I don’t know about you but a lot of my daily life can be contaminated by anxiety – not major, life-crippling anxiety, but those small little worries about daily life activities and events.  And if I am not careful, anxiety can almost rule my day.  While I’m doing one thing, I’m worrying about the next event or meeting.  What a waste.  It is not the way I want to live my life.

So let’s talk about ways we can manage these worry-focused thoughts.  First, let’s briefly define what anxiety is. 

First and foremost, anxiety is fear (usually a “small” fear).  We are afraid we are going to be late.  We worry about what others will think of us.  We are concerned about being adequately prepared for a meeting / speech / test / presentation later this week.

Secondly, we can note that worrying and being anxious is about the future – something that is going to (or may) happen at some point after “now”.  We don’t worry about the past, although we may worry how our past actions or decisions will impact the future.

Finally, most anxiety has some component of circumstances you can’t totally control.  Some people worry about the weather, others about the stock market, or traffic; some are anxious about what other people will think about them.  [Think about it – if we are worrying about things totally under our control, we could effectively manage the anxiety by just doing the action necessary.]

Now let’s identify the three most common responses to anxiety (I seem to be thinking in “3’s” today):

            1. Action.  A lot of people (myself included), do something when they are anxious.  It may not be productive activity – but doing something gives the person a sense that they are helping the situation (this may or may not be true).

            2. Paralysis.  Others tend to become paralyzed when they are anxious.  They don’t know what to do, so they withdraw, become passive and do nothing.  Frequently, these individuals also become highly internally focused, focusing on their thoughts and feelings.

            3. Rumination.  This is the third response, that can go with either action or paralysis.  Some people focus on what they are worrying about – and continue to think and talk repetitively about their worries.  This response can lead to a self-stimulating cycle of increasing anxiety.

So, what can we do when we are anxious?  Here are some ways to manage ourselves:

            *Limit the amount of “future” that you allow yourself to think (and worry) about.  Since worrying is all about the future, the more “future” that you allow yourself to be concerned about, the more opportunity there is for things to worry about.  So just focus on today – take “one day at a time”.  In highly stressful circumstances, you may even break the day into smaller segments (“I’m going to get to lunch, and then figure out the rest of the day after that.”)

            *Determine what you can do to manage the risks you are concerned about.  If you are worried about getting a low grade on a test, make a plan and schedule to study for it.  If you are concerned about ‘blowing’ a presentation, prepare the best you can.  If are anxious about being late to an appointment, leave early and allow extra time for unplanned events.  Make sure and take small steps to implement the plan.

            *Avoid people, unnecessary situations or input that increase your anxiety.  There are some people who are chronic worriers and have a fearful approach to life.  If I  am anxious myself, I try not to be around these people too much so they don’t feed my own anxiety.  Or if I am worried about the economy and my retirement savings, I will limit how much financial news I will expose myself to.

            *Distract yourself with positive activities.  Sometimes there are situations where all you can do is ‘wait’ (for example, waiting to hear if you were accepted into the college of your choice; or waiting to hear if you got the job you applied for).  When there is nothing you can really do to make the situation better, it may be good to go ahead and live life – go for a run, spend some fun time with friends, do some other work or tasks that need to be done, read a book, help somebody else in need.

            *Be thankful for the positive things in your life – especially the ‘little’ things.  Gratitude is a great antidote for a lot of negative things in our lives, including anxiety.  Look for little daily things that you appreciate – food to eat for breakfast, a nice cool morning, being able to work inside when it is raining outside, having family and friends that care about you, a car that starts, and so forth.

            *Build competencies into your life that will help you deal with ongoing challenges in your life.  Sometimes there are circumstances in our lives that are going to be there for a while – financial hardship, long work days, being away from family and friends.  And it can be helpful to have a longer term view on dealing with these situations – figuring out what you can build into your life that will help you long-term in dealing with the challenges you face.  Work on a ‘tighter’ budget, figure out some ways to earn a little extra money, develop an exercise program, learn how to use Skype to keep in touch with people over long distance.

So, that’s it. For those of you fellow-worriers or anxiety addicts, maybe there will be some advice that can help reduce your daily anxiety level.  Have a great week!

I took some time off this weekend to “do nothing” — more than usual, at least. So Friday night, I went to a baseball game (to me that is pretty close to doing nothing!) with my family and hung out with some friends. After doing some chores on Saturday, I went fishing for a while (a more correct description would be “beating the water and losing lures”), went to a movie, and then hung out in the nice Spring evening shooting the breeze with some friends. And today, I helped my wife do some gardening, did some reading, and took a walk in the woods.

