Whether you are a CEO, manager or employee, we all can suffer from excessive worrying. You may just think this is generally indicative of life, which in part is true but there is a difference between occasionally worrying and being in a permanent state of anxiety, both in and out of work. This can have a bad effect on your mental and physical health and also have a negative effect on your work, which then can lead to more worry and the cycle goes on! This is a problem, where if not addressed early on can slowly invade your life without you realising. The best way to analyse this is to take a big step back, clear your mind and have a look at the following 5 signs. If you establish you are worrying too much then we have the ABC strategies for coping and helping at the end of the blog!
The Five Tell Tail Signs
1- You Replay Everything Over and Over
This is a case where you are constantly overthinking past situations and replaying them through your mind to give yourself some reassurance. As an example, you’ve just been to a work meeting and your boss said one of your ideas sounded good, but didn’t really elaborate. After the meeting, you sit at your desk and start replaying the meeting over and over in your head trying to think if your boss said anything else, you start thinking about the tone and the way they spoke. Did they actually think it was good? Did they say it sarcastically? Did they mean it? You will replay it over and over potentially convincing yourself of the worst-case scenario.
2- The Worst-Case Scenario
This is when you always think of the worst-case scenario in everything and twist even positive news into something bad. For example, your boss may say something like; that was a great conclusion to the project the other day, lets get together as I have some questions. Now person one, who is a generally positive person, may think great my boss has noticed my good work and wants to know how I did such a good job! I can't wait for the meeting!
Let's now look at person two, who is generally in a constant worried state. They may think, oh-no! the boss has spotted something that is wrong with the project and wants to give me a dressing down for it!
These are two very different takes on the same request from your boss! This is what we call your filter, and if your filter is one of anxiety and not positivity then it can potentially bring out a negative hypothesis to a simple request!
3- You Rehearse What’s Going to Happen
Every day you rehearse for the most mundane things. You think about your drive to meetings, you check out the parking options as you are worried you won't get parked, and you prepare what you’re going to say in advance. You will hardly let anything happen naturally as you worry about how you are going to get somewhere, what you are going to do and what you are going to say.
4- You Struggle to Sleep
When it comes to nighttime, you will rarely fall straight to sleep. You might toss and turn, thinking and worrying about what the next day will bring. You also go over things that happened within your day and especially dwell on any slightly negative situations. This leads to a lot of overthinking which in turn leads to a lack of sleep.
5- You Can’t Ever Relax
You always need relaxing time, however, if you find that during this time, you just can’t switch off, you are a serious worrier. If you find that you are having persistent anxious thoughts throughout your daily life, even when you’re trying to relax, you’re definitely worrying way too much!
The ABC Strategies For Coping With Worry
A - Quality Sleep
Let's tackle an important foundation step first …. SLEEP!
Poor sleep means poor functioning the following day, which can lead to more stress which then, in turn, creates worse sleep. Your anxiety levels rise when you have not got enough shut-eye! When it comes to sleep, you need to break the cycle and move your bedtime to at least get the recommended 7-9 hours. Some tips for this: stop using technology or use blue blockers before bed, let yourself unwind, maybe read some fiction, dim the lights or ultimately do a bit of mindfulness or meditation! If you feel guilty about taking ‘your’ time, remind yourself that proper rest lays the foundation for proper functioning. You will be better positioned to tackle the next day! There are also plenty of apps out there to monitor your sleep to see if you are getting the correct amount of quality sleep. It might take some time to get into this new routine, but once you’re sleeping more, your worries will decrease.
B - Mindfulness and Meditation
We have mentioned this many times in our blogs and podcasts, practising meditation and mindfulness can calm your mind and really put the breaks on anxiety. Whether you are sitting down in a quiet place for 10 minutes just being mindful, or putting Headspace on your phone and doing 10 minutes of meditation, it will all help! Using a meditation app like Headspace can help you have a calmer, more focused day, reducing worry and anxiety. Try doing it first thing before work and at night before you go to sleep, it will have a profound effect on your work and personal life. Research shows us that mindfulness and meditation are real-world stress busters, so give it a try, commit to doing a little bit every day and you will see a vast difference in the long term. In the podcast 'Regaining Your Mojo With Motivation! The esteemed counsellor and life coach Sandra Marston gives a shout out to a book on mindfulness by Ruby Wax called 'Sane New World', this is definitely worth a read. Mindfulness is slightly different to meditation but it can have a very strong effect!
C - Breathing
Yes Breathing! We mentioned this very subject in a blog post last month called 'Nerves and how to deal with them for an interview', in this we had a big section on breathing! You would be amazed Just how relaxed and free from worry you can become after a bit of structured breathing. There are lots of styles out there to choose from but the one we focused on was Box breathing. Research shows that there is a link between the way you breathe and the way you think and feel. It is all to do with The Autonomic Nervous System which controls, among many things, heart rate and respiration. Structured breathing taps into the parasympathetic nervous system which helps your body calm down, it slows your heart rate, respiration and reduces cortisol levels in your body. Relaxation techniques like box breathing engage the Parasympathetic Nervous System quickly, calming the mind and body and helping with worry and anxiety. This technique of breathing is used by US Navy SEALs to keep them working efficiently under high pressure. They are taught simple controlled breathing techniques that help them stay relaxed in high-stress environments.
Let's try some Boxed breathing! All you have to do is picture a box with equal sides. Inhale for 4 counts as you breathe in and visualise moving up one side of the square. Then hold your breath for 4 counts, as you do this imagine moving across the top of the square while holding your breath. Then exhale for 4 counts while your visualising moving down the other side of the square. Then finally hold your exhaled breath for 4 counts and visualise moving along the bottom of the square back to the start. Then all you need to do is repeat this until your anxiety releases. A great technique for managing worry at any time! If it is good enough for the SEAL's it's good enough for you!
Conclusion
Worry comes when you allow your mind to wander too far into the future and dwell on the past. Using all these techniques will anchor yourself in the present and can do wonders to dispel worries. Using meditation to calm your mind adds power to the foundations of breathing exercises and getting great quality sleep gives you the best way to face your day! Put these three things together for a few weeks and you will feel like a different person! Remember, everyone worries and worry isn’t necessarily a bad thing – it’s human. The problem with your worries comes when they take over your life and you find yourself struggling to be productive, especially at work. If you try all this and are still having problems maybe seeing a counsellor would be the way forward, they are so approachable. As mentioned earlier, give our podcast 'Regaining Your Mojo With Motivation!' with Sandra a listen, we go into all these relaxation techniques and much more! Also, you will get to listen to a proper counsellor talk and quickly realise they are just there to help you with great ideas and solutions, and definitely not someone you should fear. We hope this blog helps you on some level and all the very best for the future.