When Worry Doesn’t Slow Down and How It’s Affecting Your Health

161 - Have you noticed how your body feels when your mind won’t settle?

Tense, a drop in energy, and the strain of the mental back-and-forth…

In this episode, I talk about how ongoing worry affects your body, not just your thoughts. When your system stays on alert, it can influence your sleep, digestion, energy, and even your ability to follow through on the things you care about.

I also share why this feels more intense right now. We’re taking in more information than ever, and it keeps your brain engaged in a way that makes it harder to switch off.

You’ll hear simple ways to create space so your system can settle, and how to shift your thinking in a way that feels more realistic, not forced.

We also look at how small actions help rebuild momentum, and why support can make a bigger difference than trying to figure everything out on your own.

If your mind has been busy and your body feels it, this will give you a better understanding of what’s happening and what you can start doing about it.

And if you’ve been stuck in that place of thinking about something without moving forward, I’m hosting a workshop called Out Of The Miserable Maybe on Saturday afternoon, May 30th.

It’s designed to help you get out of that cycle and take action in a way that feels doable and empowered.

You can join me in person or online, and I’m keeping the group small so you can be supported through your own situation.

Click here to register: https://www.clarendasempowerment.com/courses/out-of-the-miserable-maybe

You can always find out more at:

 https://www.clarendasempowerment.com/

Transcript

0:00

Worry feels useful until you see what it's doing to you. We tend to think that worrying about a problem will solve it faster. It feels productive like we're doing something, but in fact, it's actually draining your energy. You can feel it in your body. It might be a tight jaw or clenched hands, or just that big sigh that you don't even realize that you just took. The more we tell ourselves that something is hard or out of our control, the tighter our body becomes. It feels terrible, and after a while it sure adds up.

Welcome to episode 161: 0:38

When Worry Doesn’t Slow Down and How It’s Affecting Your Health. Chronic worry keeps stress hormones elevated. It affects your sleep, disrupts digestion, increases blood pressure, suppresses your immune system, and increases your risk for cardiac disease. Your body doesn't really know the difference between what you're just thinking and what is truly real. So it responds the same way. And right now there's a lot vying for our attention. There seems to be a lot to think about, so our brains are on high alert. And this isn't new, my friend. It seems like it is, but it's not. We just have to look at history to realize that there's always been good and evil. There's been things to celebrate and things to grieve. There's one thing that we know is certain, and that's uncertainty itself. However, we're taking in more information than any generation before us. Within minutes, we can hear or watch something that's happened halfway across the world. And most often it's the most extreme version of it. I don't think we were meant to carry all that. When I think back to my childhood, most of what shaped my world was the things around me in my community. So my family, church, neighbors, and school.

