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EDNA FOA CONDUCTED RESEARCH on social anxiety to find out what helped the most to reduce anxiety. The answer was changing the way a person thought about consequences. That was the key to whether she succeeded or failed to manage her anxiety.

Specifically, anxious people expect the consequences of a negative event to be worse than they would actually be. And of course this makes them more anxious than they need to be.

When you worry about something, you’re asking yourself, “What if?” You wonder, What if X happened? And you think the consequences would be terrible. That’s what scares you. What if it happened?

What I’ve discovered I do (and apparently I’m not alone) is I stop right there. I don’t think beyond it. I worry, “What if that happened?” and it scares me so much I don’t want to think any more about it. But when I make myself follow through on the question, my anxiety is usually cured in short order. Let me give you an example.

When my wife and I first got married, whenever we had an argument, it made me very upset. I was always afraid the argument would bring our relationship to an end. My question was, “What if she leaves me?” It sounds stupid now, but I never once thought beyond that. It was too awful to contemplate. This is the woman with whom I share all my dreams. This is my best friend. This is the one I love with all my heart. It was too terrifying to think any further than her leaving me.

This worry put me in a panic, and usually my desperation to prevent an impending disaster would only make our fights worse. I wouldn’t let us take a break. She wanted to leave and go for a walk. I wouldn’t let her go until we had resolved our argument. Of course, it is almost impossible to resolve an argument between two people when both are upset, so my actions prolonged our arguments and made them more destructive.

One day I asked her how she managed to stay so calm when we argued. I always seemed to get intense, but even when she was mad, she never got anxious or desperate.

“Do any thoughts go through your mind when we’re arguing?” I asked, “Do you say anything to yourself? Do you picture something?”

Turns out, she did something very specific. She did it every time and it kept her calm. Like me, she also had the thought, “What if this is the end of us?” But she didn’t stop there. Rather than recoiling from the thought, she faced it. She deliberately imagined the worst that could happen. She tried to see a little movie in her mind of what would happen if we divorced. She imagined going through the sadness, moving to a different place, and going on with her life.

And as she imagined time passing, she could see that she would survive, and even if this tragic thing happened, there would actually be some happiness down the road.

This seemed like a pretty straightforward technique, so I gave it a try and it really calmed me down. Our fights became less intense because I wasn’t trying so hard to stop the fight (try to end an argument quickly and it will make the fight last longer).

Imagining the worst does two things: First of all, imagining a divorce and us moving away from each other always makes me sad. No matter how angry I am when I start thinking about it, I always feel sad because I realize how much I would miss her. That is a good realization to have during a fight. It’s a perspective that sometimes goes out the window when I’m angry, and it’s worth remembering.

The second benefit is realizing that even if this worst-case-scenario happened, I could still go on and be happy. That helps me keep the situation in perspective and helps me calm down. And my lower anxiety helps me listen. It helps me speak more calmly and kindly and sanely.

I tried it the very next time we had an argument. It worked beautifully. It may have been the first time we ever argued when I stayed relatively calm. I didn’t panic at all. I didn’t get desperate. I tried it again the next argument. And the next. And that’s about all it took. That was more than twenty years ago, and I now never even consider the possibility that an argument spells doom. It totally cured me of that particular anxiety.

All I did was think beyond the original fear. Try it with one of your fears right now. You’re afraid of what? What makes you afraid when you think about it?

What if it happened? Really, think about it. What if that terrible thing really happened? What would come next? And then what? And then what?

Jim says, “I get nervous at work because I’m afraid my boss is going to get mad at me.”

I say, “Okay, what if he does?”

Jim: “It would be upsetting.”

Me: “Yeah, so? Then what would happen?”

Jim: “He might write me up. That means it would be a warning, and one more and I’ll be fired!”

Me: “Okay, let’s say that happens. He writes you up, you don’t improve, and then he fires you. Then what would you do?”

Jim: “I’d have to find another job.”

Me: “Okay. Could you do that?”

Jim: “Yeah, I think so, but it might not pay as much as I’m making now.”

Me: “So, what would you do then?”

Jim: “I’d have to buy fewer things.”

