How To Stop Worrying About Anxiety

Worry And Anxiety Self

Its tough to be productive in your daily life when anxiety and worry are dominating your thoughts. But what can you do? If youre like many chronic worriers, your anxious thoughts feel uncontrollable. Youve tried lots of things, from distracting yourself, reasoning with your worries, and trying to think positive, but nothing seems to work.

Do You Worry Too Much

Worrying doesn’t always deserve such a bad rap. Sometimes worry is a good thing, says Bruce Levin, MD, a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst in Plymouth Meeting, Pa. “If there is an actual threat then there is something to worry about,” he says. “If you run into a bear in the woods, you have something to worry about.” In these cases, “not worrying may be more of a problem than to worry.”

So how much worry is too much worry?

“It depends on the degree to which that disproportionate worry affects you and how much you are suffering and how much it limits you,” he says. “If it’s posing interference in your life or is enough of a problem or nuisance that you are distressed, the good news is there is help.”

Stop Worrying By Maintaining A Regular Sleep Schedule

Insomnia is a common side effect of chronic worry. When your mind is running wild, it can be tough to relax and get enough sleep. While you may feel like staying up will help you solve your worries, youre often better off with a restorative nights sleep.

Without sleep, minor worries can trigger a stress response that perpetuates for days or weeks in a row.

Heres how to stop worrying and finally get some sleep:

• Do a quick meditation or mindfulness exercise before bed
• Drink a cup of calming tea and read a book right before you go to sleep

Read Also: Does B Complex Help With Anxiety

Choose Mindfulness To Stop Worrying

Worry thrives everywhere except the here and now. The past may be filled with regrets. The future is where we store our fears. The present moment offers a sharper, more productive focus.

Mindfulness can provide a sense of control. Considering embracing meditation and/or breathing exercises to get started.

Thoughts Are Just Thoughts

Another way of dealing with negative thoughts often used in modern therapy is realizing that thoughts aren’t facts, says Berger.

He says it is important when we think something to ask: Is that real? Did that really happen? What is the worst thing that could happen?

Flight anxiety is one example where untrue thoughts are accepted as facts. Although air travel is the safest way to get around, people suffering from fear of flying accept their thoughts and fears as reality, then act upon them by refusing to fly.

Read Also: How To Help Anxiety Without Medication

How To Stop Worries And Anxious Thoughts

If you experience obsessive worrying, stressful, or anxious thoughts, you are probably wondering how to stop feeling anxious. But when we try to get rid of those feelings, the anxiety or fear grows.

When we welcome those feelings, they tend to go away due to the acceptance of those feelings. Controlling negative thoughts becomes much more beneficial than trying to stop or avoid negative thoughts.

Follow this simple 5 step process to challenge worrying and anxious thoughts:

The Answer Is No You Are Not Stuck With It Forever Because There Is An Alternative To Trying To Control Anxiety: Acceptance

Acceptance is the opposite of control. It means allowing yourself to think and feel whatever pops up, even when it is uncomfortable. If trying to control anxious thoughts is the problem, then allowing yourself to think anxious thoughts must be the solution.

This is probably a very different approach from the way youve been doing things. Its probably a very different approach from what people have told you to do before. But it works.

Read Also: How To Calm Anxiety At Work

Stop Spending Your Time Fighting The Anxiety And The Anxious Thoughts

Let them hang out with you while you go do something else.

Youll find that by taking this non-defensive stance, the anxiety eventually eases up without you doing anything about it. It might take a while, but it will happen. In the meantime, remember that in the short-term, both alternatives involve feeling the anxiety.

In the short-term, its there if you try to get rid of it and its there if you stop trying to get rid of it. So why bother with all that effort? It goes nowhere anyway, so whats the point? Give yourself a break and try accepting the anxiety instead of fighting it.

I see this work for people all the time, and I know it will work for you if you give it a chance.

Interested in learning some of the most common and most effective strategies I teach my clients for dealing with anxiety and worry? Check out my self-help video series, How to Stop Overanalyzing, with over 3 hours of content covering the skills I teach to almost all of my clients in the first 5 therapy sessions.

About Dr. Stein

How to Stop Overanalyzing

How to Stop Overanalyzing is a self-help video series by psychologist and anxiety specialist Dr. Michael Stein. It includes over 3 hours of instructional videos about overanalyzing, anxiety, and clear strategies for how to relieve these problems.

It is a compilation of all of the most common things I typically teach to my anxious clients.

