IF YOU MUST WORRY, DON'T WASTE IT

(New thoughts are posted each Monday and Thursday)(

Worry? Anxiety? Call it what you will. It is the darkness of the night without the brightness of the stars. It Velcro’s itself to our emotions and serves up exhaustion.

Are there ways and means to improve our handling of this mini or maxi nightmare? There are indeed. Firstly, it is very important to understand that it is a malady none of us will ever completely eliminate. Therefore, we should all remember what an old farmer once wisely reminded me “Every path has its puddles.”

Yes, sometimes the best we can do, after we have tried to keep thoughts that stink at a distance, is to work at making them less toxic and a little more manageable.

The causes of anxiety may come slowly as arthritis, bringing pain and immobility. They may come quickly with the words, “I want a divorce.” The cause may be the amputation of a limb after a horrible accident, an unexpected coronary that allows depression to come sweeping in. It may be an out-of-control anger from a friend or stranger. It may be shock waves from three words that become giants as you hear them spoken, “You are fired.”

If possible, ease the pain of whatever is the cause by mixing achieving with grieving. Though divorce is traumatic, a marriage may have been close to a living hell. An amputated limb may have saved a life. A friend of mine recently fell and severely fractured his jaw. Because of it they found cancer which was then successfully treated. The job fired from was a job you had wanted to quit for years. It makes sense to find silver rather than more shadows in the clouds. Let’s put it this way, “Don’t just complain about the weather, buy an umbrella.”

Talking about a problem with some-one close can help perspective. To just along sit and hug anxiety close really has little value. You can be so overwrought you put a wrong slant to the thing that’s worrying you, or you may have misinterpreted the problem. Maybe the other person has gone through what you are going through or something similar. It is a mathematical solution really because two points of view are always better than just one.

Would you ease your own anxieties? Then pause and try placing your problems and anxieties second in line while considering the problems and anxieties of someone else. That’s a tall order, but it is truly the best way to keep from being overwhelmed by self pity.

A case in point. One of our grand-daughters broke her foot. After moping about the house for a day or two, bemoaning the fact that the accident had really put a crimp in her plans, her mother gently reminded her that things could be much worse. That she should consider the plight of her counsin, who has M.S. She did and immediately her perspective of her miseries changed.

There is such great truth in what the novelist, A. J. Cronin, wrote: “Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow. It only saps today of its strength.”