Stop worrying about the potholes in the road and celebrate the journey … Barbara Hoffman

I admit it—I am a world champion worry wart! My vivid imagination can take me on some pretty scary worry trips, if I let it.

For example, when I got home from a recent visit with my  granddaughters, I had an email from my daughter saying she’d spent the day organizing everything for their backpacking trip the next morning. By bedtime the seven-year old was sick with a sore throat and stuffy nose. They’d see how she was in the morning to decide whether to go backpacking.

Those Darn Negative Scenarios

I could hardly sleep that night imagining the possible negative scenarios. I won’t go into detail, but they involved the four-hour car ride to get to their destination and everyone coming down with a virus while they were off in the woods! And then there was my own fear about catching what my granddaughter had. We’d shared food and drinks at the airport the day before.

The next morning my granddaughter was better and they left as planned. Five days later my daughter called bursting with pride as she described their awesome adventure. The seven-year old carried her own backpack the entire 2.5 miles to their campsite. The three-year old walked the whole way without having to be carried, and their dog carried her own food in a saddle pack.

They had a fabulous time and at night when they sought refuge from the mosquitoes in their tent, they played  UNO with the cards I’d given them the previous week.

Now why couldn’t I have come up with any of these positive scenarios when I was wasting my time worrying? Because when we worry, we have conversations with ourselves about distressing things we anticipate happening. The key word here is “anticipate.” The worry is about something that hasn’t happened and may or may not happen. Worry is always about something imaginary. Something that doesn’t yet exist. Worry, in fact, is the process of becoming distressed about the nonexistent. Put in that perspective, worrying seems like a big waste of time.

How to Stop Worrying

I’ve found some useful strategies from an article by C.S. Clarke, PhD that have helped me break the useless cycle of habitual worrying.

Use thought-stopping. Simply say “Stop” in your mind. Mentally shout it, if necessary. Whenever you find yourself worrying, stop the dialogue this way immediately. This may sound too easy, but it really works!

Replace the worry dialogue with a practical dialogue. The events you are anticipating really might occur and you can’t waste your time stuck in the worry cycle.

Plan your most effective responses to the most probable future events. Determine if there is anything you can do right now to prevent or modify those events. Talk to yourself about what probably will happen.

If you can’t change the negative self-talk, choose positive mental images. Make up pictures that represent what you want to happen that oppose the pictures of what you fear will happen.

Make pictures of your desired responses to counteract your feared responses when you know the outcome is unpleasant.

I just returned from a six-day Girls Getaway with my daughter and two granddaughters. We flew to Portland, Oregon and spent five fun-filled days with our cousins. I invested so much energy into creating a memorable adventure for my granddaughters that I forgot to pace myself. When I finally got home, I realized I had “hit the wall!”

Amazing Girls Getaway in Portland, OR

I had the joy of witnessing my granddaughters’ first meeting with their cousins. The two sets of sisters bonded instantly and it brought back memories of my own childhood summers when I visited my cousins or they came to stay with us. Now I appreciate what my parents experienced as they watched another generation become friends.

My seven-year old granddaughter and I shared a room. She’s an early riser and wanted to read or play cards at 6:30 in the morning. We spent two nights at Seaside and I was the designated hand-holder when the four little girls waded into the ocean. I also got in the pool and helped my three-year old practice her dog paddle. I don’t think I ever said “no” to any of their requests. My “pecs” got a workout from carrying the little one whenever she got tired.

I glowed with pride when my cousin referred to me as “Super Grandma.” On our last day at the beach I did four loads of laundry, packed all the suitcases into our rental car and drove back to the airport while my two little cuties dozed in the back seat for the entire 90 miles.

We had the usual “hurry up and wait” routine at the airport with check-in, security, and the wait to board our plane. The only thing I didn’t have to worry about was the car seat, which my daughter lugged through all the stops. We landed at Sacramento airport at 6 pm and walked outside into a 100-degree furnace.

Exhaustion Sets in

When we got to my daughter’s house, I took the girls swimming for an hour to cool off. By the time I fell into bed at 11:30 pm, I realized how exhausted I was. I’d planned to drive home the next morning, but then my daughter asked if I would take the girls to the library so she could do the laundry and organize for their backpacking trip the next day. How could I say “no” to one more opportunity to be with my two dolls? We read books and sat through story hour.  When it came to checking out the pile of books they’d chosen, I nearly had a meltdown. They each wanted to scan their own books and the machine wouldn’t cooperate.

By the time we got lunch and came home it was nearly 1 pm. I wanted to hit the road before rush hour traffic and threw all my stuff into the car. We all had a hard time saying goodbye after spending so many days together.

Lessons Learned

On the drive home I could barely keep my eyes open. I relived memories of our vacation and congratulated myself on having so much energy. But when I finally pulled into my driveway, I was completely drained. I realized that I overdid the Super Grandma thing and should have conserved my energy by pacing myself more and treating myself to some down time.

I hope I’ve learned from my mistake, but I understand that once you’ve taken on “super” status, it’s hard to be anything less.

Recently, my daughter was complaining about the mean girls in my granddaughter’s class. Without giving it much thought, I replied: “Oh, that’s what kids do in the first grade!”

Boy, did I blow it with my off-handed remark—on two counts! I should have known better. First of all, if I’d listened more carefully, I would have remembered the E-word, which my daughter is always reminding me to use. Secondly, I completely minimized her distress.

A few days later we talked about our conversation and she admitted that my response bothered her. I said I need to make myself a bumper sticker:

EMPATHIZE DON’T MINIMIZE

She loved the idea.

All she wanted me to say was “It must be so hard to watch that mean behavior” and affirm what she was feeling, and then commiserate a little. For example, “I remember when you were little and the kids teased you. I felt so helpless, I didn’t know what to do.

Empathize Don’t Minimize has become my new mantra because that’s what the parents of our grandchildren want. And for that matter, that’s what all the people in our lives want. Being the problem-solver that I am, I have to remind myself over and over again that people don’t want advice; they want you to understand how they’re feeling.

My next step was to turn to the Internet for inspiration. And, did I discover a gold mine! TeachEmpathy.com was #6 in the 2.7 million results I got when I googled “learning empathy.” The website is sponsored by the Nonviolent Communication Academy and was created to contribute clarity around the topic of empathy and understand how it can enrich your life.

Here’s how they define empathy:

The capability to share and understand another’s emotions and feelings. It is often characterized as the ability to “put oneself into another’s shoes.”

The origin of the word empathy dates back to the 1880s, when German psychologist Theodore Lipps coined the term einfuhlung (literally, “in-feeling”) to describe the emotional appreciation of another’s feelings.

In an essay entitled “Some Thoughts on Empathy,” Columbia University psychiatrist Alberta Szalita stated, “I view empathy as one of the important mechanisms through which we bridge the gap between experience and thought.”

In U.S. President Barack Obama’s own words: “Empathy strikes me as the most important quality that we need in America and around the world.”

I’m sure I’ll be writing more about this subject because I need practice, practice, practice!