That doesn’t seem to reflect reality.
As someone who has dealt with many of the problems mentioned in this thread I can tell you that platitudes aren’t helpful or necessary in changing something as intrinsic as worrying.
Don’t you have a tattoo under your shirt?
Hoo boy, I suddenly feel like I’m in over my head. Keep in mind that this is someone else’s philosophy and not my own, so I’m stabbing at the dark here a little.
Courage is a healthy response to loss, or perceived loss. What constitutes loss?
Loss of health is one possibility. Suppose you notice a mole that you’ve never seen before. Doing nothing about it is foolish, of course. Laying awake at night and fretting about it and saying “Oh woe is me, I’m dying of cancer” won’t do you much good either. Manning up and getting a doctor to check it out may just save your life. And even if the doctor hands you a death sentence, you can man up and face it rather than ignoring it or denying it.
How about loss of money? Let’s say you get a phone bill for $30,000. Once again, ignoring it would be foolish. Complaining about your victim status isn’t much better. Calling the phone company and being assertive might actually solve the problem.
Loss of love is another possibility. Suppose your mate dumps you. You can choose to wallow in self-pity, or you can have the courage to get back out in the world and meet new people.
I think that the point is that imagined catastrophe is often worse than actual catastrophe. It takes courage to face reality, but that reality is usually not as bad as you think it might be.
And the side benefit is that courage, when acted on, builds confidence. It’s hard to worry when you’re full of confidence.Hoo boy, I suddenly feel like I’m in over my head. Keep in mind that this is someone else’s philosophy and not my own, so I’m stabbing at the dark here a little.
Courage is a healthy response to loss, or perceived loss. What constitutes loss?
Loss of health is one possibility. Suppose you notice a mole that you’ve never seen before. Doing nothing about it is foolish, of course. Laying awake at night and fretting about it and saying “Oh woe is me, I’m dying of cancer” won’t do you much good either. Manning up and getting a doctor to check it out may just save your life. And even if the doctor hands you a death sentence, you can man up and face it rather than ignoring it or denying it.
How about loss of money? Let’s say you get a phone bill for $30,000. Once again, ignoring it would be foolish. Complaining about your victim status isn’t much better. Calling the phone company and being assertive might actually solve the problem.
Loss of love is another possibility. Suppose your mate dumps you. You can choose to wallow in self-pity, or you can have the courage to get back out in the world and meet new people.
I think that the point is that imagined catastrophe is often worse than actual catastrophe. It takes courage to face reality, but that reality is usually not as bad as you think it might be.
And the side benefit is that courage, when acted on, builds confidence. It’s hard to worry when you’re full of confidence.
Hmm… you could read it the other way. (Which makes me think self esteem is a red herring in this case.) If someone thinks others are talking about them, making plans concerning them, and so on, then it sounds to me that this person esteems herself highly. And if someone thinks others are probably not paying attention to him, then it sounds to me as though he esteems himself lowly.
-FrL-
I’m pretty laid back. I’ve had a lifetime of problems and setbacks, large and small, and I always land on my feet. So do most people…even the worriers (even though they don’t think they will).
Life happens…barring fatal illness or a flaming car wreck or something, we’ll all be OK. And I can’t waste time worrying about what “might” happen. Life’s too short to let those thoughts consume me. I do my best. Sometimes it’s enough, sometimes it’s not – but it’s rarely enough to keep me up nights with worry.
Respectfully, I must disagree. If you think that people are saying bad things about you behind your back, you are probably projecting your own fears an insecurities on them. If you think that people are saying “Wow, what an awesome dude”, then I wouldn’t think that you’d spend a lot of energy fretting about it.
The key word here is face. It takes little courage to just let things take their course, even if you walk in with your eyes open and your head up. That’s just being human. And even if things turn out okay, you won’t be free from the worry next time. You won’t learn.
Courage - at least the kind that builds confidence - is not just a healthy response to loss. It’s the willingness to risk losing everything by taking serious action, and holding yourself 100 per cent accountable.
It’s too much for most of us, which is why most of us lack confidence. Confidence comes only at a high price. Part of that price is saying no to someone who needs help - the tender, wounded you, stuck in a bad old world. You have to kick that you to the curb, hear its pain and fear, and turn away. The world has to win that little victory over you before it shows you a kinder face.
I apologize if the above reads metaphysical. I do believe, though, that there is some psychological truth to the idea that we sometimes have to be cruel to ourselves to make progress - to accept the pain life gives us at face value, but then deny the self that feels the pain even if this makes us hurt more deeply. That self is tenacious and insidious, and it will drag us down unless it just psychically dies.
That’s how I understand courage and growth, anyway. You need others to be good to you, but there is a part of yourself that you have to actively crush.
