How to Stop Worrying About Everything
Compulsively worrying about every little thing can really take a toll on a person. I can tell you from experience. Worry nearly took me out! The solution? How to stop worrying about everything even when it seems you have no other choice?
Live In Day Tight Compartments
What does that mean? To live in day-tight compartments. It means to only be concerned with (concerned with not worrying mind you, there is a difference) with the goings-on from sunrise to sundown.
This doesn’t mean you don’t plan for the future, you can certainly take actions that day that will be FOR your future. But you don’t spend your day WORRYING about the future. And you certainly don’t spend your time worrying about the past.
The past should be for one thing (maybe two things) only. To learn from (and to reminisce—in a positive way). It doesn’t do anyone any good, especially when you keep mulling over WHAT happened, what SHOULD have happened, and letting what DID happen haunt you. In the famous words of Disney, cuz you know they invented it . . . Let It Go.
The idea of living in day-tight compartments was introduced to me by the book How to Stop Worrying and Start Living by Dale Carnegie. The premise was taken from Sir William Osler who had crossed the Atlantic on an ocean liner in which the Captain upon pressing a button could shut off parts of the ship from one another—shut off into “watertight compartments.”
By doing this with our own lives we are able to really focus our attention on what really matters and not concern ourselves with things that either have happened or have not yet happened (and in most cases, likely never will.)
I was thinking about this concept the other day and looked at it from yet another perspective. Instead of living in our supposed “cushy” lives that we’ve created with a home/mortgage to worry about, children to feed, bills to pay and whatnot. Why not think more like a homeless person who is only concerned about the day ahead of them?
Their concern is likely, (and yes, I am speculating—so I apologize if I have it ALL wrong), what am I going to eat today? Where will I get it? How will I afford it? Where will I sleep tonight?
They are not concerned with how they will afford something 40 years from now. They are simply focused on today and today only. If we all live that way, our lives would likely be far more enjoyable and productive and in doing so the future we used to worry about would probably be well taken care of.
You can’t get anywhere by worrying yourself there. Be concerned, be productive and goal-oriented . . . but don’t WORRY about it.
By living in day-tight compartments you will find that it is much easier to handle the things on your plate. Because within that day there is only so much you CAN do, NEED to do and WILL do. You only have to make it to sundown. You don’t need to worry about how to do the things that need to be done tomorrow, next week, next year or years from now.
What will happen?
You will feel lighter 🙂 You will find it easier to accomplish the things you need to accomplish and by accomplishing them you will go to bed that night feeling ACCOMPLISHED and happy and worry-free.
But you have to LET IT GO. You have to be willing to set aside the things that are out of your control and only be concerned with the things that are. You have to be willing to go with the flow and realize not everything will go the way you wanted or expected sometimes.
You have to be willing to change your perspective.
If you have been a habitual worrier this might seem like it’ll be a hard habit to break. But if you simply DECIDE to break it, it will be broken. That is the power of our minds. Think it and more often than not, it will be so.
It might not be so immediately, perhaps it will never be so. But keeping a positive mindset will only result in positive outcomes.
Three really great resources on the subject of STOPPING THE WORRY are:
How to Stop Worrying and Start Living
What do you think? I’d love to hear your opinion on the matter, so please leave me a comment below. If you would like to discuss this further with me, please contact me directly. And if there is something that you are worried about that you simply can’t seem to get past, I’d love to help in any way that I can.
Live in day-tight compartments and see just how smoothly your ship sails!!
Your Friend,
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