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List Making

I’m reading 10% Happier, and one of the things that Joseph Goldstein tells Dan Harris to do when he’s ruminating on the same worry for the 90th time is to ask himself, “Is this useful?” I’ve been trying to remember it when I restart a stress loop in my head at 2 am when I’m lying in bed. Is worrying about this right now useful? Maybe it is because I’m trying to work out a solution. Maybe it’s not because I’m just replaying the same conversation in my head again and again, and nothing is changing.

I read a post on Gretchen Rubin about the idea of making lists when you’re anxious. She was interviewing Chris Guillebeau and he said that he uses two prompts when he’s anxious, writing out the lists in his journal.

Prompt One is “What’s going well right now? (Because no matter what I’m anxious about, there’s usually something that’s going well or that I can otherwise be grateful for.)” and Prompt Two is “What bothers me? (Because identifying the root cause of distress is the first step towards remedying it.)”

And I sort of mentally combined the two pieces of advice and started using the prompts to write out the things I’m anxious about and then evaluate (when I see them on paper) whether they’re worth feeling anxious about. Is it useful? Sometimes it is because writing it out gives me a starting point for tackling the problem. Sometimes it isn’t though the act of taking something out of my head has worth as long as I only do it once.

4 comments

1 Charlotte { 09.22.19 at 8:23 am }

Interesting. So if I am anxious about something that I can fix, such as making sure I can pay all of my upcoming bills, or a pressing to-do and grocery lists if I have a lot going on/shopping to do, ect then I will write those things down and figure out all the money on paper that always helps to make me feel less anxious.
However, if my anxiety is triggered by something I can’t control (or hell, even identify sometimes) the idea of writing it down to me feels like I am manifesting the worst to happen. Like writing it down will make it real or come to fruition. Like jinxing myself. The same way speaking it out loud would manifest it into reality.
Does that make sense?

2 Melissa Kowalewski { 09.22.19 at 5:12 pm }

I totally feel more in control when I make a list. I tend to feel REALLY overwhelmed when I feel like I have so much to do that I will forget. That book is on my TBR list! As is Rubin’s book!

3 Sharon { 09.23.19 at 2:42 pm }

I like this idea. I read 10% Happier a few years back, too, and enjoyed it.

4 Nearlydawn { 09.24.19 at 11:51 pm }

Nice – I like this idea. I certainly use lists to get stuff out of my head. I feel better once I’ve noted the items down – hadn’t thought to use that specifically on anxiety-resolution though.

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