When you follow the line of questioning, it always seems to peter out into nothing. You realize you could handle it. You’d live. It wouldn’t be catastrophic. It may be difficult. It may be inconvenient. It may be a challenge. But it’s nothing to get distraught over.

According to the research, the two biggest mistakes anxious people tend to make is that they think the bad thing is more likely than it really is, and they think if the bad thing happens, the consequences would be more horrible than they really would be.

This is the antidote: Ask the question, “What would happen then?” and keep following the realistic consequences out to their probable natural conclusion, and your fear usually fades or disappears.

I need to warn you about something. Please remember this: It won’t work to tell yourself, “It’ll be okay.” I’ve tried it and it doesn’t have any impact on my anxiety. You must go through the visualization. You must see it happening and see how you’d handle it. Be honest in your imaginings. Try to make it true-to-life. Don’t try to imagine it more positively than you really think would happen. That’s not the point. What do you think would really happen? Imagine it. And what do you think you’d really do about it? This will have a definite — and maybe even a dramatic — effect on your feelings.

Like a magic bullet, it goes to the heart of your worry and dissolves it.

In his book, How to Stop Worrying and Start Living, Dale Carnegie tells the story of a man who cured himself of a very serious case of anxiety using a method very similar to this. His name was Earl Haney and he had ulcers. Bad ulcers.

One night Haney had a hemorrhage and was rushed to the hospital where he stayed. He had holes in his stomach lining and had to have his stomach pumped every day. His diet was alkaline powder and tablespoon of half-and-half per hour. He was in bad shape.

This continued for several months. His weight dropped from 175 pounds to 90 pounds. Three doctors agreed he was terminal. Death was inevitable. He was basically waiting around to die.

Finally a thought dawned on Haney. He realized he always wanted to travel the world before he died and he figured if he was going to do it, he’d better go now.

Of course, his doctors were strongly against the idea. Haney would have to pump his own stomach twice a day. Crazy!

Haney went ahead with his plans anyway. He bought a casket and took it with him so if he died on the way, he could be buried in the family plot back home.

He boarded a ship from Los Angeles to visit China and India. During the voyage, he gradually gave up on all the pampering and stomach pumping. He let it go. If he was going to die, so be it, he thought. His worry and tension evaporated. He stopped worrying.

Even during a typhoon, which should have scared him to death, he actually enjoyed it because he had already looked at the “what if.” It didn’t bother him. He’d looked at the consequences already: He would die and his body would be sent back to Nebraska. His alternative was wasting away in a hospital, and he’d much rather die in a typhoon on his way to China.

He started really enjoying himself now that he was free of constant worries, and he gained 90 pounds on his trip. His health returned. When he got home, he went back to work and never felt better in his life.

He was cured. He stopped cowering in fear at what might happen. He had learned to take an honest, unflinching look at the likely consequences of possible negative events. The constant worry evaporated into the thin air it was made of.

You can have the same sort of recovery from your worry. Think about something you have worried about recently. Now ask yourself, “What if it happened?” Really. What if it happened? What would you do about it? How would you respond? And then what would happen? And then what? And how would you respond to that? Follow it through as realistically as you can and see if that doesn’t have a dramatic effect on that particular worry.

When your own distress is making things worse, go ahead and confront the worst that could possibly happen. Don’t just do it briefly. This isn’t positive thinking. Don’t merely tell yourself, “Oh, there is nothing to be afraid of, everything will be all right.” That won’t work! Imagine the worst case scenario clearly in your mind. Imagine what would happen. Imagine time passing. And be realistic. Don’t try to be optimistic with your imaginings. Try to imagine what you really think would happen.

What you will discover is that this is not the calamity you feared. And your increased calm will help make a calamity less likely.

Tags: direct your mind by Adam Khan
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Al Siebert has spent 40 years interviewing survivors of all kinds to find out what makes them different from people who don’t survive difficult situations. One of his discoveries is survivors tend to be curious. They ask questions about the situation.

Often people who didn’t survive tried to impose their own “shoulds” on the situation: People should act this way; nobody should be allowed to be so brutal; nobody should have to eat food with weavils in it. Rather than opening their minds to the way things were really working, they pointlessly occupied their minds with fruitless indignation at what should not be.

