May 3, 2024 • 14 mins
Have you ever been held captive by the 'what ifs' that haunt every corner of your thoughts? Join me, Jim Cunningham, on the Unscripted Mind podcast for a conversation that could very well be the key to unlocking your peace of mind. We're tackling the beast of uncertainty, a force so powerful it can induce a whirlwind of anxiety with just a whisper of 'what's next?' But, as we dive into the crux of why the unknown is such a formidable adversary, you'll discover that it's not an invincible one. As Ursula K Le Guin nudges us to recognize, life is an endless series of unpredictable moments – yet within that chaos lies our chance to thrive.
Throughout our discussion, we'll arm you with six potent strategies to reframe your view of uncertainty, transforming it from a source of dread to a manageable aspect of life. Prepare to challenge the very nature of your fears, examining their validity and the evidence – or lack thereof – that supports them. By embracing these practical steps, you'll learn to interrupt the cycle of intrusive thoughts that so often lead to sleepless nights and anxious days. Whether you're navigating the complexities of daily stressors or the seismic shifts of life-changing events, this episode is your compass through the fog of the unknown, guiding you toward clarity and control over the anxiety that has overstayed its welcome in your mind.
The goal of The UnScripted Mind Podcast is to give you fresh perspectives, practical insights and tools you can use to give you more choices, self-awareness and control of your feelings, reactions and behaviors.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jim Cunningham (00:02):
Ursula K Le Guin once said the only thing
that makes life possible ispermanent, intolerable
uncertainty , not knowing whatcomes next.
That's not how most of us seeuncertainty.
In fact, fear of the unknown isone of the greatest sources of
anxieties that we have.
(00:22):
In this episode of theUnscripted Mind, we're going to
give you six specific things youcan do to conquer the anxiety
of uncertainty.
Welcome to the Unscripted Mindpodcast, where our goal is to
(00:45):
give you fresh perspectives,practical insights and tools you
can use to give you morechoices, increase your
self-awareness and bettercontrol of your feelings,
reactions and behaviors.
My name is Jim Cunningham andtoday we're going to discuss how
and why uncertainty affects usin such unhealthy ways, and then
(01:07):
we're going to give you sixtangible things you can do to
change the way you think aboutuncertainty.
Now we can drive ourselvescrazy, worrying about all kinds
of things that might happen,trying to account for all the
radical possibilities that areout there, but you know,
honestly, at the end of the day,we can't deal with all the
unknowns and that are out there.
But you know, honestly, at theend of the day, we can't deal
with all the unknowns and thewhat ifs.
(01:28):
First, let's talk a little bitabout anxiety itself.
Anxiety is, at its heart, ourfriend.
Now that seems like a crazystatement, I know, but stick
with me for a second.
Anxiety is that hypervigilantpart of ourselves that drives us
and tries to anticipate and beready for anything and every bad
(01:49):
thing that could possiblyhappen.
That, in and of itself, isn'tthe problem, though.
The problem is when anxietyoverwhelms the system.
This can lead to panic attacks,heart palpitations, anger and a
myriad of other symptoms.
But how many of these thingsthat you worry about are
actually future-based?
If you take a minute to stopand think about that, the answer
(02:12):
has to be 99.9% of them.
And here's the great news aboutanxiety it's all future-based.
The things that make us anxioushaven't even happened yet.
They're actually figments ofour imagination, and you know
how we know this.
We know this because, as soonas something happens that thing
(02:34):
that we fear the most we stopworrying about it, we stop
having anxiety about it and wejust start dealing with it.
If I'm worried about having aflat tire and thinking, oh my
gosh, I don't have a sparewhatever, that creates a ton of
anxiety, but as soon as I have aflat, the anxiety goes away and
I start problem solving, okay,who can I call?
(02:56):
Maybe I call AAA, maybe I calla friend, maybe whatever.
But now I start problem solving.
So sure we have some fear andunhappiness that go about the
bad thing that happens.
But now I start problem solving.
So sure we have some fear andunhappiness that go about the
bad thing that happens.
But anxiety's job is done assoon as the thing happens.
So we have to remember that andthat is good news that anxiety,
when you're feeling it the thinghasn't happened yet, always
(03:18):
something important to remember.
Our brain always does a greatjob of trying to keep us safe.
Sometimes it does too good of ajob.
Our brain is going to fill inany gaps in knowledge with
fabricated facts, and thesefacts are not the positive
outcomes that you'd always hopefor.
So I call it msu, making stuffup, or any other s word you want
(03:41):
to put in there.
Usually the made, the made-upfacts are worst-case scenarios.
They are only our imaginations,though still None of these
things have happened.
And if I look at the evidence tosupport all the things that I
have worried about over theyears, what, maybe 1% of them
have actually ever happened?
(04:01):
It just doesn't work out likethat, and I have to remember
that.
So if we take a moment andconsider the actual fear, we
usually find there's littleevidence to support it.
We have to be aware of what thethoughts were entertaining and
be careful of those kinds ofthings.
