Why Worry?

Do you ever worry?  If so, why?  And should you?  If not, how can you stop worrying?

If I am asked the question "do you ever worry?" I always answer "no".  I will explain in a moment why I can say that and how you can too, but strictly speaking it is not 100% accurate.  I do worry - for a few seconds while the worry works its true purpose.  And what is that purpose?  Worry has the same purpose as pain - to make me aware that there is a problem and that I should try to do something about it.

Just like pain, when you are aware there is a problem and have done whatever you can to deal with it, the worry has served its purpose.  But also just like pain, the worry normally lasts until the problem has completely gone away - and sometimes even beyond this.  It makes no difference that you have responded to your body's signal and that continuation of the pain or the worry is no longer required.  Unless you have learned techniques to stop it, the pain or worry just goes on and on.

In the case of pain there are mental techniques you can use to reduce or even eliminate it, or rather to reduce or eliminate the unpleasant effects.  Most of us either don't know those techniques or find them too difficult to use when we are distracted by severe pain.  But there is medication we can use which can be very effective in numbing the pain.  Likewise for worry.

One problem with medication is that if you use it too much you become dependent on it, and at the same time it can become less and less effective.  It is much better if you can deal with the root of the problem, in this case the worry, rather than taking drugs to dull your reaction to it.

Once the worry has done its job of making you aware that "Houston, we have a problem!" the first thing you must do is address that problem.  It would have been very foolish of Jack Swigert, the Apollo 13 astronaut, simply to have ignored the problem, pretended it didn't exist, and hope it would go away.  He did the right thing and took action.  It would be very foolish of you, too, to ignore the problem when a worry arises.  You must focus on what the worry is warning you about.  Identify the problem, look at what action or actions you can take to address the problem, decide on the most appropriate actions, and take them.  This should always be the first step.

Having taken the appropriate actions you no longer need the worry.  But unless you do something about it that worry will remain.  At this point it is not only unnecessary but also usually counter-productive.  It can leave you like a rabbit caught in the headlights and stop you taking the necessary actions.  And remember what usually happens to that rabbit if it doesn't take immediate action!

The way I always deal with "post action" worry is a technique I have used since childhood, and I can guarantee it has always worked for me.

The technique, in a nutshell, is very simple.

First list the possible end results of whatever it is that is worrying you.  What are the most devastating possible results?  How likely are they?  Cross out any that are very unlikely.  Then focus on the most devastating of those that remain.

At this point you are now going to do something counter-intuitive, especially if, like me, you believe in and practise the Law of Attraction.  You are going to imagine that this has already happened.  What changes will that mean in your life?  Is there anything you can and should do to react to those changes and make your life a little better?  Don't skip past this step, worrying (see that word again?) that you will invoke the Law of Attraction and create the very problem you want to avoid.  Yes, if you stop there, like that rabbit, then you WILL invoke the Law of Attraction.  You are NOT going to stop there, but you do first have to experience this situation in your mind.

Now answer this question.  Just how bad is life for you now this bad thing has happened?  How does this compare with other bad experiences you have had previously?  How does it compare with the bad things you have seen around you or on the news that have happened to others less fortunate than you?  Once you have taken the actions you have thought about to limit the damage, then how bad is it?

Perhaps I have been fortunate, but in the 50 years I have been doing this I have never yet come across a problem that still seemed completely overpowering once I have analysed it in this way.  Not even when I was diagnosed with cancer.

Once you have accepted the possible consequences of whatever has been worrying you, go back to the action you have taken or have resolved to take which will probably make the problem go away anyway.  Recognize that because you have done this, the bad experience you have just analyzed will probably not happen anyway.  Focus on that action.  Make sure you do everything possible to help it counter the identified problem. 

Or if there is no action you can and should take, then focus anyway on the possible positive outcomes.  In my experience, most of the things we worry about never actually happen, or if they do they cause much less damage than we expect.  So focus on this.  Now you ARE using the Law of Attraction, so don't skip this step either, as it is making it far less likely that your life will be affected badly by the problem.

Once you have taken all these steps, you have done all you can.  The worry has done its job.  Thank it for making you aware of the problem, and then simply allow it to slip away.  Believe me, if you follow these step properly then slip away it will.

And that is it!  This is a complete strategy for dealing with worry.  Not something I just read about and thought it sounded like a nice idea, but a strategy I have used successfully for the past 50 years.  Use it properly, and watch your worries melt away!

Destroy Your Limiting Beliefs

We all have limiting beliefs, worries, and negative thoughts.  Things that try to stop us achieving whatever it is we want to achieve.  Sometimes we recognize these as our own internal beliefs and sometimes they appear as external barriers.  But if they do appear as external barriers you should be aware that they are still internal beliefs.  There is no independent external barrier that is capable of stopping you achieving what you want to achieve.  The power of the entire universe is behind you if you are prepared to accept that power and allow it to propel you forwards.  Those barriers that seem to be outside are either directly or indirectly your own inner limiting beliefs.

