“Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow.
It empties today of its strength.”- Corrie ten Boom.

3 Scientific Ways to Banish Worry:
Make an appointment with yourself to worry. If its important enough that your mind keeps coming to it, then get out your calendar, and set aside a time and place to worry about it. Give yourself a full uninterrupted 15 minutes to do nothing but worry. Seriously, there is no purpose to half worry about anything, and you are busy. So if you catch yourself worrying at a time other than your designated worry time, you must make a point to think of something else. Use your “worry time” productively by thinking of solutions to the worries. Write the solutions down quickly. Schedule additional time  if your first 15 minute appointment to worry did not produce solutions for the issues to be resolved. Move on to your next task of the day.

PRACTICAL TIP: Schedule the appointment at a time at least 2 days into the future; there is power in letting things settle down and rest. Sometimes issues resolve themselves, and you do not want to use valuable worry time on something that , if you had waited a day, you would not have needed to worry about at all.

Accept the worry, and move on in life.  Do not suppress your feelings. You are entitled to have and feel emotions. Worry is initiated when your imagination grabs a hold of unprocessed emotions. So, experience and acknowledge how you are feeling (even write it down so you won’t forget) and then move on. Do not let your imagination get a hold of your feelings. If you find yourself worrying, force yourself to fully imagine at least one other alternative ending.

Exercise.  Exercise makes serotonin, a chemical that makes you happy and sleep well. So, if you are worried, exercise. If you do not like to exercise, exercise anyway. Aerobic exercise is probably best, but at least walk to the refrigerator 2 times more than you need to, hold onto the sides of the refrigerator and lean in real far, stretching your arms and shoulders muscles. Open and close the front door two times before you leave the house. Your goal should just be to incorporate more moving into your day.

1 Spiritual Thing to Consider to Banish Worry:

John tells us definitively, “…But perfect love drives out fear… The one who fears is not made perfect in love.”

This is a hard statement for me to swallow, until I understand that it is not a judgement but a key secret to banish worry. I can choose to worry, or to fear, or I can choose to be perfected in love. It is a choice, though when in midst of worry, it is sometimes very hard to realize it . What if , when we stand before God one day, we have the opportunity to be found that we have been perfected in His Love? I much prefer that, then to stand and be found to not having accepted the gift of His love driving out my fear. In practice , the next time I worry, I will ask myself “ Do you choose worry, or do you choose Love?”