Samhain Publishing Ltd Weblog

Worriers Anonymous, Anyone?

Agonizing. Stressing. Stewing. Brooding. Fretting.

Worrying.

The list of synonyms is endless, I suspect because worrying is so prevalent a pastime. But, whatever you want to call it, the end result is the same – countless hours of wasted time and energy fretting over things you generally have no control over.

I don’t know about you, but I can worry like nobody’s business. In fact, I’d go so far as to say I could win an Olympic competition in the event. Why do I say that? Because I can take a miniscule germ of a concern that’s niggling away in the back of my mind and turn it into a monstrosity of anxiety that consumes my every waking thought.

Is it a waste of time? Yes. A waste of energy? Hell, yeah!

And I know I’m not alone in this. It seems to me there should be a 12-step program for us – Worriers Anonymous, anyone? LOL

Of course, there are times when worrying actually does serve a purpose – such as to solve a problem or anticipate something we can avoid. For that reason, those times of worrying are necessary and helpful, but the times it doesn’t serve a purpose far outweighs the times that it does.

I remember reading once that out of all the things we worry about 40% are over things that never happen, 30% are things that happened in the past and we can’t change anyway, 22% are over petty little things that we’ll forget about within a week or so, and a mere 8% are over things that are somewhat worth worrying about. That means a whopping 92% of the things we worry about are totally useless. I don’t know about you, but I find that staggering.

I recently ran across a quote by Dan Zadra that I think sums it up perfectly – “Worry is a misuse of the imagination.”

Talk about insightful, especially for a writer.

It certainly hit home for me. As a writer, I utilize my imagination all the time in my quest to write interesting and fun stories that I hope readers will enjoy, and this quote made me realize that all those years of worrying about everything and anything imaginable was a colossal waste of my creative energy. Energy I could have put towards plotting, dialogue or my latest blog post.

In fact I’d go so far as to say that I actually do worry less since I started writing, for that very reason. When I wake up three o’clock in the morning and can’t sleep, instead of working myself up over things I can’t change, I spend that time thinking about my current book and characters. A much nicer way to spend the time, especially if I’m working on a sex scene. LOL

So, at a time of year when so many New Years’ resolutions are being bandied about, I figured it was a good time to think on this — why not resolve to expend our energy worrying less and creating more? It doesn’t matter if it’s writing or some other creative endeavor you enjoy, as long as you focus on shifting the use of your imagination away from worrying towards creating something wonderful.

I know it’s something I plan to do. How about you?

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Anara Bella ~ Romance that’s sexy with a touch of sass
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