The news came on at 6: 2:03

00 PM and we had a weekly paper on Wednesdays called the Victoria County Record. That's very different from what we're exposed to now. Social media and the news, they're activating our sympathetic nervous systems. That's that fight or flight response. It's an automatic physiological reaction. So, of course all of our senses feel on high alert because of that surge in adrenaline. I'm talking about this again because worry and mental stress can create so much problems in our mental and physical health. The body can't distinguish between the levels of danger, so it automatically activates the sympathetic nervous system, which causes cortisol to rise. That then increases blood sugar and triglycerides, which are blood fats, which in imminent danger could be used for fuel for your body. But you guessed it, since we don't actually have to run for our lives, our body can't use it and instead is just stored up as fat. When I help women with releasing weight, it's about so much more than just another eating plan. It's about what's causing that urge or desire to eat often for comfort or distraction. And it can be simply the body's way, the innate way that it has to try to rebalance the nervous system. Today, I want to encourage you to work on your own mind and body. It's the one thing that you can control. We need to protect it and strengthen it. Even if you've been given an unfavorable diagnosis, there's usually some actions you can take to extend your days or even years. Your mind and heart are so valuable and our souls yearn for more. Your heart, mind, motivations, desires and emotions are creating your current life right now. So if you're feeling more alert, more tense, more stressed, more on edge, it makes sense. But staying in that state doesn't help you think clearly. It does the opposite. If you've been sitting in that space of constant back and forth, it's why I'm going to run the Out Of The Miserable Maybe Workshop another time. It will be on May 30th. It's a Saturday afternoon and you can join me live in person for a small amount of people up to 10 or online. It's for you if you know that there's things that you want to do, you think about it, you kind of circle around in it, but you haven't yet followed through. Or you've started to follow through, something got in your way and you didn't complete it. And it's kind of perplexing because you're like, I know that I really want to do it, but I can't seem to do it. I have a formula that we use and it's powerful to show you why you're not doing it and how you can take action and get that result that you want. I'm sure you can say there's been a lot of energy, wasted energy thinking about it. So sometimes then we can avoid it 'cause we don't want to feel bad about it. But I know that if we have something in our heart, in our mind that we want to accomplish and we don't do it, it continues to drain our energy. So I want to support you and help you gain the confidence to have what you desire and to make it happen, and to get that satisfaction of knowing you're doing so. I'll share more details in the show notes, so be sure to check it out. When you're in a state of worry, even a small reset can start to shift the nervous system. Shift it in a calming way. So something as simple as stepping outside, taking slow, deep breaths, focusing on what is going well in your life, where you are safe and feel protected. Just trying to come back to the present and notice the sights and sounds around you that will help ground you. It's not a time to be problem solving while you're doing this. You're simply being present. And you're certainly not scrolling as you're out trying to ground yourself. You might think, "Well, does that really help?" Well, it doesn't help fix the problem but it helps you have a greater capacity to be able to deal with the problem or the unknown thing. You're able to say, "Okay, that's outside of my control. What can I focus on now?" And focus on something where you can be productive, where it's constructive. It also gives you the capacity to notice what is the thought you have about that situation. And if that thought is not serving you, if it's not helping you move forward, it's maybe serving you in the fight or flight response of, "I've gotta be aware, I've gotta be alert." But if it's not helping you move forward in what you want to do, then after having that slight reset, you might be able to make a new decision and shift your focus. It is training your brain. It doesn't just happen on its own. And it's not jumping to something that's like overly positive or extreme. It has to feel believable. So a thought that feels better when you think it, and also has some belief to it, that's what I call a bridge thought. It's getting you from where you're thinking now, which is kind of crappy or worrisome, not jumping over to everything's rainbows and daisies. It's that bridge thought or thoughts that's going to help you feel better one thought at a time. That sure beats just spinning in circles. And when you take that one action step, it changes your state. There's a realignment that happens and you start to gain momentum. However, there are times when even a small step might feel impossible for you. And that's where you'll want to reach out to a family member or a friend or your counselor, or if you have a therapist or a coach, reach out for support. Don't try to do life alone and stay in that river of misery. Having that outside perspective and support can make such a difference. Yesterday, I worked with a client who was feeling quite stuck and so we didn't try to go and create this great big shift. We looked to her past and found evidence for what she knows is possible, which started to bring up the confidence within. From knowing what she's done in the past and the belief that she can do it again, and then we will continue to work on this rewiring some of the beliefs that she's had from the past that she could get so far, and that would be all. Now we're working on creating her new identity and the beliefs that support that, so