Hey everyone, happy How-To Tuesday!! 🙂
How are you doing this morning?
(Image Credit)
There was a crazy thunderstorm in my neck of the woods last night, but good thing I shut my window just in time!
There’s something about thunderstorms that make me so relaxed and calm. Does this happen to any of you too? I know it’s common to fall asleep to rain/thunderstorm sounds, and I always wondered why! Maybe it’s because they’re very soothing and allow our minds to forget about worrying and stress for awhile.
And speaking of worrying, has anyone noticed that worrying has become a national pastime?
Whether you’re worrying about repaying college loans, having job stability in an unstable economy, or making sure your children are growing up the proper way, there’s always something to sweat about.
The simple reason?
Biology: all of our brains are wired to worry.
Of course, we all know worrying is charged with more negative emotions.
But your brain’s number one priority is to keep you alive, and it’s developed to do that very well. Sometimes, worrying is the body’s response to danger, an age-old mechanism to keep you alive.
The thing to do is to learn to soothe and guide your brain to calm it’s fear circuit. Here are some ways to begin:
(Thanks to the online course I just started, here are some things I learned)…
1. Promote greater awareness about your emotions. – The first step to decreasing worry is to recognize when you’re doing it. Becoming aware of your emotional state as it occurs trains your brain and decreases your “fight or flight” response.
2. Take a deep breath (many of them). – Taking slow, deep breaths through your nose with slow exhales turns down your nervous system and reduces your body’s stress response. This advice is obviously not the most original, but that doesn’t mean it’s not effective!
3. Don’t look back or forward. – When you find your mind drifting into the past or future, come back to the present moment, right here right now — mindfulness. In this moment, you are okay. Your thoughts are only creating your sense of danger.
4. Pay attention only to what you can control. – Your brain loves control and feels happier and calmer when it just feels more in control. Feeling in control can reduce anxiety, worrying, and even pain. Avoid imagining the worst possible scenarios!
5. Make a decision, even if you don’t really want to. – Simply making a decision about whatever it is that you’re worrying about shifts your brain’s cognitive focus to the things that matter the most.
6. Aim for good enough. – Worrying is often triggered by setting unrealistic or perfectionist expectations on yourself or others. For example, don’t aim for being the perfect parent, just be a good one. The problem with worrying starts when the brain’s anxiety-circuits get stuck in the “on” position which constantly triggers the body’s fear response. (Thank you, online course!)
So rather than make yourself more stressed out by worrying-about-worrying, think of worry as your brain just doing its job.
You just don’t want it to get too enthusiastic!
By the way, my oats from yesterday….
Have a lovely day, and remember, DON’T WORRY!
XOXO <3