Recent events across the world have led to an increase in anxiety and worrying.
For people who already have worries, this can lead to increased pressure. Help is at hand to stop us worrying with some simple proven techniques.
If you aren’t worried, please remember that just because you may not be worried doesn’t mean that others aren’t.
Our mental diaries can easily fill with unwanted anxiety. People often think that if they worry about something for long enough, they can come up with a solution. However, worrying about things excessively is bad for us.
It’s not easy to think I’ll just stop worrying and it is not helpful to tell people this. Sometimes, the harder people try to stop worrying, the worries can become even more invasive.
Our mental health therapists are often asked how to deal with worries that go round and round in our heads.
One of the techniques they use in these situations is a method devised by a clinical psychologist from the Netherlands, Professor Ad Kerkhof.
Professor Kerhof’s clinical trials enabled him to assess the effectiveness of certain techniques to help people worry less. He worked with people with extreme anxiety and then applied the techniques to people who find themselves worrying too much.
One of the most effective methods to help with worries is to schedule a time to worry. Preferably in two 15-minutes slots just before and after the working day. Please don’t plan your worry time for when you are in bed.
For your morning worry session, treat it like a meeting or task at work. Sit up in a work chair and tackle them as you would a list of things to do at work. Tackle your worries one by one.
When a worry arises don’t ignore it completely, just say “not now”. It is not the time to worry about it you will get to it later.
For the evening session, just allocate five minutes to the list of worries. The remaining ten minutes are for a positive memory. Recall a time you felt happy or proud. Analyse the memory as you would if it were a worry. Let it go round and round in your head recalling the positives. Try to relive the good feelings you felt at the time. Try and recall your sensory experiences from the positive moment. Not just the sights but the sounds and smells too.
If you begin to worry outside of your worry time, find a way to distract yourself. Speak to a friend, escape into a good book or listen to some music.
We are hardwired with a flight or fight response and to look for danger so often the negatives stand out more than the positives. Our survival makes us focus on danger and worries rather than positive beautiful things. We are not ignoring the worries, just managing them in a way that makes it easier to deal with them.
While we may not be able to get rid of all our worries, we can manage them.
If you would like to offer mental health support to your employees consider or Proactive Employee Assistance Programme. It’s free to register.