Build Your Mental Muscle

Becoming mentally stronger requires you to have a balanced sense of control. After all, you can do a lot to increase your happiness and your chances of success, but you cant control every factor around you like the weather, the economy, or how other people behave.

When you stop worrying about things you cant control, youll have more time and energy to devote to the things you do have control over. And this can be key to reaching your greatest potential.

Read Also: How To Stop Anxiety After Drinking Alcohol

Other Versions Of The Container Exercise:

If its on your mind, your mind isnt clear. Anything you consider unfinished in any way must be captured in a trusted system outside your mind, or what I call a collection bucket, that you know youll come regularly back and sort through.

Are You Worrying Too Much

By now you know that excessive worrying can be hard on your mental and physical well-being. An occasional anxious thought or moment of stress is natural, and worrying itself isnt an inherently bad thing. But, if those rare occurrences start to become more regular or even constant, its time to evaluate how much youre worrying. Its also a tell-tale sign youre stressing too much if your worries are starting to interfere with your daily life, work, or relationships.

Constant worrying can be a sign of a deeper issue, such as chronic anxiety or another anxiety disorder. If you suspect you may have an anxiety disorder or worry too much, you should consider reaching out for helpeither from a trusted friend or, even more ideally, a licensed mental health professional.

Don’t Miss: Where To Get Help For Social Anxiety Disorder

Find The Canaries In Your Coal Mine

Recognizing that thoughts are just thoughts takes practice but you can develop the skill relatively quickly. Dealing with emotions is trickier. And the two tend to gang up on you negative thoughts producing negative emotions and vice versa creating a self-reinforcing loop of awfulness.

When we get lost in thought we tend to forget our bodies. You need to start noticing the physical sensations that accompany your emotions. Muscle tightening. Shallow breaths. Sweating. Whatever you do when the worrying heats up. These are the canaries in the coal mine.

So make yourself a list. Write down the common thoughts you have when getting worried, the physical sensations that accompany the emotions, and also note what actions you feel driven to take

Get familiar with the list. This is like the supercool planning montage in the heist film, setting up all the protagonists tricks before they pay off in the third act.

This might sound like a lot of planning and preparing. It would be better if your brain had an off switch but sadly thats not available in Sapien OS7. Sorry. So it might seem much easier and more effective to simply avoid things that make you worried.

But thats actually the worst thing you can do

How To Stop Worrying By Managing What

People with anxiety tend to have what if thoughts when there is nothing wrong. Anxious thoughts can be convincing, but you need to learn to tell yourself, my anxious thoughts arent true or valid. The key is to check whether the anxiety is about something that is happening now or something that might happen. If you got put on probation at work, your anxious thoughts about your job are valid. If there is no clear evidence right now that things are wrong at work, your anxiety is getting the better of you.

Check to see why your anxious thinking might be useful and challenge it until you are clear that the anxious thought is not helpful. For example, suppose youre anxious about your partner leaving you. Worrying about it now might help you feel more prepared when the bad news comes. Now challenge: will you be less able to pack your belongings and find a new place to live if you havent been worrying about it? Will you be less devastated? No! In fact, constant worrying may be taking a negative toll on your relationship.

Make a plan. If you are worried that something might happen and there is actual evidence that its valid , decide how you will handle the situation. Identify the problem, decide on the goal, brainstorm solutions and select one option. If you continue the what-if worry tell yourself, stop! I have a plan.

Learn practical, easy ways to stop worrying and start feeling better

Recommended Reading: How To Reduce Anxiety At Night

How To Stop Worrying Tip : Create A Daily Worry Period

Its tough to be productive in your daily activities when anxiety and worry are dominating your thoughts and distracting you from work, school, or your home life. This is where the strategy of postponing worrying can help. Rather than trying to stop or get rid of an anxious thought, give yourself permission to have it, but put off dwelling on it until later.

Tend To Your Emotions

Emotions dissipate with time. They never feel like they will but they always do. In many ways its analogous to healing: unless theres something truly serious, it eventually takes care of itself as long as we stop messing with it. But we love to mess with it.

We struggle, avoid, suppress and deny. And thats like emotionally picking at the wound, preventing it from scabbing over.

When you tend to your emotions you dont want to redirect your attention but you still want to accept and label. You dont want to identify with them but you do want to feel them. Label them to get distance and investigate them nonjudgmentally. Ask yourself, What is my brain doing? What is my body doing? The distance is built into the question. Youre not anxious but there is anxiety.