On some level this may be true but the cult of self-esteem creates far more unhappiness than happiness. Those that think they don’t have any crave it and those that think they have it have to protect it.
The real answer is self-acceptance. If you can just be happy with how you are and not worry about maintaining your position in society, there is no room left for worrying about what others think/say/feel about you.
Let’s not confuse self-esteem with the movement trading under that name.
It could be that self-confidence (another way of saying self-esteem, AFAIC) really comes from being told one is inadequate, worthless, crap etc. and believing it - enough to either a) act to change the situation or b) crash emotionally enough to bounce back and then act.
Self-acceptance is something else entirely. It can be positive, or it can be passive, comfort-seeking and lead to resignation.
Another thought that makes me laid back:
The plan I come up with now isn’t really any better than the plan I’d come up with when it happens.
Just today I thought I missed my train stop. Quite a big problem when I don’t speak the language and had only enough money in my pocket for cab fare home. I sat there fretting about what I’d do and where the next stop would be and how I could get by.
Then it dawned on me. I’m not going to come up with some magic solution. Any plan I came up with by fretting would be just as good or bad as the plan I’d come up with when confronted by the situation. So, I said a quick prayer and sat back down to watch the countryside go by.
Well said. I’m not sure where this “maintaining your position in society” stuff came from, but it’s most definitely not what I’m talking about. Let’s not confuse self-esteem with its polar opposite, narcissism.
No, let’s not.
However, maintaining your position in society looks like it’s moving from a luxury to a necessity. If it hasn’t been one already, that is - just as long as we’ve had to barter materially for things like love, friendship, safety and peace.
I don’t think well on my feet. If I have to come up with a solution on the spot for a problem, I know I’m probably not going to think of a particularly good one. If I’ve thought about “what would I do if X happened” before, I have some more time to think about what I might do, so I’m not so panicky if it does. That’s one way I keep from having to think on my feet.
Thank you for responding to my post.
It’s obviously a little difficult to have a discourse when we’re talking via some intermediary. I’m not sure whose philosophy you’re talking about specifically, but I’m also shooting from the hip and referencing only my own experience.
My experience tells me different.
Given a situation where a person has to screw up the courage to try, there are people who will detect that effort and attack because that person is vulnerable. (Their vulnerability having been displayed by their courage.)
I’m not talking about those situations necessarily, because a lot of the worry we’re talking about in this thread is abstract or even non-extant.
How does one approach non-extant (I’d much prefer to write existent BTW) worries with courage?
Is it beneficial to discuss one’s worries with another person?
Worry can be a way of dealing with the different possibilities that are inherent in our lives. To me it seems logical.
I didn’t used to be a worrier. Then I married someone whose health was iffy and I became worried about that. Then that worry became a habit and I was worried about everything.
Now that he’s gone, I wonder if I will return to being a non-worrier or if the worry habit will stick.
In retrospect, the worrying helped me practice for loss and grief.
I wish you joy and resolution.
In my experience, there is an aspect of CBT that is counter intuitive because it is not about resolution. The only point is to break out of the vicious cycle of self reproach using tools that put the lie to distorted patterns in our own thought processes.
Worry, grief, sadness, anger, resentment and a whole litany of other negative experiences make sense; they are functional emotions.
I will try to take it as a personal lesson that you are able to see something positive in your grief even in the midst of it.
I don’t know. Can you give me an example of a non-extant worry?
Yes, of course. Some people charge a lot for this service. Those that don’t charge may often find themselves growing weary of the worrier, of course. It’s a terrible burdan to be drawn into someone else’s imagined catastophes day in and day out.
Yes, of course. But worrying a little and then finding an actionable solution is far different from obsessing endlessly over something you have no control over.
There’s a difference between “worry” and normal thought processes that solve problems. I think “worry” tends to stand in the way of problem resolution. Thinking something through, weighing consequences in a non-obsessive way, playing out different approaches quickly in your head…these are skills that can be learned. Me? I think about the odds of a negative outcome actually befalling me. If the odds are good I’ll come through it relatively unscathed, I’ll go for it.
Sorry, I should have done a better job editing that post…
…I was trying to get at what you refer to as imagined catastrophes. Worrys about events that never come to pass.
Granted, however, in any relationship there is likey to be a worrier and a relaxer. In some cases it may be more akin to an Ant and a Grasshopper with the burden being on the Ant as the Grasshopper continuously says, “You worry too much and can I borrow fifty bucks.”
For those who obsess endlessly over things they have no control over, they are dealing with a pychological problem and would likely benefit from therapy and possibly medication, IMO.
For those paired up with the grasshopper type, they likely “obsess” only from the perspective of perennially oblivious.