Managing Worry and Anxiety By Jean HolthausSample

  Day 1

Worry Is Within Our Control

Anxiety is a term much like the term blood sugar—it describes certain thoughts, feelings, and physical sensations just as blood sugar describes certain chemicals within the body. Everyone has blood sugar, and it is considered normal if it stays within a certain range. When it leaves the “normal” range, that is a medical condition requiring treatment for the individual involved to return to health. Similarly, everyone experiences anxiety, and it is healthy if it stays within a certain range. When anxiety exceeds the “normal” range it becomes a debilitating medical condition requiring treatment, just like any other medical condition, for the individual experiencing it to return to health.

Healthy anxiety varies in intensity, duration, and expression, but is a response to potential danger. Once this danger has been addressed, the anxiety dissipates. However, many of us move past healthy anxiety into what I call the “worry zone.”

Worry can be defined as persistently thinking about problems, fears, or concerns because you think something bad has happened or could happen. If I am driving a car in a snowstorm, the anxiety my body feels is related to the physical circumstances, and, when I arrive safely at home, my anxiety will dissipate because my circumstances have changed. However, if I am sitting at work, it begins to snow, and I begin to think of all the things that might happen as I try to drive home, I have moved from healthy anxiety into worry. Worry exists on a continuum from mildly annoying to interfering with your ability to live life in the way you want to.

The stress produced by worry can be devastating emotionally, spiritually, and physically. Worry is what Paul was referring to in Scripture when he said, “Do not be anxious about anything.” Unlike healthy anxiety, which is necessary, or medical illnesses and related anxiety disorders we do not cause, worry is a habit within our control and Scripture tells us to avoid it.

While you may feel like you were “born a worrier,” it is a learned pattern of behavior and, like all behaviors, can be changed with hard work and time.

Ask God to show you how to look to Him rather than to fear when you are worried.