How To Gain Control Over Your Constant Worrying: And Stay In Control For Good

Excessive worrying can feel like a running dialogue in the background of your mind that won’t turn off. This can affect work, school, home life, and sleep. Managing stress is the best way to worry less.

Why Do We Worry?

Worrying is often a result of fearing the unknown. If there is someone sick that we care about, we worry.

When we think about the future, which is a big question mark, we worry. When we try to figure out what our future will hold, if things will go well, we naturally will worry because it isn’t here yet.

You simply cannot control what has yet to occur, and trying to gain control over what has not happened yet causes you to overthink because we do not have a time machine. 

Worrying about things you can’t control — like the state of the economy or someone else’s behavior — will put you in a state of constant mental fatigue.

You”ll end up feeling like your mind is running a perpetual marathon.

 A 2017 research study by Mattress Firm, surveying 2,000 millennials, revealed that the average millennial spent over four hours a day worrying about something.  

For most people, worry is worse right before bed. That’s when the mind tends to scan the day for positives and, unfortunately, for things we feel unaccomplished, worried about, or have left unfinished.

This is why it’s important to take time before you lay your head down for the night and strategically worry. Yes, intentionally worry for a set amount of time and do this every day.

Can Worrying Be Productive?

The answer is absolutely. When worries are productive, meaning you find a solution, worry can decrease. You can even feel confident and empowered because it doesn’t feel as if worry takes over and there’s nothing you can do about it.

Contrary to this, are worries going round and round in your mind creating more “gloom and doom,” the longer they circulate.  

When someone is a chronic worrier, they overanalyze everything constantly about things in life that they feel cannot be solved or that they feel powerless to. Worry is often based on things in the future.

These are unproductive worries. Over time, worrying can feel like a continuous life-sucking chore. A highly useful strategy to manage these frequent unproductive worries is to schedule worry time.

Worrying can protect you by helping you keep a closer watch of potentially dangerous or problematic situations that otherwise could greatly impact you. 

For example, let’s suppose that you worry about losing your job. How will you rebound from this?

As a result of this worry, you might work harder, appear more friendly and pleasant at work, start applying to new jobs just in case, or make sure you have enough savings.

All of these things are protective factors carried out due to worrying.

How Do We Worry Less Without All Of The Stress?

This is accomplished by having “go-to” relaxation skills and ways to distract yourself under your belt. One of these skills involves inviting worry into your life rather than trying to push it away. Huh? Stay with me.

Real Versus Imagined Worry

The most important question to ask yourself is, are my worries based on reality or are they worry thoughts my mind is conjuring up without any real evidence.

For example, let’s say you’re worrying if you will graduate from college. You party a lot, skip class often, and you don’t always do well on your tests. Should you be worried? Sorry, but yes.

On the other hand, let’s say you are attending classes regularly, you’re on the Dean’s List for the third year in a row, and you balance school and your social life pretty well.

Now, should you be worried? I’d say this is one of those instances where reality-checking will serve you well. 

Consider if there is anything you can do right now, rather than in the future. If there isn’t, try your best to let it go.

More importantly, taking actual steps towards finding solutions to your worries so that you worry less.

SCHEDULE TIME TO WORRY

When it comes down to it, scheduling worry time makes you feel more in control. Your worries aren’t allowed to run around in your mind wreaking havoc. They are going to be there anyway.

This is huge in terms of denying yourself the ability to accept worry as a lifestyle. You are choosing to say “No, worry. Not now” and this is very empowering.

The reality is, if you’re going to worry anyway, because you are not in place in your life where you’ve learned to control your worrying, isn’t it a better idea to only allow worry certain times of the day?

Rather than worrying being your baseline, why not set aside time to worry at two points in the day? 

Designating worry time to a specific time and place, rather than at work, home, and before bed, could help you be more present and put more energy toward the moments that matter most.

By isolating our worries to particular moments, we learn to control when and, most importantly, how much we worry.

Essentially, the goal of worry time is to include it in your day as you would the gym or meeting friends, for example.

How Do I Control My Worrying?

How To Schedule Worry Time

Choose a comfortable, private place where you can carry out your worry time. Somewhere quiet with a chair and desk will do, but never use your bed because this should be your safe space, only used for sleep or relaxation.  

Clear your schedule for the designated time and focus only on this. You are more likely to follow through with scheduled worry time if you write it down or set a reminder on your phone.

 Speaking of phone, silence your cell phone or leave it in another room entirely. In fact, technology should not be in use during this time because it is an unnecessary distraction.

Take a Mini Worry Time Early During The Day: 15 Minutes

Often times, worry can occupy your mind during the day when you need your mind to be functioning optimally. When this occurs, use the time that you take a break, such as one of your 15-minute work break to process these worry thoughts.

This is a good time to gather your thoughts and check in on what matters to you most.

Write it down somewhere or type it so it is out of your head and there for you to come back to when you have the time to seek out a potential solution. 

Solution-focused Worry Time: 30 Minutes

The second worry time will ideally be towards the end of the day where you can worry for 30 minutes straight. Make sure that the time is not too close to bedtime or you may bring those thoughts with you in bed when you should be relaxing and unwinding. 

If you find that you are worrying during other times of the day, take a deep, controlled breath and remind yourself that you have time set aside for worrying.

You will think about this later and you are in control of your thoughts, no-one else. Deny your stress access to your life when you need to be at your best and come back to the present moment. 

Make sure that you do not exceed the 30 minutes you set aside for worry time. It is important to try your best to stay within these parameters. 

Write down all of your worries and stay focused on your worry thoughts. Allow yourself to feel stress at this time.

After a week or two of using worry time, see if you can identify common themes or patterns in your worry thoughts and work on challenging these worry thoughts before they take up too much of your energy. 

Be Strategic and Consistent to Worry Less

Remember, worrying for the sake of worrying is not productive. It does not provide a solution to your problem; it only sucks your energy and makes you less effective.

When you choose to worry a couple of times a day, rather than the entire day, your body can more frequently be in a state of relaxation. Fight or flight mode will lessen and your parasympathetic system can take over.

When you choose to worry strategically, this is when you feel more in control of your life.

When you stop worrying about things you can’t control, you’ll have more time and energy to devote to the things that are within your control.

This is the ultimate confidence booster, because your able to handle more in your everyday life.

Take a deep breath and remind yourself, “Not now stress, you’’ll have your time later…when I say so!”