“Worry is like a rocking chair: it gives you something to do but never gets you anywhere.” ~ Erma Bombeck
I appreciate having something to do, but rocking in a chair doesn’t really cut it for me (at least not yet). :) I’m also not trying to get anywhere. I simply want to dance passionately with the world while I still have the precious opportunity. And so I view the value of everything through a particular lens. I ask myself: Is it useful? Does it serve my desire to enjoy and improve my relationships with myself, with the world, and with others? If so, then I bet on it. And if I can’t connect those dots, to whatever it is, then I regard it as useless (at best).
That’s how I feel about worry.
I recently spoke to a friend who confessed that he’s been routinely waking up at three in the morning, worrying about various things (we never discussed the actual things). I asked him if he considered those thoughts to be useful. He wasn’t quite sure what I meant, so I pressed him a bit:
“They’re your thoughts, right? So are they serving you? Are they helping you solve a particular problem? Are they making your life, and others, better?”
“Since there’s nothing more that I can do about it, and certainly not at 3 a.m., I suppose not.”
At the end of our call, he got it.
Worry is useless because it can’t help you improve your life or your relationship with others. In fact, excessive worry causes you to become depressed and angry, and to withdraw from life. And despite what your identity validating mind may tell you, worry doesn’t demonstrate that you’re a caring person. If you worry less than someone else, does that really mean that you care less? C’mon?
The complex systems thinker, Nora Bateson, said:
“It’s a prerequisite of system change that you lose faith in the existing system. Once you lose faith, you stop looking for yourself inside it.”
Your conditioned mind, which produces worry, is your existing system; one in which you have complete faith, because you believe that the system is useful and, more importantly, that it is right. But that system is not indisputable; it’s simply a tool like ChatGPT. So change your faulty system and use that powerful tool, consciously and deliberately. And when you are not using it, put it away and experience the amazing world around you, including other human beings.
Make no mistake: Worry is both symptomatic and revealing of one’s system of thinking, and of one’s environment. It reveals a lack of trust in yourself, in your fellow human beings, and in the mysterious and powerful Universe. Let’s stop looking for ourselves inside the existing, defective system. Let’s trust each other and let’s trust life.
It’s a bet I’m willing to make, because it’s useful.
Stay passionate!
Wow Tom!
I needed this. Today. I’m in a situation that I wasn’t expecting, and I am left worrying about what’s to come of my decision. Because of our multiple talks, I know exactly what I want…but that doesn’t mean I don’t “worry” about the consequences I might face one day.
“I ask myself: Is it useful? Does it serve my desire to enjoy and improve my relationships with myself, with the world, and with others? If so, then I bet on “
This brought peace to my soul this morning.
“I simply want to dance passionately with the world while I still have the precious opportunity” …this also spoke to me.
I now embrace that I won’t exist forever and that’s been so powerful.
Crazy eh? Something that makes people worry… death… Makes me feel alive.
All thanks to you.
This quote was like a knock on the side of the head.
“And despite what your identity validating mind may tell you, worry doesn’t demonstrate that you’re a caring person. If you worry less than someone else, does that really mean that you care less? C’mon?”
Unconsciously I realized that I felt I needed to worry to show how much I care. A default I was not fully aware of. Thank you. After all, I would be horrified to think that people needed to worry about me on ANYTHING to show they care. Their greatest gift to me is for them to be happy!