Can I cope?

I went for a longer than usual walk yesterday, without a defined route, in an area where you can easily get “lost”. For as long as I can remember, I’ve had a degree of anxiety about getting lost. I manage this easily by knowing where I’m going, or using satnav, or having some kind of fall back. So today, when I could feel the compulsion to plot a route, I thought: “so what if I do get lost?”. It got me thinking about what I meant by “lost”. What I actually meant was taking an unplanned path, ending up somewhere other than where I expected, no big deal. So I started thinking what would happen. The reality is that I could easily retrace my steps, or just find my way back via a different route, that is all. And once I realised this, not only did my anxiety about getting “lost” go, but I actually felt more excited about the walk. What actually happened was as predicted above. And I loved the walk. And as I thought about this, I started to see a link with other anxieties that people often experience: What if I get it wrong? What if people laugh at me? What if she says no? What if I fail? What if it doesn’t work? What if I’m not good enough? What if people don’t like me? …the list goes on, but you get my point. So, what is my point? It’s that very often our fears or anxieties, or just the inner voice that stops us doing something, are about “what might happen”, rather than how we might cope. We have far less control over “what might happen” than how we cope (feel, think, act). Ultimately we’re in control of that. Imagine if, rather than being controlled by anxiety, we instead reminded ourselves that even if the thing causing anxiety happens, we can cope, and it ceases to be an inhibitor. What’s more, if thinking like this helps you do / say more, you’ll realise that more often than not, the thing causing anxiety doesn’t happen anyway. And that’s before we even start talking about the fact that the outcome could be so much better than “cope”. If you could take it in your stride, even enjoy / benefit or grow in experience, then you’re creating your own destiny…. #copingskills #coping #anxiety #icandoit #icandothis #adriansummertoncoaching