To be honest, I needed to do nothing. I was (am?) pretty emotionally worn out and needed some mental space. I kept asking Kathy, “Why am I so tired?” and she started listing off the various projects I am involved in. And I said, “Oh, yea.” So I kept choosing to rest, piddle, and slow down. And it was interesting this weekend, as I interacted with others, a lot of people said, “I’m really tired.”

And it made me think, “Why are we so busy?” What drives our busyness? So, obviously, the starting point is to look at my life — what drives me? why do I choose activity versus rest? Why do I fill my schedule full? Lest those of you who know me well start to write and tell me why, my goal isn’t to do a full self psychoanalysis here. But I will share some thoughts that are relevant both to me — some in the past, some in the present — and others I know.

It seems a large part of our busyness — whether it is work-related, or family-driven — is driven by fear. Fear of “falling behind”. Fear of not knowing something important that we think we should know. Being afraid that we are going to miss out on some opportunity. Being anxious that our kids are going to be “behind” — in academics, in sports, socially, with regards to the latest gadget.

I observe the phenomenon frequently in youth sports. We are starting our children to participate in organized sports at earlier and earlier ages — T-ball, basketball, soccer, etc. — largely because we don’t want our kids to be “left behind” and not be competitive later in life. Reality check: Many successful athletes did not start playing their sport until junior high or high school. And many middle school and high school athletes, who are quite gifted, are dropping out of sports due to burn out.

Just this weekend, a friend who coaches his kids’ soccer team asked me if my son played in select club tournaments when he was 9 or 10. My son, who was an All-State soccer player in high school, didn’t start playing soccer until middle school. The father replied, “That settles it. I’m not sacrificing my weekends with my family for tournaments at this age.” Bravo. (I’m surprised we don’t have leagues where parents push their children around the field in strollers so they “will get the feel of the game.”)

But I see it in business, too. Someone sees or hears a spot on the news, or reads an article or blog, about “successful businesses do xyz” and all of a sudden they come to the management team and say, “We need to be doing xyz. Everyone is doing it and if we don’t, we’ll be left behind the competition.” It is like chasing money market returns from last year. It looks good, so let’s go after it.

Now there is a type of busyness that comes from a high drive to achieve. These people often have high energy levels, are goal-oriented, and want to be “successful” — however, that may be defined in their field of expertise (including parenting). Not to get too psychoanalytical here, but sometimes these people’s drive for achievement can be rooted in fear, too. Often the drivenness comes from earlier life experiences that they don’t want to experience again (this was common for Depression-era entrepreneurs). And sometimes it just seems to be the person’s personality type.

But when busyness creates physical lack of wellness due to not taking care of oneself, or when your schedule is so full you have virtually no time or emotional energy to invest in relationships (family and/or friends), or you just don’t have the mental or emotional energy to do “it” anymore, then it is time to do some self-reflection.

It seems to me that a few well-placed actions can help stem the tide against our culture of busyness.

1. Be clear about your goals. What do you want in life? What are your business goals? What are your goals for your children? If you don’t clarify your goals, then you are at risk for being driven by the latest fad that blows by.

2. Set like-minded people around you. We all need support. And our culture — through the media, our neighbors, our coworkers, and our competitors — give us seemingly hundreds of messages a day that we need to be going faster, working harder, doing more, etc. We need a cadre of friends, colleagues and compatriots who have similar values and goals to be “reality checks” for us, to serve as examples in their lives, and to help us weather the forces we are moving against.

3. Create structures in your life that facilitate accomplishing your goals. If you want to get in better shape physically, it makes sense to structure exercise into your week. If you want to have good family relationships, then you better schedule time together that allows for talking about what is going on in your lives. If you want to have a profitable business that provides excellent services, then you better have mechanisms in place to measure profitability and the quality of services provided. Additionally, existing structure creates resistance to distractibility. If I have a meeting every Monday at 9 a.m. with my team that is core to our business plan, then that is a barrier to scheduling something else at that time that may not be as important.

Most of us are busy. Many of us are busier than we want to be (myself included). So, we (I) need to take some responsibility for our lives and ask ourselves: If I am busier than I want to be, what is driving me to make the decisions to keep so busy?