Today's Topic - Dealing with Scary Thoughts In the last lesson, I spoke of mindfulness.
Mindfulness is not just a great tool for eliminating anxiety, being mindful helps with eliminating scary thoughts too.
But mindfulness is not the whole secret.
First, let's define a scary thought.
Scary thoughts are the foundation upon which anxiety is built and they run the gamut from "I'm going to be late!" to "I think I'm having a heart attack!" Somewhere in the middle are the more common, "oh no a test!" and "Why do I feel weird?" It's a scary thought that breaks us out of our comfort zone and sends us into a panic.
The best example I can give is this: Have you ever been a passenger in a car and looked down for a second or two and when you looked up, the car in front of you had its brake lights on and you instantly tensed up and pressed the floor with your foot as if preparing for a crash? This happened because you were preoccupied and when you looked up, you had False Evidence Appearing Real (FEAR), which caused you to flinch.
It's the same thing with scary thoughts.
You are going about your business and WHAMO! A scary thought comes in and makes you flinch! You stomp on the invisible brake! This makes you want to run or fight as the adrenaline surges through your body.
It's terrifying because you don't see anything like a car in front of you and you can't instantly re-orient yourself to the fact that you are safe.
Mindfulness is the first step, but the secret second step is laughter! When you are in the car and you look up, get scared, flinch and press the invisible brake in the floor, what does the driver do? Yes, they look at you as if asking, "are you ok?" Then, you feel a little silly and break out into laughter at yourself.
Laugh at yourself! This is what you are supposed to do.
When you get a scary thought in your head, don't instantly identify yourself with it.
Be mindful.
Using our metaphor, try to see if the car in front of you is actually stopping before you go into a panic.
Then, laugh about it.
See how far it got before you recognized it.
Then laugh about it.
In my book, I told the story of making my wife walk around target for an hour because I felt safe there and if I had a heart attack, they could get an ambulance there fast.
This is a hilarious story! I wish I would have laughed at it before I spent the hour in Target.
Now, if I have a scary thought, I make myself laugh at it.
I think to myself, I wonder if that would scare me if it was a sexy voice that said it? Then I hear it with a sexy voice, or a silly, cartoon voice and I try to make the thought as stupid and silly as possible.
I rework it until I can get a chuckle out of it.
Notice what I'm not doing this whole time? That's right! I'm not panicking! I haven't identified that thought with myself.
It's just a dumb, scary thought and I laugh about it and move on.
Just remember, your thoughts are just thoughts.
They don't represent you.
Notice, laugh, and let it go.
To your health and success! You are on track!