One day you’ll look back and realize that you worried too much about things that don’t really matter.
One day you’ll look back and realize that you worried too much about things that don’t really matter.
When was the last time you worried about something?
Perhaps, more importantly, when was the last day you did not worry about something?
Worry becomes a part of life from the first moment we encounter something negative in childhood and stays with us until we pass into another dimension. It is a part of life, whether we want it to be, or not.
As soon as our mind is able to forecast future events as well as to forecast the outcome of certain actions, behaviors or statements, our ability to worry grows with every chapter. We are well on our way to achieving expert worrier status in our childhood, and upon reaching adulthood, our worrying skills have sharpened, and our range of things to worry about has grown exponentially.
This is nothing compared to the worrying chapter that arises when we become a parent. From that point forward, worry is part of your life, and will carry many a wasted moment of your life here forward.
Is it possible to reduce these percentages of wasted expenditures of energy? I would love to report that this is very possible, yet in my experiences, I have only found opportunity to compartmentalize worry and sequester it to its own chamber of my mind where I tend to it periodically, but am (in most cases) able to turn it off so that I may achieve higher functional status.
Take a moment and think back on some of the things that worried you most when you were in high school? Did those fears materialize, or were they replaced with new fears in college and so on?
In most cases, worry is unfounded anxiety that is able to materialize with the tiniest of thoughts and to spread rampantly across our consciousness with ease. It can consume us, and render us mostly useless until such time as we are able to ratchet ourselves free of its crushing grip and allow us to move to another plan of attack, such that we are behaving proactively against whatever is causing us fear and anxiety.
To the point of today’s aphorism, most of the worries we have focused on in our lives, really stem from issues that did not matter much in the grand scheme of things. They rise up and rear their ugly thoughts readily, such that we are disrupted from the joy of our current moment, long enough to contemplate something unpleasant. From that moment forward, how we are conditioned to compartmentalize that worry is the secret to our daily happiness.
For example, if you are having a great day, and then a thought runs through your mind that gives you an uncomfortable feeling, you really do have a choice. You may embrace that thought and let it stew and simmer in your mind, giving way to a string of such thoughts, each equally uncomfortable, or you may see it for what it is, just a thought, and dismiss it readily and continue as you were.
You really do have that choice.
Whether or not you opt to leverage that choice is actually an act of maturity and focus. Some are able to allow that thought to come top of mind, see it for what it is, and then just as quickly, it is gone and their current focus takes charge again. This is not a superpower. It is learned. It is practiced. It is achievable by all of us, should we so desire.
It starts with a desire to have a balanced life that is run by our higher selves and not overcome by emotions, fears, anxieties and depression. These are all normal feelings, but they do not need to control you. They need to be understood so that we may better embrace our internal power to control them as they arise, process the apprehension that they bring, deal with it instantly, and disregard the lingering negative emotion that wishes to remain in their wake.
The chance to thrive is on our doorstep daily. The opportunity to benefit from that chance remains in our possession and is readily on tap for our access, whenever we need it. The only critical ingredient is BELIEF. With belief, we are able to overcome almost anything and enable ourselves to prevail under circumstances we might previously have never imagined possible.
Happy Monday!
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