that she doesn't revert back to the old belief system that has been so ingrained. That's in her default mode. She felt more encouraged and confident that, "Yes, this is what I needed. I'm back on board. I'm continuing on." That's the kind of work that I do with my clients. If we haven't met before, I'm Clarenda Price, a former Nurse, Personal Trainer, and Life and Weight Loss Coach. I help women reduce stress, feel more in control of their health and habits, and create sustainable changes... changes that can actually last. We do so in a way where they don't have to feel like they have to add more pressure or that there's something wrong with their discipline and willpower. I help them discover their true intrinsic values, and from there, create the identity of who they want to be. They want to show up in a certain way. They want to feel a certain way. They want to look a certain way. It's a beautiful thing. When your mind is clear and focused, it's going to create better actions. And those actions will give you the results that you want. Yet when worry takes over, you can feel like you're simply stuck. You're in a frozen state. That's especially true when it's things that are based on our survival, like things of safety, financial, and our health. Those are real life stressors, but as always, there's always a way to move forward. One simple exercise you can do right now is to get everything out of your head and onto paper. Call it a brain dump. You may have also heard me say a thought download. There's no structure framework needed. You just start writing. There's various ways to do this, but for today, let's just say that everything you've written down, like"What am I thinking? What's on my mind?" You choose one thought. Doesn't have to be like positive, but let's say it's helpful, it's beneficial, it's constructive. Choose that thought to think about. Then take one step forward. Maybe it's a conversation you need to have, a phone call, a decision, a shift in your routine. Just something that creates even a little bit of momentum to get you going. And if you discover you have quite a few good thoughts, then make that list. Just keep going and you can write an action for each of those thoughts of what you want to take. And it doesn't have to be all done at once. And if there's only one that's enough, just start there. So we've talked mainly about the mind with the worry, but I also want you to pay attention to what's happening, your physiology. I had a client experiment with her caffeine intake, her coffee in the morning, both in the amount and the timing. She was hesitant at first, but I said, just try it. Because she'd been experiencing some anxiety and she noticed a big shift in her anxiety levels... much lower. She's enjoying half, half-caf, I think it's called now, and um, still enjoys the taste and the feel of it. She's sitting outside now enjoying that and doesn't miss the caffeine. And also doesn't miss that heightened anxiety that she was feeling. Caffeine isn't bad. It's actually, there's a lot of helpful benefits to it, but you have to know that it does stimulate your nervous system which can trigger adrenaline, and depending on the amount, it can increase your cortisol by 50%. So notice if you're someone that amplifies that feeling of being on edge or feeling wired. It's personal. It's not a cookie cutter approach. It's not like, "oh, you shouldn't have caffeine and you should," when we can look out, zoom out and look at the bigger picture, then it becomes clear. For me, it'll be a year in June since I've stopped having my caffeine every morning. Now probably I could count on both hands how many times I've had even some caffeine in it. And a lot of times I think it's more of a mental thing that I'm like, oh, I didn't sleep that great and I've got this. I want to be able to focus on the podcast or this early client and I'll think I'll just put one tablespoon to like my four before I put it through my pour over or Keurig, whichever one I'm using. The biggest difference that I've noticed is my sleep. Uh, I always knew that I was sensitive to caffeine. Like if I had chocolate past 3 o'clock, I would know that I would have more frequent awakenings in the night or not go as deep in my sleep. So caffeine tends to do the same thing, even if it's like early in the morning, like 8 o'clock, let's say, not when I first get up. You should never drink coffee when you first get up. In case you don't know that yet. You want to make sure you've been up at least an hour. You want to have had protein in your system so that you won't get that heightened response. So bottom line, we're all different, but just having that awareness gives you options. I think most of you, if you are listening or watching to this, all have a growth mindset. Otherwise you'd be watching cat videos or something else. So I just say be open. Be open to what you're hearing, but also do your research and make sure it's valid because there is a lot of noise out there right now. And before I wrap up, I want you to think of someone in your life right now who may be going through a difficult time. Maybe you've noticed not from them, maybe they've kind of gone quiet, but maybe from some post on Facebook or somewhere that you've noticed that maybe they're going through a challenging time. If I've been around someone at a gathering and I notice that they're a bit off, I then get curious, like, I wonder what they're carrying right now. So if the right opportunity comes, then reach out to them. Ask them, talk with them, or simply share this podcast because maybe they need to hear this about the worrying. And you could send a little thinking of you message. Nothing too elaborate, nothing too invasive at all, but just to say, I'm thinking about you and this helped me so I thought it might help you. I think, now especially, we need more of that, people who are gonna be real, thoughtful, and kind. Because yes, there's a lot that we can't control, but what we can control is how we show up for ourselves and others. How we support will make a difference.