How Can I Stop Worrying?

There’s such a stigma that we can’t even talk about it.

Well, hey there. Welcome back.

The Stigma of Private Worry

What are you worried about? No, really. What are you worried about? Maybe you say nothing. Maybe you say, “Oh, the usual, you know, the things everyone worries about.” We deal with life and concerns and we take objective measures to reach goals in public. But then in private we worry and sometimes the worry doesn’t match our outward demeanor does it? Worry has a stigma to it just like suicide does. And I talked about this in my episode called throwing away the container. There’s such a stigma that we can’t even talk about it. We don’t even allow ourselves to talk about it. We wave it off as a few moments of weakness or we just think everyone feels the same way about this that or the other thing, but we don’t really address it for the most part. Now, you may feel that you have a worry about a certain thing and then you decide you’re going to take action. And when you do that, you actually feel a lot better. But it doesn’t happen often, does it? The stigma and guilt prevents you from really exploring it. And if you’ve noticed through a number of episodes and even my books, I tend to push really hard in the direction of, well, no, let’s just do that. Let’s feel that. Let’s let’s see what that’s like. Let’s not hide. Let’s not shove things into the dark recesses and not deal with them. Because that’s how they get their power. That’s how they fester and get stronger because we push them into a corner and we don’t deal with them.

Saying It Out Loud: The Power of the “Third Voice”

It’s typical for someone to feel bad and embarrassed if they say out loud to someone, I am worried about this because it almost feels so unnatural to just say it that way. And if you’ve read three voices, it means you’re saying it in your third voice. We like to say it in our second voice all the time, which is our inner dialogue and monologue. Because like many other things, fears, paranoia, and so forth, they sound silly when you say them out loud. Well, then why wouldn’t you say them out loud then? If it sounds silly and sort of dispels it. Here’s the contrast.

This does not apply if we’re worried for someone else. If we think to ourselves, “Oh, I’m worried about Susan. And Susan being someone you work with or Susan being your daughter or your cousin or your sister. Now you’re concerned. Oh, that’s so much better. Well, I’m just concerned for her.” Well, it’s sort of silly for you to be worried about that. But I’m sure she’ll be fine. Yeah, I’m just worried about her. Aw, it’s really nice that you feel that way. It’s really nice to have all that empathy towards someone who isn’t you. Do you see how odd that is?

If you’re worried about Susan, you may just have coffee with her and sit down and say, you know, how have you been? What’s going o