Survivors on the other hand, says Siebert, asked themselves questions like, “What is going on here?” “How do the guards see this?” “What must I do to give myself a chance to survive?” They were curious, open, and inquisitive.

This kind of questioning is good for a great many applications besides surviving in a POW camp: at work, in your marriage, with your kids. Find out how things work, what’s going on, who responds to what, what people are feeling and why, etc., etc. There is so much to know and so little time. So open your eyes and ears and start asking some good questions.

Tags: direct your mind by Adam Khan
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Everybody has good memories, and they can make you feel good, but only if you recall them. You could have a fantastic memory that you never reminisce about and you can forget it ever happened! In fact, it is almost for sure you have many of them already that you have forgotten. Some of them might be recent. The event happened, it was wonderful, but life moves on and you haven’t thought of it since. That memory is on its way to being forgotten.

But not if you ask yourself this question occasionally: What memory makes me feel good?

Every time you remember something, you strengthen the memory. When you don’t recall a memory, it tends to fade away unless it was emotionally significant, and even then a strong memory is not guaranteed.

Depressed people have just as many positive events as undepressed people, according to the research, but depressed people reminisce more about their negative events. They strengthen those memories so they seem more real, they are more vivid, and they are easier to recall again because they’ve been recalled before.

You can use this same method in reverse and you’ll feel better more often. Your life will feel richer and more wonderful because your memory will be full of easily-recalled great times. You will have more confidence in yourself because you’ll remember more of your triumphs and successes. You’ll feel more in love because you’ll remember more of those special moments you’ve had with your mate.

Ask yourself the question and ponder it. You’ll be happier.

Tags: direct your mind by Adam Khan
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In this series on directing your mind, I’m giving you several questions I have found to be useful. Read more about the principle here (and see the list of questions): The Steering Wheel of Your Mind. The question I will cover in this article is, “What else?” It is a good question for a lot of situations.

For example, Yale psychologist Alan Kazdin did an experiment with kids suffering from “conduct disorder” — young people prone to violence, vandalism, truancy, and hostility.

Psychologists have tried many things over the years but not much has been successful. How do you change a problem child into a healthy, happy, productive youngster? Theories abound. Results are rare.

Kazdin tried something unusual. He taught the trouble-making kids and their parents how to think up options for handling situations, and to come up with different ways of interpreting situations — other ways besides using hostility.

The result: Significantly less troublemaking. Fewer problems. It worked.

The question is, “Why did it work?” Think about it for a moment. When the only response you have is hostility, that’s what you do, regardless of whether it gets you the results you’re after. Kazdin trained these people essentially to ask themselves, “What else?” The parents and their kids learned to say to themselves before they responded to something, “Okay, I could do that (what I’ve always done), but what else could I do?” He taught them to think of new options they’d never thought of before.

And also he taught them to ask, “What else could it mean?” When someone bumped into one of these kids, for example, instead of immediately interpreting it as a hostile attack or a threat, he learned to ask himself, “Okay, it might mean that, but what else could it mean?”

It seems a simple solution to a difficult problem. But it’s harder than it seems. Our minds naturally streamline our mental processes. Asking what else? makes the decision-process more complex. So it takes some deliberate effort to turn your mind to the task of coming up with alternative ideas. It is not really difficult, but it doesn’t come naturally.

This question is useful in many different ways. As I’m writing this, it’s really cold outside, and even though a little while ago I had the heater turned up and my feet covered, my feet were still as cold as ice. Turning the heater up and covering my feet were obvious solutions. But, I asked myself, what else might work? What else could I do?

When you ask yourself a question, it awakens a part of your brain that answers questions. Ask a question, and your mind seems to search through all the things you’ve heard or know, and it often comes up with something.

I suddenly remembered something Klassy (my wife) told me years ago: “If your hands are cold, cover your head.” She used to live in Lake Tahoe, California, and she learned how to deal with very cold weather. I grew up in Southern California and didn’t know much about it.

So a little while ago I put a wool hat on. My feet aren’t cold any more.

What else? It’s such a valuable question. It’s especially useful when you’ve been doing something a certain way for a long time.

I’m always surprised when someone comes up with a new way to do something familiar, because it makes me think, “Now why didn’t I think of that?” Once you see the new way, it seems kind of obvious. But it took somebody asking what else? to come up with it.

