You worry too much!

You guys ever heard of the expression “worried sick”?

For me that could sometimes be a reality.

You see, my brain loves to worry. Worrying is probably what it does best and if I don’t control it, I could easily worry my self to the point of being physically ill.

It’s something that I have lived with my whole life and I am realizing that it’s only getting worse as I’m getting older.

So over the years I’ve started doing research on how I can possibly control my worries. I have found some solutions that work for me, so I figure I’ll share them here in hopes to help others.

As I understand it…

The reason we worry so much is because of how we perceive things. Some of it has been taught to us by the people we surround our selves with, like friends or family and some of it is just the way your brain is wired.

But the main thing to keep in mind is that you can retrain the way your brain perceives things. It’s not easy and there is are shortcuts or guaranteed ways. You kind of have to dabble with a lot of these solutions to see what works best for you…

So lets jump into it…

The very first thing you wanna get good at, is being able to catch your self falling into that deep well of worry. Which means you just need to be vigilant toward your thoughts. Pay attention to what you’re thinking all the time.

Lets take a typical example…

Lets say I get a phone call from my doctors office telling me they want to see me regarding my latest blood work. At this point, knowing my self, the worst possible thoughts will go through my head. I will notice this feeling and try to counter act it with the following thoughts.

First I’ll think of that worst possible outcome and try to analyze it. Is it really as bad as my brain is imagining it to be?

For example, I’ll imagine that when I go see my doctor, I will receive the news that I have some kind of a disease for which I will have to take pills for rest of my life. This would be a hard pill to swallow but if you take a step back and think about it. There have been plenty of people who have lived long and happy lives while having to deal with some type of a disease and take pills every day.

Now, I am not saying that it will be an easy life, but a long happy life is possible and that knowledge by it self would calm me down significantly.

Second thing I try to do is to remind myself that I am able to ignore my brain.

I am training my self to look at my brain as if it’s just another muscle, like a biceps for example. You have to exercise your bicep in order for it to grow just like you have to exercise your brain if you want to be smart.

But sometimes my bicep twitches. It usually doesn’t last long and is somewhat normal. So I just ignore it and eventually the twitch goes away.

So I’m learning to ignore negative thoughts just like those bicep twitches.

Third and final thing of which I try to remind myself is that worrying about something that has not happened yet is kind of silly…

Concentrating on the present is what I should really be focusing on. Whatever happens in the future, I’ll deal with it when it becomes the present.

It’s like making your self feel exhausted before you actually work out. It’s silly. But that’s how our brains work. They love worrying about things, because to some degree our brains equate worrying with caring and it doesn’t have to be that way.

You could care about something without having to worry yourself over it.

So those are the three things I do when I catch myself worrying excessively.

1. The worst possible scenarios is likely not as bad as you think
2. You don’t have to listen to your thoughts all the time
3. Agonizing over something that hasn’t happened yet is kind of silly

I believe subconsciously we think that worrying could possibly prevent bad things from happening or worrying shows that we care. But the fact is, worrying can affect the body in many negative ways and does nothing to solve the troubles you possibly have to face.

Thanks for reading and I hope you found this information useful. Let me know in the comments what you do when you find your self worrying excessively.

I’m sure there’s plenty of things I can learn from you guys as well…

Cheers.