Limiting beliefs arise in different ways.  Some have been with you since your early childhood.  Often they are misinterpretations of what is happening around you as a young child.  Some are specific statements made to you by authority figures.  These may again have arisen in early childhood - something said by a parent, an older sibling, a teacher for example.  Or they may have arisen more recently - comments made by friends, especially those whose opinions you respect, something your boss may have said, a comment by your spouse, etc.  They can arise from something you have read.  This may be a direct statement - perhaps a comment in a non-fiction book that if you want to achieve something you must be prepared to struggle hard to get there.  Or it can be indirect - maybe a novel you have read in which the hero had to cross a number of barriers to get where he or she wanted to go, and had great difficulty in doing so.

Do you see why I have said we ALL have limiting beliefs?  It is simply not possible to go through life without acquiring them.

But it is possible to protect yourself so that it is more difficult for such beliefs to grow roots and take control over you.  And it is possible to uproot those that have taken hold.

There are many techniques to do both of these things.  If you have been reading my blog for long you will already have come across some of these techniques.  Today I want to focus on one powerful technique you can use to uproot and neutralize any limiting belief you may come across.

In order to use this technique you should create a safe space for yourself.  I am using the term "space" in the widest possible sense - a 4-dimensional space.  You should have a place where you can go and know you will not be interrupted.  I cannot tell you where that should be as it will depend entirely on your own personal circumstances.  It may be that you can reserve a room in your house for exercises of this kind.  For many of us that is simply not possible - we don't have enough rooms in our house to reserve one fully in this way.  But I did say this is a 4-dimensional space.  So it includes time as well as physical space.  Perhaps you can simply inform those around you (your spouse or partner for example) that at a particular time each day, in a particular place, you need you own space and would appreciate it if there could be no interruptions.  However you create it, do your best to create this 4-dimensional safe space to which you can retreat when you need to do so.  You will use it for today's particular exercise, but it will also be available for other meditations which you should use.

The time dimension of your safe space is very important.  You must make sure anyone who may otherwise wish to interrupt you is aware of it and knows it is very important for you.  But also you must avoid interruptions by yourself!  In other words, don't schedule your session at a time when there is a deadline coming up for something else you need to do.

Go to your safe space and relax yourself.  Close your eyes and feel your body and mind relaxing.  If you have any relaxation music it would be a good idea to use this to relax you more, but it is not essential.

Once you are fully relaxed I want you to imagine there is a big garbage bin just at the edge of your safe space.  There is no garbage in it yet.  But it is the most efficient garbage bin in the universe.  Inside it there is a black hole.  A black hole which will swallow up and completely destroy anything you put in the bin.  See that garbage bin there and see the black hole inside.

Allow a limiting belief or worry, or whatever other negative thought or feeling you may have, to surface.  Don't react to it.  Don't try to argue with it.  Don't judge it, nor yourself for having it.  Just let it surface.

Now see yourself picking up this negativity and throwing it into the most efficient garbage bin in the universe.  See the black hole swallowing it up.  It has no choice.  It cannot escape.  It cannot resist.  It has gone!

Feel the sense of peace that comes with knowing this particular negativity is gone for ever.  It is no longer in the universe at all.  It is as though it never existed in the first place.

Gradually allow yourself to surface from the deep, relaxed state you were in.  When you are ready, open your eyes.  Now you are ready to get up and leave your safe space.  Leaving behind the limiting belief you originally identified.  In fact, not just leaving it behind, but knowing it has disappeared from this universe and it is as though it never existed in the first place.

How to Eliminate Fear and Anxiety

Do you ever worry about something?  Do you suffer from anxiety?  Are you ever fearful?  Would you like to eliminate fear, worry and anxiety altogether?

Before we go any further, let me clarify one important point about fear.  The reason nature has given us an emotion we call "fear" is to try to stop us from getting into dangerous situations when we do not need to.  This is a good thing.  You should not try to eliminate that fear, but rather respect it.  React to the fear by doing whatever you can to remove yourself from a dangerous or catastrophic situation.  Once you have done that and know there is nothing else you should or can do, then use the techniques in this article to eliminate the fear.

Deciding whether or not you can do anything about a situation is a very important first step, perhaps the most important step of all.  If there is something you can do which may stop something bad happening, then do it!  Don't sit there worrying about what might happen if there is something you can do to stop it!  This might seem obvious, but for some reason most people never take this first step, but instead feel like a rabbit frozen in the headlights of a car about to run it over.  The rabbit could simply run away and avoid the terrible fate awaiting it, but it doesn't as it is paralyzed by the very fear nature intended to save it from that fate.  Do not become that rabbit!