“Unaware of Mind’s effect in patterning and enslaving their lives,” wrote William Bartley III, “people live in a state of waking sleep, in a state of enchantment, of mesmerism, most of the time. Every day, in every way, they become more and more the way they have always been.”

A couple of days ago I saw measuring spoons, but rather than having a separate spoon for teaspoons and tablespoons and halves and fourths, it was a single spoon with one end of the cupped part capable of sliding back and fourth, making the cup bigger or smaller, and there were lines on it for teaspoon and half teaspoon, etc.

Why didn’t I think of that? Because I didn’t ask, “What else could measure teaspoons besides the measuring spoon I’m so familiar with?”

What else? is an especially practical question when what you usually do doesn’t work very well. When a certain person makes certain kinds of remarks, you could get angry and defend yourself, but what else could you do?

You can do a certain task grudgingly, but how else could you do it? What other ways could you go about it? In what other ways could you think about it?

When you interact with your teenager and you both end up angry, ask yourself, “What else could I do?” What other approaches or responses can you think up besides what you normally do?

Here’s a good rule: If what you’re doing isn’t working, do something else.

Of course, you don’t want to go with something just because it’s different, because the new idea could be worse.

Creativity is the process of thinking up new ideas and then rejecting most of them. But those are two processes, and the parts of your brains involved in each are different, so they shouldn’t be done at the same time.

In other words, when you’re thinking up alternatives, don’t judge the ideas for their merits at the same time. Let your mind go. Let it come up with crazy ideas, off-the-wall angles, impossible notions. This stretches your mind beyond the limits which has previously confined your thinking. Out of that loosened-up state of mind, a truly original idea and sometimes a perfect solution can suddenly become obvious. You just couldn’t see it before because you were unknowingly confining your thinking about that subject within certain parameters.

Think up ideas, and keep thinking them up until you get a good one. And if it’s important enough, and you have the time, keep thinking up ideas and see if you can come up with an even better one.

After you’ve thought up all the ideas you want, then and only then, judge the ideas for their merit. Do not do the creative part and the judging part simultaneously because it will interfere with your ability to think up novel out-of-the-box ideas.

The best way to characterize “thinking” is as a dialog. Consider thinking as a dialog with yourself. I know that if it is with yourself it’s supposed to be called a monologue, but thinking isn’t done very well as a monologue because there is nothing to provoke the thoughts further. A monologue is an expression of an already-decided thought. Dialog can create something new.

Have a thought and then criticize it and you have a dialog. Come up with an idea and then ask, “What else?” and you have dialog, and that’s where good thinking happens.

“Well, my in-laws are coming over,” says Pete to himself, “and they always drive me nuts. Every time I open my mouth, they make me sorry I said anything. Maybe I’ll just not say anything.”

If Pete stops there, his monologue has created one idea. But this time he has a dialog with himself, and thereby becomes more creative. “Yes, I could try that,” he says to himself, “but what else might work?”

“What else might work for what?” he asks himself. “I guess I need a goal if I want to think up an idea to solve it. I need to know what I’m trying to accomplish.”

“I want to feel happy even when they are here,” he decides.

“Do I feel happy when I say nothing?”

“No. I’ve tried that before. It’s not much fun. It’s a little better than being annoyed, but I’m definitely not happy.”

“So what else could I do?”

“Since I want to be happy, I should do what makes me happy. I really enjoy playing my new video game. Maybe I can enlist one of them to play with me.”

“Good idea. But I’m not going to stop there. What else could I do?”

“I like talking about politics. I could make that my theme for the night. I could turn every conversation to the subject of politics.”

“That’s not bad. What else could I do?”

And so on. The more Pete asks, the more ideas he’ll get. Some of his ideas will be goofy or won’t work very well, but thinking is like good photography: You take lots of pictures and then get rid of almost all of them. You’ll have maybe two or three good ones, but they were worth it.

Creativity is like that. You generate lots of ideas and throw out most of them. But in generating so many, you have more to choose from, so your chances of getting a better one improve as the number of ideas increases. And the way to get many ideas is to keep asking, “What else?”

Tags: direct your mind by Adam Khan
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