How to Worry Less and Create more

What if your worst-case scenario became less likely? It could, If you would spend less time worrying, and more time creating. 

Why worry?

Worry is caused by the anticipation of a future negative event.

We look around and feel overwhelmed by the many possible outcomes which may hurt us or those we love.

Fundamentally, we worry because we don’t want to lose control.

In other words,

We want at least as much tomorrow as we have today.

If we have a certain level of dignity today, we want at least that much dignity tomorrow. If we have a home today, we don’t want to lose that home tomorrow.

The Problem with Worry

But you see where this is going, right? If we spend too much time worrying, holding on to what we have, something else will be neglected.

What often gets left behind is creativity. 

But time spent creating is what makes the world go round, and often what brings us the most intense joy.

To be fully alive is to be involved in the act of creation.

But how can we make the shift from worry to creation?

Like This

books, Eat, Pray, Love, it was very possible that she had reached the pinnacle of her career, at age forty. 

She could have wasted years of creative energy worrying about this. 

What did she do instead?

She kept writing.

Keep showing up.

Creativity takes courage, and requires that we keep showing up.

You may have read or heard of an old book by Rollo May called The Courage to Create. In it, May makes the case that if we are to live in the world we want — a world where life is good and filled with promise — that creativity is not a commodity. Creativity is a necessity.

And creativity takes courage.

Courage comes from the heart. The word itself — courage — comes from the French word for heart, coeur. To be courageous, then, is to live from your heart, authentically, and vulnerably. When you live from the heart, you choose to live with a thin skin and keep showing up, even when it hurts, and even when you don’t feel like it today.

Courage is the antidote for worry. When you feel yourself starting to descend into that dark, conservative place of worry, remind yourself of the life you want: a good life, filled with promise.

Time Well Spent

While your time and energy may be limited resources, your choices about how to spend your time and energy are not as limited as you may think.

You can choose to spend

• less time worrying
• more time creating

If you choose to spend more time creating, your worst nightmares may become less likely, for several reasons:

What you create may may change the course of your life and the lives of others; you may change the course of history itself.

His insight is as true today as it was way back around AD 60 or so.

I am not naïve to the reality of suffering. I’m just saying that we often worry beyond healthy proportion — unless we make a concerted, courageous effort to spend less time worrying and more time creating.

So if you’re feeling down and blue, and troubled by some foolish game… 

Ask yourself:

What do I want to create today?

The takeaway:

What you create may change the course of your life and those you love in miraculous ways.

Read more.

I can help you worry less and create more.