Once you have thought through the actions you could take, and have taken the appropriate ones, now is the time to eliminate the fear or worry as now it is serving no useful purpose.

One method I always use at this point is to imagine whatever it is I fear or whatever is worrying me has happened.  Imagine the worst case scenario.  Now think about whatever you can do to make the best of a bad situation.  Once you have done those things, just how bad is it?  How does it compare with, for example, the suffering of people trapped in Aleppo?  Is it as bad as that?  I think not!  Accept this bad result and move on.  Don't spend too long on this, as you don't want inadvertently to invoke the law of attraction and find you have created the bad situation for yourself.  Now that you recognize there will be things you can do at the time to reduce the hurt of whatever this bad situation may be, put it behind you.  Remember you have done everything you can to stop it happening in the first place, and you have recognized it is not exactly the end of the world if it does happen, and therefore the fear and worry serves no purpose any longer.  It can be a good idea to verbalize this.  Thank the worry for having alerted you, tell it you have addressed the problem (either by changing things so it doesn't happen, by accepting the results if it does, or both), and then tell it now it has done its job it can go away.

You may think talking to a worry in this way is childish and silly, but it is not - it is actually a very effective way of disarming it.

Recognize that what you have done here is simply accept the worst case scenario should it ever occur.  Unless you have worked pretty hard to create a bad situation for yourself it is probably never going to materialize.  In 1816 Thomas Jefferson wrote the following to John Adams:

"How much pain have cost us the evils which have never happened!"

Sometimes we worry about something because it seems too big for us to deal with, and yet we also feel it is something we SHOULD be dealing with.  The answer to this is to treat it in the same way as you would treat the task of eating an elephant (sorry to all of my vegetarian friends!) - break it down into bite sized pieces and then deal with each piece one at a time.  The big puzzle may seem too big for you to solve, but there are usually small pieces you can chip away and solve, eventually making that big problem very much smaller.  While you are dealing with one piece, again address the big worry.  Again thank it for showing your there is a problem which needs to be solved and tell it that you are dealing with it piece by piece.  Ask it to go away while you are solving each piece so that it does not stop the very process it wanted you to start.

You may find just the techniques I have given you above are enough to deal with all your fears, worries and anxieties.  But there are many people for whom this is simply not enough.  They find they are still worrying about things.  Often those worries and anxieties are "nameless".  They don't know what they are worrying about.  Worrying and being anxious has become such a habit that they simply cannot stop.  If you find you are one of these habitual worriers, then read on for what you can do once you have used the principal attacks on your worries.

Schedule some time each day to practise meditation, mindfulness exercises or yoga.  Ideally you should do this when you first wake in the morning and again just before you go to sleep at night.  I am not going to go through any meditation or yoga techniques in this article as that would probably turn it into a book!  Take a look and you will find plenty of material around - including in other articles in this blog.  Perhaps even invest in some books on the subject, subscribe to a course, join a local group.  Do anything - just as long as you take some action!  What you will find is that these techniques will help you relax and your nameless anxieties will gradually melt away.

Even regular physical exercise can help.  Having a hard work-out can make those worries, the ones not related to anything you can deal with, simply melt away.

Finally, do not underestimate the importance of staying socially engaged.  The support good friends can give you should not be underestimated.  Sometimes they can help you directly with the things that are worrying you if you take the trouble to ask for their help or advice.  Even when this is not the case you will find simply enjoying good company will lower your anxiety levels for no apparent reason at all.

Dealing with Worry

Do you ever worry about anything?  If so, why?

Worry can be a killer.  Literally.  It can, for example, bring on a heart attack.  It can trigger depression.  It can result in painful ulcers.  It can make you feel suicidal.  So why would you inflict all this on yourself?

Worry does, of course, have an underlying reason.  It is intended to alert you to a problem that needs fixing.  A future event that may have undesirable consequences unless you do something about it.  Just as the reason for pain is to alert you to a physical problem that needs fixing.

Once the worry has done its job of alerting you, then as long as you do something about the potential problem there is no longer any need for the worry.  Unfortunately, just as is the case with pain, it usually continues well after its purpose has vanished.  Wouldn’t it be good if we could make the worry vanish just as easily?

Well actually we can!

Park the worry on the side for a minute.  You should do this by thanking your subconscious for giving you this warning, telling it you are now taking action, and therefore the worry has done its job.  You may feel a little silly at first, talking to yourself like this, but it is important to do this if you want to deal with the worry properly.  If you thank your subconscious in this way it knows it can relax.  Otherwise it will keep the worry there, turning up the volume more and more to attract your attention, until that worry reaches a disabling pitch.

Once you have parked the worry you must then sit down, or even lie down, and start to think through what this worrying situation is and what, if anything, you can do about it.