So let me ask you the questionwhat types of thoughts do you
(04:22):
tend to entertain?
So, with all this in mind, whatare we going to do with all of
these Well, let's call themintrusive thoughts when they
show up, how do we handle thatin the moment?
Well, here are six ideas andsix things that you can think
about.
They are practical.
The idea is to give yousomething very tangible that you
can do.
So the first thing I mightrecommend is this thing I call
(04:45):
eliminating the variables.
What that means is we can't getrid of all the unknowns, but
the more information we have towork with, the better.
And again, this goes to thisMSU thing, where my mind is
making up all the worstscenarios that aren't going to
come true.
So the more information I have,the less opportunity my brain
has to make those things up.
(05:06):
So how do I eliminate variables?
Well, I'll give you an example.
If you're worried about acontentious conversation you
need to have with a coworker ora friend or whoever it might be,
and, of course, you'verehearsed this conversation 6
million times in your head andit always ends up pretty bad and
you can always imagine theworst scenarios and how this is
(05:28):
going to turn out.
The way you eliminate thevariable is you actually have
the conversation, schedule it,put it on the calendar, go have
the conversation and then, evenif it does turn out bad, you're
not worried about it.
You don't have anxiety about itanymore, because then you have
something that you can actuallyaddress.
The more proactive you can be,the less reactive you have to be
(05:49):
, and that's really the goal,right, if I can start to
anticipate something and that'sbased on facts, I don't have to
be reacting in the moment, andthat gives us a lot more sense
of control, which is a greatanecdote to anxiety.
The second thing I might suggestis focusing on what you can
control Now.
(06:11):
We can't control the future.
That's where anxiety lives.
We can't control the past.
That's where regret and allthese other things live.
The only place that you havecontrol is in the present.
So ask yourself what you needto do next, like the next thing
you need to do in this moment.
Focus on that and that's it.
(06:32):
One thing at a time.
Don't worry about tomorrow'sproblems.
Stick with today's problems.
One thing at a time, it's allyou can control.
When I look at everything inthe world, the only thing I can
really ultimately control ismyself and, to be perfectly
honest, I kind of suck at that.
So staying in the present is agreat strategy, because it's
(06:55):
still something that I canactually act on and tangibly
manipulate.
The third thing I might suggestis focusing on the trees, not
the forest.
Now, I know that's backwardsfrom what we've normally heard,
but sometimes the forest is justtoo much.
Staying in the present allowsus to not be overwhelmed by
everything in the forest.
(07:16):
If I can just focus on one treeat a time, that's all I got to
do.
If I do that enough times, theforest takes care of itself.
This is a good sports analogy.
If you're at the free throwline and the game is on the line
and you're worried about whathappens when you miss the shot,
that's the wrong thing to befocusing on.
It's much better to focus onthe things you can control, and
(07:40):
in that moment, the thing youcan control is focusing on and
executing the mechanics ofshooting a free throw.
If I do that correctly, theshot takes care of itself.
I don't have to worry aboutanything else.
So focus on the trees, not theforest.
The forest can feel huge, buteach tree keeps it very
manageable.
And again, one thing at a time,and sometimes the next thing is
(08:03):
the best thing to focus on.
Number four what you know versuswhat you feel.
Let me explain this one.
Somebody once said feelingsmake great servants, but make
horrible masters.
Feelings can deceive us, so wehave to keep those in check, and
one way to do that and this hasworked for me on a number of
(08:26):
different occasions is making alist of things that I know for
certain, that are indisputable,that I know for a fact.
Then, when I start feeling andI start questioning and I start
wondering and I'm thinking, well, I don't know if I should go
back to my list of what I know.
And when I go back to that list, it grounds me in truth and
(08:49):
reality.
Feelings are transitory andthey will lead you astray in a
lot of ways, so focusing onsomething that I can count on is
much better.
I can trust facts.
I can't always trust myfeelings.
Number five I would say is toembrace adversity.
The only time we grow is whenwe are outside of our comfort
(09:11):
zone.
When everything is easy, wejust atrophy.
Adversity is a period of growthand we need to embrace that and
see it as opportunity, not thishorrible, horrible thing.
Now, it's not pleasant in themoment, don't get me wrong, but
sometimes it's about perspectiveand seeing things in a
(09:32):
different light.
When you think of the Stoicphilosophies, a lot of that
deals with not trying to goaround obstacles but embracing
them, because it's going to makearound obstacles, but embracing
them because it's going to makeus bigger, faster, stronger and
smarter.
And without that we're justgoing to deprive ourselves.
And I think this is true.
If you're dealing withstruggles with our children and
(09:54):
stuff, depriving them of thatopportunity to struggle a little
bit and have a little bit ofanxiety and figure out how to
manage it, you're doing them afavor.
As a parent, I know that's avery difficult thing to watch
sometimes, but we need to bechallenged in order to be
creative, adaptive and resilient.
The sixth thing I might suggest,and the final thing, is taking
(10:16):
care of yourself.
This is an easy thing tooverlook because we get so
wrapped up on everything elseand the anxiety of the future
thing that probably isn't goingto happen, that we forget to
take care of ourselves.
