, confident and satisfied feelings. Since worry is a concoction of fear, fear wants you to be unhappy, unsatisfied and disconnected in your relationships and be all riled up with nowhere to go. Although you aren’t alone, you alone have the power to stop thinking obsessively and behaving negatively.
WORRYING MAKES POSITIVE CHANGES SLIP RIGHT THROUGH YOUR FINGERS LIKE SAND
Well, you get the gist. When you blame yourself through a worry pattern, the positive changes you do seek and have control over slip right through your fingers like sand. When you become consumed by self-inflicted worry that feeds on itself, a pessimistic or downer mood is inflicted upon you. Sometimes, we are our own worst enemies!
INNER-PERSONAL WORRY SELF-TALK
The worry self-talk: “If I can’t control certain situations, I can at least have control over worrying myself to death — which is the only way I feel in control.” The challenge for change: TO accept that it’s O.K. in your world not to have control over life events or to have all of the answers all of the time. After all, higher powers are not going to make you stop worrying when it is fully in your power to do so.
CORRECTIVE POSITIVE “SKULL TALK”
So how can you talk some sense to yourself for a change? How can you feel comfortable when life’s big questions don’t have any ready or simple answers?
1. Sarcastically say: “Why am I asking myself WHY questions that don’t have answers but do such a great job of driving me crazy?”
2. Get feisty in your inner skull talk, and say: “I can break this pattern of driving myself crazy and upsetting myself unnecessarily!”
3. Remind yourself: “The cost of worrying is to make myself unhappy and make myself forget to do all those little important things that will make me feel happier!”
4. Be kind to yourself, say: “This bad habit may not be as hard to break as I imagine it to be! My goal is to reduce my level of worrying by half today. I will set aside only five minutes to worry myself past death. After that, no more worrying for today.”
5. Be true to yourself, say: “I can accept the way things are.” “I can stand being disappointed or feeling at a loss.” “Other people don’t have to change in order to make life easier on me.” “I refuse to worry myself about those things I cannot control!” “Just because I do such a great job of worrying, doesn’t mean I have to do it so much!”
NO WORRIES MATE
You can let go of trying to control the outcome of life events that you can’t control by worrying. Why worry? After all, worry won’t make you feel safer, care more, change faster or help others stop driving you nuts.
Worn out with worry? No worries mate. Nothing bad’s going to happen, anyway.