Worrying is something we all do from time to time. We worry about the things that concern us. We worry about our love ones and sometimes we just worry for the sake of worrying.

In the last few years I’ve started to consciously stop worrying. I haven’t found worrying to be at all useful, you see. It has never helped me, nor contributed to the solution to any challenges I have been through. Its just made me feel worse and so I decided I needed to stop it. Merriam Webster defines worrying as:

: to think about problems or fears : to feel or show fear and concern because you think that something bad has happened or could happen

: to make (someone) anxious or upset : to cause (someone) to worry

How do we stop worrying?

Its actually easier than most would think. To stop worrying, we simply just stop thinking about an event or situation that causes us to worry. We literally just turn off those thoughts. We don’t deny them, we just don’t think about them. Here lies the difference. When we think about worrying thoughts, we use destructive ways of thinking to look at our worrying situation. Its not productive because worrying doesn’t enable us to find solutions. In fact, worrying makes things worse. Worrying places  emphasis on what could go wrong and sends us into a tailspin of more worrying thoughts.

Download the Stop Worry & Stress Guided meditation here.

When we make a conscious effort to look objectively at our situations, without judgement, we’re  able to see the situation at hand, openly. For example, when we worry about our finances, we often bring in other thoughts that help us confirm our worries. We think of the bills which we won’t be able to pay and the consequences of that. We think about possible conflicts which may occur and this continues in a vicious circle. This makes our worrying worse but it provides us with zero solutions. If we are able to take a step back from our worries by examining our challenge without judgement, we enable ourselves to find the solutions to them.

When we ask ourselves “What can I do about this situation?’ we set ourselves and our minds in a state that is ready to look for a solution. Questioning our situation is helpful. Questions are helpful because we allow ourselves to look for answers. Sometimes the answer is to do nothing, because nothing can be done. Answers like these come up when we already know that we have done all that we can for the time being. Its like asking yourself what you can do to change a situation it the middle of the night. In the middle of the night, there is very little we can do. At these moments the best we can do is to rest and get sleep so that we can try something new, with the energy we need, in the morning.  We can ask ourselves specific questions too. For example, What can I do to earn extra money? When we do this, we again use our minds to look for solutions. By asking ourselves constructive questions, we give ourselves the feeling that we are at least trying to improve our situation and this gives us the feeling of empowerment. We are not victims to our situations but we must enable our thoughts to be open to possibilities and potential.

All answers lie within

Through the active choice I made to not worry, I discovered that all of the answer that I need in life are always accessible. We can access answers to life’s most pertinent questions by looking within. We can look within by meditating. During a deep state of meditation, we can ask ourselves questions and listen to the voice of our intuition return to use the answer we were looking for. Surprisingly enough, the answer that comes doesn’t often surprise us. That makes sense too, because the answers were always within us. Its just that we never thought of looking within to find them.

Helping ourselves find more happiness in our lives is a question of balance. Its being able to roll with the storms as they come and enjoy the warm winds in times of peace, but its life work. It requires regular attention from time to time because life is always about change and growth. When we accept this, we teach ourselves to dance during the rains and realize that there is nothing to fear and answers to our worries are always within reach.

To help others with their worries, I created a guided meditation audio for this. Its called the Stop Worry & Stress Meditation and you can download it here for free.

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