Worrying. Raise your hand if you’ve worried at all
today, this week, this month. Yeah, me too. It’s natural and normal. Everyone
does it. But some of us are better than others at not
letting worry and anxiety seep into other aspects of our day, contaminating our thoughts,
and stymying our productivity. Think about how much of a time sink worrying
can be. All the time you spend on worrying is time
taken away from doing something calming, nurturing or productive.
A friend of mine once told me that worrying is like a rocking chair. You’re moving back
and forth, but it’s getting you nowhere. Today I’m going to share a method for replacing
anxious thoughts with invigorating and productive ones.
If preventing worries from getting in the way of your day sounds useful to you, then
stick around! What’s up Explearners. Mary Daphne here
of explearning.co where we believe social skills are the key to the Good Life. What’s
the Good Life? It’s where you call the shots, you have a crew you can count on, and you’re
on a mission you care about. Before I jump in, I wanted to tell you about
a great free resource we’ve created for the Explearning community. It’s a comprehensive
small talk guide. If you find yourself grasping at thin air when you’re in unfamiliar social
situations, then our small talk guide is for you! Click the link in the description box
below to get the downloadable delivered to your inbox.
Ok back to the lesson. Time spent worrying is stale time. It’s
time that could otherwise be spent enriching your life and those around you.
So how to you jolt yourself out of the worry cycle?
When we remember that time is a finite resource. We can’t squander time on anxious thoughts
at the expense of achieving our life goals. And as soon you jolt yourself back into working
towards your goals, your mind becomes re-focused on those goals, which means you aren’t focused
on worrying anymore. Mission accomplished!
For icing on the cake, it won’t just help you worry less, it’ll also kick you out
of a cycle of procrastination. After all, it is folly to put off important work when
we have an uncertain deadline. It turns out that procrastination has a habit
of exacerbating worries because you know in the back of your head that there are tasks
that need doing, and that will nag at you until those tasks get done.
Even if this is a house chore you were dreading or an email you were putting off sending,
complete those tasks because that will propel you into motion. And momentum is the ultimate
elixir: it’s the remedy for anxiety and it’s the antidote for procrastination. Getting
things in motion is the name of the game. How many times have you put off what you could
do today, claiming you’ll do it tomorrow? And then when tomorrow rolls around, you say
you’ll do it tomorrow. And tomorrow suddenly turns into weeks, months, years…
By contrast, when you fill your day with the things you have set out to accomplish, you
have no time for worrying or procrastination. You can sleep easy knowing you did the best
you could that day, and you can wake the next morning well rested and feeling invigorated
by the anticipation of yet another productive day.
Now the most important part of this concept is making sure you have something meaningful
to set your mind to. If you have a very mission-driven job, then let it be your job. If not, then
make sure you have something outside your job that can absorb your free time in a meaningful
way. For many of us, this is tending to the well-being
of our family. After all, when you are caring for other people, you feel a sense of purpose
and worry less about yourself. But this can also be a side-hustle, a professional skill
you are developing, or a language you are mastering. The more concentration and commitment
the task takes, the more fulfilling the experience will be.
Once you have a mission that matters, you are all set.
As soon as you feel the worries creeping in, acknowledge those worries, and then remind
yourself that you have something far more important to focus on: your mission. Every
minute spent worrying is a minute fewer you have to make progress on the things you care
about most. We all have dreams and aspirations. If life
is about choices, let’s choose to focus on accomplishing those dreams and aspirations
rather than the things that distract from them.
So now that I've shared our thoughts, I’d love to hear your own ideas for replacing
stale worrying time with alive time. What strategies do you have for worrying and procrastinating
less? What helps fill you with a sense of purpose?
Share that with me and the Explearning community in the comments down below.
And, if you loved this lesson, please be sure to let me know. You can give this video a
thumb’s up on YouTube and if you haven’t done so already subscribe to join our tribe
of Explearners, so you never miss a lesson. If you ring that bell, you’ll get notified
about new lessons and our weekly live streams. Email this video to a friend or coworker who
also wants to supercharge their social skills. While we’re at it, feel free to also share
it with your Facebook and Twitter friends as well!
And remember, the writeup of these lessons are always available on our blog at explearning.co/blog.
With that, have an awesome week, Explearners. Thank you so much for joining me and I’ll
see you next time for your next Explearning lesson.
Happy Explearning ⚡