Nearly everyone worries at some point in their lives. There is the “normal” everyday worries such as how to pay your bills, how to carry on a successful relationship, or what to do if your out of a job. How to provide for yourself or your family in difficult economic times or how to cope with real problems such as being bullied in school are things that are “normal” to be concerned about. The worry I’d like to focus on in this article is the type that is needless or out of proportion for the thing your worrying about. Its the kind of worry that begins to interfere with your everyday life and feels out of control.
I have read quite a number of articles on this topic. Most articles suggest different ways to cope with worry such as but not limited to:
- Scheduling a “worry time”
- refocusing your attention on the present
- looking at you surroundings
- meditation
- deep breathing
- practice gratitude
- Journaling
- focus on what you can control
- exercise
I agree that these suggestions can certainly help and maybe they have worked for you. For example regular exercise has been a great outlet for me. However, I felt that at least for me applying some of these suggestions did not provide the results I had hoped for. You may have found this to be the case as well.
This is because many of us have learned to distract or distance ourselves from deeper and more difficult emotions by worrying.1 For example, how many of us in our gut know that what we are worrying about is out of proportion? We want to stop but just can’t. Worrying has become our crutch. Our go to. Its become our way to cope. The problem is that by suppressing what we are really feeling, those emotions don’t go away on their own. They keep being felt and need to be addressed.2
How to address difficult feelings
If we feel like worry has become a real issue in our life, at this point we need to think more about what may be the real cause of these difficult feelings.
I can illustrate this with the example of fire. When a fire alarm sounds, is it a good idea to just keep shutting it off without checking out a possible cause? Of course not. There might be a real fire burning out of control somewhere. Since we don’t smell or see smoke does that mean its a false alarm? Not necessarily. We all see firefighters meticulously investigate if there is a fire somewhere in the building before leaving the premises. This is because fires can hide. They are not always easy to spot right away. Its the same with worry, depression, anxiety and other “alarms”. At times the cause may be easy to spot, such as I’m tired, or I’ve been stressed due to overwork. At other times the cause may require some investigating. The cause may not be so easy to see.
When the cause of our worry is not so discernible, then we need to reflect on our life and ask. What was the most difficult event, or events that I’ve experienced in my life? We may feel that whatever we went through was not “that big of a deal” or “I got through it” or “I’ve moved on, its in the past”. However, we might want to consider the possibility that maybe it was a bigger deal than we think. Maybe, we are still dealing with it today.3 We might have “moved on”, but our body has kept the score.
The next time we are worrying try to set your worry aside and ask, what am I feeling? What are the sensations I am having in my body? We may realize for example, that we have a tightness in our chest, and feel like we could cry. That is sadness. Or we may feel the sensations of a different emotion. The point is by setting aside our worrying and mindfully noticing what is really going on with us we can begin to narrow down what we are feeling and why?4
Once we can identify what we went through has a direct influence on what we are currently feeling, what can we do? It would be good to begin the hard work of getting those difficult feelings out of us. Expressing them maybe to a friend, family member or therapist. Writing about it. Or other ways we may find work for us. This process may help us further open up and begin to get in touch with those feelings. We will know we are on the right track when we start to feel better and begin to worry less.5
If its a big feeling, a big trauma, a big hurt. It will take time to heal it. It may never fully heal but you can begin to progress towards feeling better emotionally. Every time you are inclined to worry, it is good to catch yourself and “put the brakes on”, that is stop worrying. Then redirect your attention not on your surroundings only but on those emotions that are “driving” you to escape through worrying. As you continue to face your pain and sit with those uncomfortable and difficult feelings, the more progress you will make towards worrying less and feeling freed up. You may notice that you have increasing space to enjoy life and the relationships around you.67
- https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0005796704002323 ↩︎
- https://thiswayup.org.au/learning-to-crack-the-code-on-tough-feelings/ ↩︎
- https://psychcentral.com/anxiety/the-connection-between-childhood-trauma-and-generalized-anxiety-disorder ↩︎
- https://www.beckybelinsky.com/blog/5-steps-to-sitting-with-your-felings ↩︎
- https://thiswayup.org.au/learning-to-crack-the-code-on-tough-feelings/ ↩︎
- https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/mohadesa-najumi/why-we-use-distractions-to-escape-our-pain_b_5179195.html ↩︎
- https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-beginning-of-the-end/202302/stop-trauma-from-becoming-ocd?msockid=2917c10096416cf5211bd4d597896df4 ↩︎