From The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook for Anxiety:

Investigate, accept and label. The feelings will dissipate. Its a skill. It takes time. But it works. And once you get good at it, its like a superpower.

So you know how to cope with worries. But how do we prevent them from ever happening again?

You May Like: How To Help Someone With Anxiety Attack Over Text

Putting Your Worry Into Perspective

Worry only becomes a psychiatric disorder when it becomes obsessive, intrusive, and uncontrollable. Otherwise, worrying is a normal part of everyday life. But even though its normal, its most often unproductive.

There will always be uncertainties in your life and situations of which you have no control. You may think that trying to predict worst-case scenarios will help you be prepared when these events may eventually arrive. However, most of the time worrying about these unknowns doesnt result in a real plan for dealing with or preventing them. You just spiral deeper and deeper into the world of what-ifs. Worry will not reduce the chances of bad things happening to you or your loved ones. Plus, since your worry doesnt usually result in a concrete plan to deal with potential events, your worry is completely unproductive.

How To Challenge These Thoughts

During your worry period, challenge your negative thoughts by asking yourself:

• Whats the evidence that the thought is true? That its not true?
• Is there a more positive, realistic way of looking at the situation?
• Whats the probability that what Im scared of will actually happen? If the probability is low, what are some more likely outcomes?
• Is the thought helpful? How will worrying about it help me and how will it hurt me?
• What would I say to a friend who had this worry?

Recommended Reading: Can Wellbutrin Help With Anxiety

What Is Chronic Worrying

Chronic worrying happens when someone cant manage their worries. If this is happening to you, you may notice that your mind cant let go of these anxious thoughts even when theres no direct threat.

People that chronically worry may find themselves preoccupied with what-if thinking or imagining the worst-case outcome for different scenarios. You may also have trouble managing your worrying about:

• family situations
• the state of the world
• other personal issues

Chronic worrying can make it hard to relax. It may cause you to feel a sense of impending doom or to be hyper-aware of your surroundings. However, it may also feel like your worrying serves a purpose that youre thinking ahead and being proactive.

Although its true that worrying has its time and place, if your worrying is preventing you from being able to enjoy the present moment and from doing the things you love, you may want to consider seeking help.

Excessive worrying can be a symptom of a mental health disorder. Three of the most common disorders that account for chronic worrying include:

• generalized anxiety disorder
• major depressive disorder
• obsessive-compulsive disorder

Although its very possible you or your loved ones chronic worrying is a symptom of a mental health disorder, this is not always the case. You would need to be diagnosed by a mental health professional to know for sure.

Stop Worrying By Focusing On What Youre Grateful For

As we focus on one negative thought, it primes our brain to look for more. By contrast, looking for a silver lining can help train your brain to search for positives and interrupt the cycle of worry. This is one reason why a daily gratitude practice can be so helpful and even life-changing.

Having trouble finding something to be grateful for? Take a step back and look for what is interesting about the situation or funny. Engage your mind through curiosity and humor. This can quickly shift you into a better place and provide a needed break from the negative thoughts. You can even try to be curious about the way you worry.

While it may take practice, learning to turn your negative thoughts around can be a great way to stop worrying.

Also Check: What Can I Give My Dog For Severe Separation Anxiety

Tip : Practice Mindfulness

Worrying is usually focused on the futureon what might happen and what youll do about itor on the past, rehashing the things youve said or done. The centuries-old practice of mindfulness can help you break free of your worries by bringing your attention back to the present. This strategy is based on observing your worries and then letting them go, helping you identify where your thinking is causing problems and getting in touch with your emotions.

Acknowledge and observe your worries. Dont try to ignore, fight, or control them like you usually would. Instead, simply observe them as if from an outsiders perspective, without reacting or judging.

Let your worries go. Notice that when you dont try to control the anxious thoughts that pop up, they soon pass, like clouds moving across the sky. Its only when you engage your worries that you get stuck.

Stay focused on the present. Pay attention to the way your body feels, the rhythm of your breathing, your ever-changing emotions, and the thoughts that drift across your mind. If you find yourself getting stuck on a particular thought, bring your attention back to the present moment.

Basic mindfulness meditation

Click here for a free mindful breathing meditation.

References

Grupe, D. W., & Nitschke, J. B. . Uncertainty and Anticipation in Anxiety. Nature Reviews. Neuroscience, 14, 488501.

Get more help

Anxiety Worksheet to help you cope with anxiety and worry.

Support resources