What Me Worry? Yes, Indeed

“Don’t panic.” That’s easier said than done. Actually, these are the two most important words to remember for those of us who are chronic worriers. Low level stress and anxiety are perfectly normal during an emergency. It’s the high level of stress and the anticipation that something awful might happen that’s concerning like a temperature rising.
 
How do we tamp it down? 

We ask ourselves: when did our tendency to worry excessively begin? We don’t remember ourselves as worry warts when we were younger. We flew in small planes alone, we tried daring activities for us, even if not skydiving or bungee jumping, we tried all kinds of foods, even stuff that looked weird and sounded stranger and we bravely entered situations where we knew nobody. We literally jumped in, found our way and didn’t worry if some didn’t seem interested in us. We simply moved on. 

We wish we could be more like that now, but we cannot go back. 

Now our worry haunts us like a ghost following us around. We think it was triggered when we became parents and escalated when dealing with the vicissitudes of aging parents, grown children, our own work and personal challenges, the kids’ challenges, our friends’ dilemmas and our relationships. Slowly and imperceptibly, our worries piled up like dirty laundry. And as we age more, we worry will we keep aging, too many obits we read are in our age bracket.

As we know, stress and worry are the leading causes of heart disease. So, we try to slough off worries—oh, it won’t really matter. We might think of strategies where we feel a modicum of control over a worrisome situation. Take illnesses and disease. We wash our hands and wash them again and again. Wear a mask in public where it probably doesn’t do much but makes us look silly. Yet, who cares in case it does add some protection. 

Another strategy is to ignore bad news completely. Shut down the phone, Facebook, Tic Tok, T.V news and basically live like you’re in a cave. However, when we’re in a group of friends and have no idea what the others are talking about as they reference the news, our stress rears its ugly head.
 
Worry can be on a loop. We get stuck on certain worries and worry more. Our blood pressure climbs, our anxiety goes into overdrive, we dive into emotional eating stuffing our mouths with chocolate or bags of pretzels. And then we stress about the health and weight consequences of our junk food binge. We can’t seem to get a break.

Here is a friend’s strategy for finding peace and putting off worry. She uses everyday peace cards by the late Thich Nhat Hanh, a Buddhist monk. Each card has a thought to meditate on, such as how to live in the present; how to focus on our breathing to calm ourselves; how to be compassionate to ourselves and others; how to diffuse our anger. The friend began using the cards with a daily ritual. She texts a photo of one of the sayings every weekday to her sister and includes a morning greeting. Her sister then texts back with a greeting. 

Here’s a sample:
Embrace Strong Emotions
Do not fight against pain; do not fight against irritation or jealousy. Embrace them with great tenderness, as though you were embracing a little baby. Your anger is yourself, and you should not be violent toward it. The same thing goes for all of your emotions.

Selective Watering
Through the practice of deep looking, we can identify the positive seeds that we want to water every day and train ourselves not to water the negative ones. This is called ‘selective watering’.” 

Experts espouse ideas to help us learn to chill but agree that the first step to recovery and health is to recognize there’s a problem. Here are 10 ways to dial down worry and its frequency.

Try an app for meditation. There are dozens of them that offer ways to breathe deeply, zone out the world, and picture yourself on a beach. Some charge a monthly fee but offer a free trial period. The difficulty is whether you’ll do it regularly so it’s worth the money. Will you do it every day or a few times a week—and then stress about this commitment?  These apps are certainly worth a try for sure.

Use music more in your life. Music, regardless of genre, is incredibly calming, whether upbeat 60s rock ‘n roll, soothing jazz or high-brow classical or a mix. Make a playlist and use it periodically. One of us who was recently sick loved playing the Muppets “Rainbow Connection” and the Jewish prayer for healing, known as the Mi Sheberach and Debbie Friedman’s rendition.

Read and listen to bad news less or not at all. It’s everywhere and hard to avoid, from Trump and Macron disagreeing about European involvement in the Ukraine War to Trump criticizing Zelensky as a dictator or climate disasters popping up everywhere like wildfires to hurricanes and tsunamis. And then there are all those plane crashes and near-misses; who wants to get on an airplane anymore?  Look for happy news. Read mindless and fun publications such as People Magazine, Entertainment Weekly or Vanity Fair. There are many others that are glitzy, gossipy, fun and entertaining. Yes, harmless gossip can be fun, if it’s not malicious or mean spirited.

Plan some activities that offer a big distraction. That might mean a cooking class, yoga, Pilates, pickleball, bridge, board games. Switch them around if you get bored. Find new ones if these don’t appeal. Word games like Wordle or Scrabble are a great antidote to use the brain in a positive way. Try to shift your thinking and not focus on unhappy events but try various ways to find joy daily whether a new walk, new plants you spy on that walk, new people you meet and new recipes you try. 

Keep a journal. It’s a great way to lay out your thinking and then reflect. You can go back and read what you’ve written and then work on making changes. A healthy exercise is to write about positive experiences or gratitude. This is a stress-reliever that is cost and medicine free.  
 
Put aside “I shoulds.” Whether it’s cleaning out a basement or attic, finishing a work project without a looming deadline, paying back people for dinner. Forget about it until you’re ready. One friend of ours gets very stressed at the idea of inviting people over, so don’t, we say, or bring in the food, open the boxes and voila! If your guests complain, send them to Ina Garten’s or Martha Stewart’s.  

Learn to prioritize your worries. This may sound insane, but some are bigger problems than you can handle, and you may need help from others such as a doctor or lawyer. Some may be emotional worries and require a talk with yourself, a friend or professional such as maybe forgiving someone or apologizing if you did something wrong inadvertently. Don’t take on all your worries at once since you’ll become overwhelmed and worry more. The goal is less!

Learn to laugh more about worries. If every medical issue becomes a major full-blown disaster where you think you’re on your way out, calm down now! This is where your doctors will help but you do your part by researching and not overreacting too early. Don’t focus on Dr. Google as one doctor said but a real doctor will help you. Add laughter into the day, whether through a movie, cartoons, or conversation with a friend with a great sense of humor. Avoid some overly serious folks who will pick up on your worries and make you worry more.

Picture yourself in a worry-free zone or imaginary safe haven. There are gorgeous snow-clad mountains around, beaches down below, blue sky above, patches of greenery, and cupcakes floating through the air with fluffy icing and cherries on top. See any worries popping up? Either do we but it takes some trial and error to get to this visual paradise. And as someone suggested: Avoid getting sucked into worrisome triggers. Pause. Focus on breathing. Leave it. Let it go. Don’t get engaged. Leave the room. Or put your worry in buckets with a lid shut tight. Send them out of your brain and don’t open that bucket unless you must. So what if you have lots of buckets, at least they’re not occupying brain space when shut tight.

If you’ve made it through some of these steps, there is less need for panic. Just keep in mind this mantra, whatever the worry, it will be over soon, it will be over soon.