Now take the action or actions you have decided upon.  This is a vital step.  Ignoring it is just as bad as ignoring whatever a pain is trying to tell us.  Also, if you try to park your worries and then do nothing about them your subconscious will soon get the message that your “thank you” speech is meaningless and it will not allow you to park future worries.  If it is not possible to take action now, work out when you can do so, and then make sure you do.  In this latter case, again thank your subconscious for the worry and tell it when you will be addressing it.

Sometimes this is all that is necessary.  Recognize the issue, address it, and stop worrying.  Wouldn’t it be nice if that was always the case?  Alas, that is NOT always the case.  In fact in most cases you will find that either there is nothing you can do about it, or if there is something you can do there is no certainty it will change things for the better.  In all these cases there is another essential step you must take.

Imagine whatever it is that has worried you has now happened.  Accept that this is not an ideal situation, that you would rather have avoided it, but now it has happened and you must move on.  Dig a bit deeper – just how bad is this situation?  Is it the worst thing that could possibly happen to you?  Is it worse than any of the nasty situations you have read about or watched in the news?  Somehow I don’t think it is!  Recognise that is the case.  Accept that life goes on.

Accepting the problem in this way is really important.  There is always a bright side to everything in this life, even though it may be difficult to see it at the time.  We all have our problems, but we can draw a line under them and move on.  So imagine drawing that line and moving on.

Once you have done this, once you have done everything possible to avoid the problem and have also accepted the consequences if it occurs no matter what you do, it is time to use the Law of Attraction properly.  You must now feel inwardly and deeply all the positive, good sensations of this issue NOT arising.  Place yourself in the future at a time after whatever it is you were worrying about could have happened, and know that everything is ok and it didn’t happen after all.  If you don’t do this, the work you have just undertaken will actually cause the Law of Attraction to start trying to bring you the problem, and you certainly don’t want that.  It was necessary for you to do it so you could really put that problem in perspective, but now you must neutralize the effect.

For example, if you were worrying about failing an exam, know that you have now passed it, and start to feel the emotions you will feel when that actually happens.  If you were worrying about your partner being hurt in an accident on the way home, know that he or she is now safe and sound with you at home.  Notice the positive way I have phrased this.  I haven’t said “you haven’t failed the exam”, but rather “you have passed the exam”.  I haven’t said “your partner hasn’t been hurt in an accident”, but rather “your partner is at home with you, safe and sound”.

Those of you who regularly practice the Law of Attraction will recognise the technique I am proposing here and will have other “tweaks” they normally use.  If you are such a person, use the Law of Attraction here in the way you normally do.  But even if you have never used the Law of Attraction before, do what I have said and you will find it starts working for you.

Be assured this technique really does work.  I have used it myself for many years and can confirm my own worries only last long enough to alert me to the potential problems, which I then address and my worries disappear.  Try it – you will be amazed at just how effective this is!

Fearless

Every person has some type of fear or worry inside of them.  You may be worried or scared about performing well at work.  Or you may be afraid that you have developed a serious illness.  These are valid fears but it is the way in which you handle them that counts.

The key here is to recognize the message your worry or fear is giving you and act on that message.  If you are concerned about an illness, see a health professional.  Get checked out to see if you have that illness, and follow medical advice if you have.  But if you don't have it, take advice on the steps you can take to avoid getting it in the first place.  If you are concerned about your job performance, start looking for ways to improve this. Maybe you need to learn a new skill or just have more confidence in what you do.

When you start to feel more confident others will also see you as more confident.  A good way to increase your confidence level is by thinking positively each day.  Try using positive affirmations to help you reach your goals.  Each morning repeat these affirmations until you truly believe them.

Being fearless means that you will not allow any fear to get the better of you or hold you back.  Instead you take steps to learn how to deal with these issues and look for ways to work around them.  Sometimes talking to another person about your fears can be a huge help.  You may discover that they have the same fears, and simply sharing can be helpful.

While everyone loves to be known as fearless there are times when being fearless is not good.  If you begin to act in a reckless manner you could injure yourself or others around you.  There is a fine line between being scared to do something and downright doing something which would be considered foolish.  But that is why I have emphasized the need first to recognize the message that fear is giving you.  As long as you do that and act on it you have done all that is necessary, and now you need to remove the fear.

The best way to conquer any fear is to tackle it slowly, over a period of time.  Try to do things that are a little out of your comfort zone so you can push your limits.  As you achieve each goal then you should feel proud of what you have just accomplished.

If you continue this process you will discover that your fears aren’t as strong as they once were.  Plus your convictions and beliefs will be stronger and this will help you become a more successful person.

There is nothing wrong in having any type of fear.  You just do not want this fear to overtake your life.  Instead set yourself small challenges which will help you overcome your fear and allow you to lead the life you really want to live.