Worry: Friend or Foe?
For some of us, worry is as innate as hunger. It’s a low hum in the background, time traveling to the past (e.g., scanning for things we did that make us look “bad”) or brainstorming future “what-ifs” (e.g., usually hypothetical threats like failure or loss). Periodically it rises to a crescendo in an intense bout of anxiety or a panic attack. The best visual characterization that comes to mind is the googly-eyed character Fear from the movie Inside Out who I think should have more accurately been called Anxiety.
Worry seems to serve important functions such as making us feel like we are solving a problem or preparing us for a future imagined event. It might even seem to motivate us, like studying for an exam in response to the concern “I’m going to fail.” Worry can also serve a superstitious function like seeming to stop something bad from happening.
However, there is an important distinction between worry and problem solving. With problem solving, there is a current problem to solve with tangible solutions. Whereas with worry, we are trying to solve an equation with too many unknown, hypothetical variables.
Here is an example of problem solving:
I have double booked myself for a walk with a friend (our first social meet up in a year) and a continuing education workshop on self-care.
Action: I can decide which one is my priority and cancel or reschedule the other.
Contrast this with worry:
I have prepared but, since public speaking makes me queasy, I am worried “I’ll flub my presentation”
My mind says “If I flub the presentation, my boss will be disappointed, I’ll be seen as inferior to my colleagues, I won’t get the promotion, and if I don’t get the promotion, I won’t be able to pay for my son’s college tuition.”
The second example is my mind running a simulation. If it comes to pass, it could be problematic, but it’s likely that I am playing up the likelihood that this one event will have such a detrimental effect on my future. I could choose as my action to over-prepare, which is likely to lead me to the brink of exhaustion, which may make my fear of mistakes more probable. It is more likely that if I do in fact make mistakes, I will feel embarrassed and others will not notice or if they do, not care. It’s unlikely they will still be thinking about it five months from now. The truth is, most of the time we don’t know if the awful thing we are imagining will even come to fruition.
In addition to overestimating the likelihood of unwanted outcomes (sometimes called ‘catastrophizing’), we also underestimate our ability to cope with unwanted events.
Here is the downside of worry (check off any of these you have noticed):
Most of the unwanted scenarios we concoct don’t come to pass, claiming valuable mental and emotional resources along the way.
We may avoid actually solving a problem by being so caught up in worry; we may be paralyzed by the “what-ifs” even when a solution is available.
Because we are focusing on the future, we miss out on the present.
The past is done and the future isn’t written yet. We cannot influence the past and we have limited ability to impact the future. This is hard for us humans to accept because we want control.
We may avoid doing things that matter to us for fear that such activities will elicit anxiety and worry.
For example: I may avoid practicing the presentation in front of a colleague because I worry she will confirm my fear “it’s not good enough.”
Worry can detract from a sense of meaning in our lives.
Worry often causes fatigue, tension, restlessness, as well as difficulties with sleep and concentration.
In fact, the number one reason people report sleep problems to me is because of worry or a racing mind – either rehashing the past or time traveling to the unknown future.
So, if worry is so detrimental, why do we keep on worrying? Because worry is extremely self-reinforcing. We tend to mistakenly attribute the absence of an unwanted outcome (e.g., I wasn’t fired!) to the fact that we worried. In our previous example, my mind tells me the presentation went well because I fretted about it! (And this sets me up to worry the next time.) The mind fails to acknowledge the actual odds that it likely wouldn’t have come to pass because I care about my job and did an adequate job of preparing even if my voice wavered or I had trouble getting started.
For how sophisticated our brains are, we are prone to many biases like the false idea that worry serves us. Many of our automatic thoughts and beliefs occur outside our conscious awareness BUT we can learn to bring mindfulness to these mental processes. So, if you’re beginning to think worry isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, here are some strategies for moving forward with more peace of mind:
1. Try keeping a worry log (there are downloadable versions on the web or you can quickly create your own worksheet using this example). Let experience be your teacher as you practice monitoring worries and actual event outcomes. After several weeks consider what the log is teaching you. Write down your takeaways in a place where you can view them regularly.
2. Ask yourself, is there an actual, live problem to be solved with tangible solutions (like in the walk/workshop dilemma) or is this worry? Certain situations can be changed or improved and call for problem solving while others are out of our control and may be better approached with acceptance.
3. Engage mindfulness to bring yourself back to the present. Try this brief meditation: https://www.tarabrach.com/brief-meditation-gathering-arriving/ . Remember, all we have is the NOW and now is where our power lies.
4. Ask yourself, if I weren’t worrying about______(e.g., the presentation), what would I be thinking about? This brings us back to what really matters to us and gives us cues for how to re-engage with our lives.
Wishing you wellness!
Dr. Alisa Burpee
Sources:
Craske & Barlow, 2006. Mastery of Your Anxiety and Worry. Oxford University Press, United Kingdom
Orsillo & Roehmer, 2011. The Mindful Way Through Anxiety. The Guilford Press, New York