A few years ago, I got together with Brighton friend and fellow author Sarah Rayner to work on Making Peace with Depression – a short, comforting book full of tips and ideas for dealing with the blues. It had a great reception from readers – and now we’ve updated it, and it’s just been published with a lovely new cover (featuring the cutest ‘black dog’ ever) by Thread. It includes tips on crafty stuff and kitchen self-care.
A super-quick strategy for scary times
Right now, many of us are struggling with worries about the future, and I wanted to share one of the most useful strategies I’ve found, which I write about in the book.
I am a champion worrier, and I can even multiworry, letting them build and build! But one very useful technique I use if I find I’m going through a period of ruminating too much is to set aside Worry Time.
Worry time… the simple strategy I use all the time
I pick a time of day when I can devote myself to worrying, and if something niggles or stresses me out, I add it to my Worry List.
Then at the designated time – say 8pm – I let myself worry in a concentrated way for 20 minutes. That might be constructive – trying to think of ways to tackle the worry or reduce the probability of something going wrong. Often it becomes so tedious that I go off and do something better – or the postponement means when I go through the list, I realise how trivial most of it was!
This can be a good way to reduce the time spent ruminating, to try out gaining control over your own thoughts and, of course, to find solutions to the things that genuinely merit concern. It also helps you identify the worries that are entirely proportionate but out of your control. In many ways, those are the hardest ones to deal with.
When the first cases of Covid-19 were being reported, I was hugely anxious because I felt no one else was seeing the signs. It meant that once the world did begin to take action, even as other people become more worried, I felt better, because at least I no longer felt ‘responsible’ for warning everyone.
And now that we’re concerned about the conflict in Ukraine and energy supply and the climate, I’m trying Worry Time all over again…