Ease Your Worry and Anxiety with These Tips

Worry is not a productive activity. It’s actually one of the least productive, time-consuming and stressful things you can do to yourself. What good is worry, really? Worrying about something you cannot control won’t get you anywhere. Worrying about things that haven’t even happened (and may never happen) won’t stop them from happening. All worrying does is empty today of its happiness without solving the potential problems of tomorrow. If you are a perpetual worrier (like myself) you can use these three tips to help you eliminate this bad habit.

Keep a Worry Book

Since it’s difficult to banish your worries completely, write them down and practice the art of forgetting about them. You can do this by emptying your worrisome thoughts into a notebook or a folder on your computer and getting them out of your head. You can write down possible solutions, consider how likely something like this is to actually happy and relieve your mind at the same time.

Stop Anxious Thoughts

When you start to worry about something, stop those anxious thoughts. You can stop them by reminding yourself that what you’re doing isn’t helping; it’s hindering. It’s not as easy as it sounds, but it will get easier over time. One way to do this is to say out loud, “Stop. I will not worry about this right now,” and then practice that continuously.

Accept What You Cannot Control

Some of us (ahem…me) like to be in control of everything, all the time. However, I know it’s not possible. That doesn’t stop me from trying and borderline panicking when things are out of my control, but I know I’m crazy, so that helps. It does help worry and anxiety relief when you can look in the mirror and say to your reflection, “Shut up. You can’t control everything you obsessive compulsive control freak.”