Developing Practical Tools

Various chemicals can relieve the anxiety that fuels, and results from, worry. On the undesirable side are alcohol and other recreational drugs. Though habit forming and therefore very risky, alcohol has been used by many over the ages to ˜˜take the edge off the effects of worry. I dont recommend it. My first formal psychotherapeutic instructor started off the first class of a course by explaining how he used alcohol to self-medicate against the daily stresses of his life. He used the story to tell us that he was a recovering alcoholic.

More desirably, various selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)such as Prozac, Zoloft, and Paxilhave become commonplace due to their apparently profound effects on mood. Hundreds of thousands of patients have been helped courtesy of these medicines. They can be very useful to take during the course of a talk- therapy process. Of course, they require a doctors prescription. Some people are reluctant to use these medicines and prefer a nonmedicinal approach. Here are six nonmedicinal practices that can help worriers.

Diversion

The first is diversion. Most worriers employ it already, and sometimes, if the object of worry is not too great, and if the worriers self-esteem is high enough, it works like a charm . This technique is simple: Change the subject. Go do something different. Get your attention off the thing you are worrying about.

Diversion can be a little tricky, however. The very nature of worry is such that a worrier wants to keep worrying. The object of worry is like a magnet . For a worrier, the idea of choosing to attend to some other matter can be counterintuitive.

Diversion is a kind of thought-suppression technique, but, as the psychologist Daniel Wegner has written, thought suppression has a certain self-defeating tendency. The part of our consciousness that would seek to detect and veer away from worry could actually stimulate it instead. People do indeed have an ability to keep an eye out for things while they are otherwise occupied. For example, a parent can be at the kitchen table immersed in conversation while still watching a child. Similarly, we can keep an eye out for worrisome thoughts. The oddity is that when it comes to thought suppression, the part that is ˜˜keeping an eye out happens to be so powerful that it actually reminds us that we are on guard against the worrisome thoughts. So, its not easy to simply choose not to worry. The answer is to distract ourselves without trying too hard.

Action Plans

Another practical tool is to write an action plan. One of the stressful aspects of worry is that, by definition, we are not in control of the worrisome situation. After all, if we had control of a matter, we wouldnt have to worry about it. Making an action plan works because it gives the feeling of getting things under control. When you worry during a sleepless night, get out of bed and devise a strategy. Make a list of everything thats problematic about the worrisome matter, and for each item on the list decide on a countermeasure. Do this until you have effective countermeasures for all the anticipated eventualities.

Self-Reinforcement

Making action plans is even more effective when coupled with some self-reinforcement. For example, after you have set an action plan, tell yourself, ˜˜Okay, things are under control. If any of these bad things happens, I have a plan for it. When repeated out loud, this simple reframing of your outlook can nip the next worry episode in the bud. Saying things out loud to yourself (in private, to avoid having to worry about other peoples impressions ) can help you manage yourself.

Goals

Sometimes worriers feel unsettled because they have an important, unanswered question. Ive heard clients ask things like: ˜˜Should I complain about my boss? or ˜˜Should I pursue that job opportunity? or ˜˜Should I tell my colleague what I really think? They perceive a ˜˜damned if you do, damned if you dont conflict. A solution can often be found in the effort to set goals. In a way, this is a form of diversion. When you are thinking about your goals, and determining ways to implement them, you are distracted from worrying about them. You also may end up eliminating the source of worry.

Rationalization

Most worriers know from experience with loved ones who are trying to help that there are some natural questions one can ask that can nudge them off of worry. The basic question to ask yourself is: ˜˜If the thing I am worried about actually happened , would things work out? The predictable answer is usually yes, in the long run, things would work out. Although subjecting ones worries to rational inquisition really misses the point of fear-based worry, in certain cases, it can make a difference.

Worry Times

A surprisingly useful tool for managing day-to-day worry can be to arrange a specific time to fret. For example, you can set from 4:00 P.M. to 5:00 P.M. as your daily worry time. At the assigned time, go ahead, worry away. Go for it. But when the temptation arises at some other time, give yourself permission to save the rumination for the scheduled worry period. You can address the issue that provoked the worry impulse, but set aside the actual angst for later. After a few weeks of this approach, you may find that you worry less than when you started this new personal policy.