It’s tough to be productive in your daily life when anxiety and
worry are dominating your thoughts. But what can you do? If you’re like many
chronic worriers, your anxious thoughts feel uncontrollable. You’ve tried lots
of things, from distracting yourself, reasoning with your worries, and trying
to think positive, but nothing seems to work.
Why trying to stop anxious thoughts doesn’t work
Telling yourself to stop worrying doesn’t work—at least not for
long. You can distract yourself or suppress anxious thoughts for a moment, but
you can’t banish them for good. In fact, trying to do so often makes them
stronger and more persistent.
You can test this out for yourself. Close your eyes and picture
a pink elephant. Once you can see the pink elephant in your mind, stop thinking
about it. Whatever you do, for the next five minutes, don’t think about pink
elephants!
How did you do? Did thoughts of pink elephants keep popping in
your brain?
“Thought stopping” backfires because it forces you to pay extra
attention to the very thought you want to avoid. You always have to be watching
for it, and this very emphasis makes it seem even more important.
But that doesn’t mean there’s nothing you can do to control your
worry. You just need to try a different approach. This is where the strategy of
postponing worrying comes in. Rather than trying to stop or get rid of an
anxious thought, give yourself permission to have it, but put off thinking any
more about it until later.
Learning to postpone worrying:
1.
Create a “worry period.” Choose a set time and place for worrying.
It should be the same every day (e.g. in the living room from 5:00 to 5:20
p.m.) and early enough that it won’t make you anxious right before bedtime.
During your worry period, you’re allowed to worry about whatever’s on your
mind. The rest of the day, however, is a worry-free zone.
2.
Postpone your worry. If an anxious thought or worry comes into
your head during the day, make a brief note of it on paper and postpone it to
your worry period. Remind yourself that you’ll have time to think about it
later, so there’s no need to worry about it right now. Save it for later and
continue to go about your day.
3.
Go over your “worry list”
during the worry period. Reflect
on the worries you wrote down during the day. If the thoughts are still
bothering you, allow yourself to worry about them, but only for the amount of
time you’ve specified for your worry period. If the worries don’t seem
important any more, cut your worry period short and enjoy the rest of your day.
Postponing worrying is effective because it breaks the habit of
dwelling on worries in the present moment. Yet there’s no struggle to suppress
the thought or judge it. You simply save it for later. As you develop the
ability to postpone your anxious thoughts, you’ll start to realize that you
have more control over your worrying than you think.
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