How to Train Your Brain to Stop Worrying

Our brain is designed to react to things quickly. Strangely enough, most reactions come without us even having to ‘think’ about it.

This is a useful little tool most of the time. But, when your brain’s initial reaction to most things becomes fear or worry, it can create larger problems for your everyday life.

Worrying occasionally is not unhealthy. We all find something to worry about from time to time.

But, when that worry takes over situations that don’t warrant it, you then might start to recognize that it is a problem.

Perhaps you feel paralyzed by an upcoming dental appointment, or a meeting with your boss, or even going out to dinner with friends.

If worrying has ever taken over your thoughts and it starts to affect your life and perhaps your relationships, it may be time to ‘re-train’ your brain.

There are some simple, but effective steps that you can take to stop worrying so much. The following tips on training your brain can be used to really think about the upcoming situations that you are worried about, and how you can handle them better.

Make Meditation a Habit

Meditation might sound cliché when it comes to calming down your thoughts, but it is something that has been been around for thousands of years for good reason: It works!

Meditation has been proven by research to improve cognitive health, lower anxiety, and it can also allow you to feel more focused throughout the day.

If you have never meditated before, you may have some incorrect preconceived notions about it. Meditation doesn’t take hours a day. You don’t need to sit or dress in a certain way.

You only need a few minutes a day in a quiet space to clear your thoughts, and remove stress from your mind. Worrisome thoughts may still come into your head while you meditate. It is the purpose of your meditative state to let them go and not dwell on them for too long.

Train Your Body

One of the best ways to train your brain to stop worrying is to train your body. Exercise has many benefits, one of them being that it can help to reduce stress.

Our body often responds to stress before our mind does. If your body feels less anxiety to a certain situation, your mind will interpret it as nothing to worry about.

One of the best ways to combat physical stress is to get more physically fit. Any form of exercise can be beneficial, you don’t need to go to the gym for hours each day for it to have a positive impact.

Even a 5-10 minute walk in the middle of the day, can clear your mind and help your body to combat stressful symptoms. This is achieved by signals being sent to your mind that everything is going to be okay.

Accept Your Worry

Sometimes, we can worry so much, that we end up stressing out over how much we are worrying! It can be an endless cycle that can wreak havoc on both your mind and body.

If you are a worrisome person by nature, one tool that you can use to overcome it, is to simply accept it. Accept the worries as they come into your mind for what they are.

The important aspect of this tip, once you accept it, you have to be able to move on. You can accept that a certain upcoming situation might cause stress. It might be something that you are not looking forward to, and it could even be something that scares you.

But, once you have talked yourself through that acceptance, you have to let it go. Sometimes, telling yourself it is okay to be worried, is the best thing that you can do. This can actually help you to feel calmer when the actual situation arises.

Empty Your Worries onto Paper

It might seem silly to write all of your worries down, since that puts them all out in front of you. But, think of this action more like an emptying of the mind.

When you write down your worries about a certain situation, you are pinning them to the paper and giving your mind a break. If you are not using a daily journal, I highly recommend that you start.

Studies have shown that journaling can be helpful for people who get nervous before taking tests, for example. When you use a journal, your thoughts can become less intimidating when they are just words on a piece of paper. Transfer your worries from your mind to a written list or journal, and you should start to feel more confident in overcoming them.

Give Yourself a Break

It is impossible to be perfect all of the time. Unfortunately, that is what many of us strive to be on a daily basis. Many of us know that we will fail sometimes, but some people have a harder time accepting this than others.

It seems like every day, we are told we have to do something new for better health, or better relationships, or to have more success in our lives.

If you fall short of those ‘expert’ tips, you might start worrying that you must be doing something majorly wrong with your life.

The key here is to cut yourself some slack. Your goal should be to live your best life, not the perfect life.

 This mindset should be at the forefront of every area of your life, including your health, relationships, workplace, and more.

When we are able to take some of the pressures off ourselves that society unfortunately puts there, it can makes it easier to stop worrying so much about the things that we will never able to live up to.

Stop Worrying and Find Freedom

It might be impossible to get rid of worrisome thoughts altogether. You may just be more conscious of stressful situations than others.

The solution is to be able to control those worries. You can’t let those thoughts take over your life, or it could damage your overall health and well being.

By using some of the suggestions in this article, you can be more mindful of your thoughts, and start fighting back against damaging worries every day.

It is unlikely that you will stop stressing about everything overnight. But, with a conscious effort and by following tips like the ones listed here, you can keep your worries in check, and live a more fulfilling life with less stress and worry.