I like to define worry as saying “no” to what could be, as in “I don’t want that to happen.” Worry is normally something we anticipate as a future threat. A telltale sign that we are dealing with worry is that it likes to start with “what if…”, followed by something you don’t want to see happen. So we say “no” to what we anticipate could happen.
Who are we saying “no” to? Well, mostly we are saying “no” to life. “Life, I don’t want this to happen.” It’s a very human expression, and I personally don’t know anyone who at least occasionally doesn’t register a mighty protest to bad or even terrible things happening.
Sometimes, we can do something about the anticipated threat. So for instance, you say to life, “I don’t want to experience my tires blowing out while I’m driving down the road.” So I buy new tires.
Of course, worry digs in and becomes obsessive when we realize we can’t do a thing about what we don’t want to see happen. For instance, I can’t control the outcome of what my boss might tell me at today’s meeting, so I worry. I may not be able to control whether I meet my expenses this month, so I worry. I can’t control how those medical tests I had turn out, so I worry. The possibilities are endless and daily. And each time I give in to thinking about this possible future threat, I drain myself of tranquility and replace it with fear. I temporarily lose my sense of wellbeing and happiness.
The heart of the matter is that worry implies that I don’t trust that I will be alright no matter what happens. Now I didn’t say pain free or suffering free. Just that I will be alright despite it all. This is a pretty heady thought, and you have to take the time to get in deeper with your experience. What has your experience taught you so far about life?
This is not something anyone can convince you of. It’s not of that nature. It’s purely in your own personal reflection on a lifetime of experiences. If at the end of the day, the truth of your own personal experience is, “well, I’ve been through great pain, and great suffering, and I wouldn’t want to wish it on anyone, and yet still, I managed to survive and somehow benefit” then we have a starting off point.
We bring the depth of our experience to daily worries, and we say, “this too shall pass,” “I’m going to be fine no matter what happens (ultimately even if I die)”. How can we dare say this? It’s been our deepest truth up to this point. Lessening our worry means coming back to this basic truth every time worry pops up. We gradually learn to live in the now, and spend less time with foolish worries. We gravitate toward light-heartedness, gratefulness, and many other good feelings as we simply enjoy the life we have in front of us.