I used to be a chronic worrier. Well, that’s not exactly true. I’m still in the recovery phase and slowly weaning myself from the unhealthy and obsessive compulsion to worry. Nonetheless, I have decided that worry is only a thief of joy and an enemy to self confidence. To see this, I had to take the journey outside of my situation, and take a hard look in on myself. Wow, was that disconcerting!
My chronic worrying began years ago after being laid off from a job with a four week old infant. Before that, I was a normal worrier. (Is there such a thing?) I worried about how my husband and I would feed, clothe, and care for this tiny new human with one less income. We were still less than two years into our marriage, and new at getting the hang of being responsible adults ourselves. After graduating college, I piled on mounds of debt because I figured that my big dream job would be right around the corner and I would be able to handle it. Well, the big dream job didn’t show up and I was not able to handle it. Shortly after losing my job, the creditors started calling and the debt kept mounting. I worried about how we would make ends meet and still meet the obligations to our creditors. I worried about where we would live when we couldn’t pay the rent. I worried about what we would drive when we couldn’t make the car payments. I just plain worried about everything, day and night. My newborn cried nonstop for the first few months and I cried along with him. When I stepped outside of my situation years later, I see that it all worked out. The worrying did little to change the situation. Wolves didn’t come eat me and I kept on living. Granted, it may not have worked out in the way that I would have wanted but it left a memorable mark on me. It was a lesson learned.
Several years later, I was laid off from another job during a corporate restructuring. Worry and its nasty face showed up, shaking its finger in my face, “I told you that you’d never make it. Now, what are you going to do with all this to take care of and your dad dying of cancer?” Worry usually brings its friends, negativity and self defeat along with it. I remember going to meet with the CEO shortly after it was announced that my job would be moved to a different department. I begged and pleaded to keep a job, any job. Although he listened with forced empathy, he had no money to sustain my position or any other additional position. A door slammed hard in my face that day, knowing that my loss was completely and utterly out of my control. I was hurt, deeply hurt, because I had felt like I had been a good employee and had done remarkable things for the company through the years. None of that mattered, and I kept worrying about what I could or should have done differently to have been more of a value to the organization. Bitterness crept in and stole a corner in my heart, and there it hid for many, many years. Looking back, it worked out in the end. I started a new job two days after being laid off and didn’t miss a beat. Best of all, I received a big raise at the new job.
Most recently, I’ve lost a lot of my self confidence by the influence that I’ve allowed others to have on me. I’ve allowed their hurtful words and actions to be on replay in my mind, telling me that I’m not worthy. I’m not smart. I’m not talented. Negativity holds on to statements that have hurt me so that they can continue to hurt me, to tear me down. One time I shared a goal from my college days with my supervisor and told him that I had dreamed of becoming a legislator. Knowing that I wasn’t on a path to reach that dream, he callously asked me, “Well, how’s that working out for you?” I’ve held on to that statement and replayed it in my head, a reminder of what I dreamed of being and a solemn comparison of who I had become. I didn’t want to admit that dreams change, and being a legislator was no longer my heart’s desire. The reality is that there will always be people who have more talent, more brains, more whatever than me. Accepting that fact doesn’t negate the value that I bring, it only means that I am happy being me.
Layers of worry, years of worry pile on. One by one, they steal my joy and my self confidence. I’ve allowed it to happen and sometimes, even relished in the thought of worry; somehow comforted by the familiarity of negativity. I find myself looking back through the years, longing for a time machine to go back and change this, or change that. But, there is no time machine. There is no magic cure to remove the negativity, the self defeating thoughts, or the bitterness. Anger creeps in and wants to lay claim to my thoughts, making me live with a sense of regret of what I could have been or who I should be. The moment that I received my figurative slap in the face was when I asked my husband of almost fifteen years why he originally fell in love with me. One of his responses was because of my “love for life.” My love for life. I remember those days that I seized with vigor and hope. Those were the days when I wouldn’t let anything knock me down for long, I was always hoping. I am who I should be, by no fault of my own. My journey was created for me to be shaped and molded, painful as it may have been at times. The truth is that the pain was not as much misery as my mind had imagined it to be. Each and every time that I thought that I was at my lowest point, my darkest hour, it all worked out. Worrying robbed me of the joy of everyday moments, the beauty of life’s simplicity that I had somehow forgotten even existed. I was too consumed by self created misery to see beyond the situation.
How have I learned to let it all go? It didn’t come in an overnight epiphany. It didn’t arrive under my pillow, covered in fairy dust. My friends and family couldn’t give it to me, no matter how much encouragement and praise they showered on me. Stepping out of my situation with an objective eye, I had to be honest with myself. There was nothing too big—even watching cancer take my sweet daddy away, even losing jobs, even losing money, even failure, even losing friends—for me to overcome. There will always be people who don’t like me and I can’t change that. People will say hurtful things, do hurtful things, and life will not be fair. I can’t worry about what people think, or worry about who others think I should be. I can’t worry about what might happen or what people are planning against me. I can only change me, and letting go of the worry is like letting go of a poison. Worry has been like vinegar in the milk, spoiling me to believe that I am less than a conqueror. Coming to terms with the God-given fact that all things will work out for the good, even if that means that the journey is filled with thorny vines knapping at my feet, is my only key to overcome worry. I can’t provide a magic solution to overcome worry, to conquer self defeat. It’s a voyage into the land of self-discovery, and self-acceptance. Start the journey today, before you realize that too much of your life has been consumed by the defeatist.
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