Work is one of our biggest sources of anxiety and stress. So often a small incident at work can turn into something bigger, resulting in negative supervisor reviews, which results in more anxiety and ruminative thinking about the original incident. “What really happened?” “What should I have done differently?” “What should I have said when I got called on it?”
Then, there’s a whole pile of worry about what could happen in the future: “What if I get laid off?” “Who will take care of my work if I can’t do it any more?” “Where will I be able to get another job?”
Not only are these thoughts non-productive, they can distract us from doing our best work, and use up energy that could be better spent on immediate needs. Recently, a client, let’s call her Jenny, brought in a story that illustrates this dynamic perfectly.
Jenny is a teacher’s aide, responsible for helping with classroom management, recess playground supervision, and small group tutoring. Now she is on probation, with specific areas for improvement to be accomplished within this month. Jenny has a very clear awareness of how her mind leads her into thoughts that go around and around, and how that ruminating makes her anxiety spike, and then she is not paying attention to the real world around her, and that makes everything get worse again.
She also has a good grasp of what to do about it: she uses mindfulness and breathing techniques to connect back to the present moment, and she reminds herself to keep her focus on the kids she’s working with. She feels good about the closeness she’s developing with the kids in her class, and knows that her relationships with them are positive.
So, how to address the ruminative thoughts? We suggested three techniques:
- Write them down. Make a list of whatever the thoughts are that go around in your head because writing them is the first step on the path of analyzing them. Once you see them in print, you can see which are the true and false statements and begin challenging negative thought patterns. The exercise of writing uses a more rational, less emotional part of the brain, and helps get you back to the present moment.
- Scheduled worry time. Whenever you find yourself worrying about something, just write it down and promise to spend some “quality time” worrying about it later. When the time you have set aside comes, you take out the list and go over each item. Write out the “worst case scenario” for each one, and list some possible actions you could take to mitigate it. The advantage of scheduling time to think about it means that whenever something comes to mind, you can just tell it “make an appointment” so you don’t have to worry right now. We have had good success with teaching this exercise over the years.
- Speak out loud. If your thoughts are threatening to take over and distract you from present reality, the discipline of speaking out loud, describing the current situation and what you need to be paying attention to can be a helpful grounding technique. Of course, you need to be in a place where you won’t be causing a distraction to someone else, but even just whispering to yourself what you are seeing can bring your mind back from rumination to where it needs to be.
Worry and rumination can be dangerous enemies, but there are strong, simple strategies to keep them under control. Remember, you are the boss, not your thoughts!