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85. Replace worry with action
Don’t worry. Or rather, don’t just worry. Let worry
change into action. When you find yourself worrying
about something, ask yourself the action question, “What
can I do about this right now?”
And then do something. Anything. Any small thing.
Most of my life, I spent my time asking myself the
wrong question every time I worried. I asked myself,
“What should I be feeling about this?” I finally discov-
ered that I was much happier when I started asking,
instead, “What can I do about this?”
If I am worried about the conversation I had with
my wife last night, and how unfair I might have been to
say the things I said, I can ask myself, “What can I do
about that right now?”
By putting the question into the action arena, a lot
of possibilities will occur to me: 1) I could send her flow-
ers; or 2) I could call her to tell her I was concerned
about how I left things; or 3) I could leave a nice little
note somewhere for her; or 4) I could go see her to make
things right. All of these possibilities are actions, and
when I act on something, the worry goes away.
We often hear the phrase “worry it to death.” But
that phrase doesn’t reflect what really happens when
we worry. It would be great if we could worry some-
thing to death. When it dies, we could dispose of the
body and be done with it.
But when we worry, we don’t worry a thing to death,
we worry it to life. Our worrying makes the problem
grow. And most of the time, we worry it into a grotesque
kind of life, a kind of Frankenstein’s monster that fright-
ens us beyond all reason.
I once came up with a system for action that helped
turn my worrying habits completely around. I would list