We get busy overworking, weforget to eat, we forget to
sleep, we don't.
We just don't take care of goodcare of ourselves.
So this is one little acronymthat I use.
(10:38):
It's called HALT.
It stands for hungry, angry,lonely, tired.
This is not an original thing.
Aa uses it.
I think some otherorganizations have used it too.
Halt is those times wheneverything is going to seem
worse than it really is.
It's going to seem like theworld is falling apart and it's
actually not.
(10:58):
It's just that I'm hungry,angry, lonely or tired.
The beautiful thing about thisit also serves as a good
checklist to createself-awareness.
When you start feeling anxiety,anger, any big emotion, ask
yourself am I hungry, angry,lonely or tired?
It's something you can actuallydo something about.
(11:19):
Sometimes I get busy, I forgetto eat.
I mean, they make commercialsabout this stuff.
You know Snickers, you're notyourself.
You know hangry We've got allkinds of words to describe these
things.
Sometimes I just need to go geta snack.
Sometimes I just need to take abreak instead of trying to
power through that difficulttask, and just need to take a
break.
Instead of trying to powerthrough that difficult task and
just trying to gut it out, it'smuch easier to take a 10-minute
(11:42):
break and come back with fresheyes and get a fresh start at it
.
Maybe I need to talk to someone, maybe I need to take a nap.
I don't know if you're a napper, a 20-minute nap is glorious.
So the goal of these six ideasis to give you something
tangible to do to counteract allof these negative thoughts that
we all have.
So if you feel like you havethem and you're the only one
(12:05):
that's actually not the case.
We all have them.
And don't even get me startedon waking up at 3 in the morning
.
The world will fall apart at 3in the morning, but it's all
made-up stuff and you know this,because when you wake up the
next morning, it all seemsridiculous.
So, focusing on eliminating thevariables, focusing on what you
(12:26):
can control, and that is in thepresent, it's not in the future
and it's not in the past.
Focus on the trees, not theforest.
The trees are tangible thingswe can deal with.
The forest can really overwhelmus if we let it.
Focus on what you know and notwhat you feel.
Feelings again are greatservants, but make horrible
masters.
Embrace adversity.
(12:46):
Just because it's hard doesn'tmean it's a bad thing.
We're going to get a lot ofgood mileage out of this.
We're going to get stronger,faster and smarter because of it
.
And finally take care ofyourself.
Hungry, angry, lonely, tired.
Make sure you eat, sleep, takea break, talk to somebody if you
need to.
It will make all the differencein the world.
(13:08):
If you do this, I think you cannot only rest and relax through
the toughest times, but you canalso thrive.
I know there are a lot of otherideas out there.
I would love to get somefeedback from you and what
things work for you to avoid theanxiety of uncertainty.
Leave a comment for us Happy tocheck those out and maybe share
(13:31):
them with other people.
Have an amazing day.
Thanks for joining me and we'llcatch you next time.
Thank you.
Ursula K Le Guin once said the only thing
that makes life possible ispermanent, intolerable
uncertainty , not knowing whatcomes next.
That's not how most of us seeuncertainty.
In fact, fear of the unknown isone of the greatest sources of
anxieties that we have.
(00:22):
In this episode of theUnscripted Mind, we're going to
give you six specific things youcan do to conquer the anxiety
of uncertainty.
Welcome to the Unscripted Mindpodcast, where our goal is to
(00:45):
give you fresh perspectives,practical insights and tools you
can use to give you morechoices, increase your
self-awareness and bettercontrol of your feelings,
reactions and behaviors.
My name is Jim Cunningham andtoday we're going to discuss how
and why uncertainty affects usin such unhealthy ways, and then
(01:07):
we're going to give you sixtangible things you can do to
change the way you think aboutuncertainty.
Now we can drive ourselvescrazy, worrying about all kinds
of things that might happen,trying to account for all the
radical possibilities that areout there, but you know,
honestly, at the end of the day,we can't deal with all the
unknowns and that are out there.
But you know, honestly, at theend of the day, we can't deal
with all the unknowns and thewhat ifs.
(01:28):
First, let's talk a little bitabout anxiety itself.
Anxiety is, at its heart, ourfriend.
Now that seems like a crazystatement, I know, but stick
with me for a second.
Anxiety is that hypervigilantpart of ourselves that drives us
and tries to anticipate and beready for anything and every bad
(01:49):
thing that could possiblyhappen.
That, in and of itself, isn'tthe problem, though.
The problem is when anxietyoverwhelms the system.
This can lead to panic attacks,heart palpitations, anger and a
myriad of other symptoms.
But how many of these thingsthat you worry about are
actually future-based?
If you take a minute to stopand think about that, the answer
(02:12):
has to be 99.9% of them.
And here's the great news aboutanxiety it's all future-based.
The things that make us anxioushaven't even happened yet.
They're actually figments ofour imagination, and you know
how we know this.
We know this because, as soonas something happens that thing
(02:34):
that we fear the most we stopworrying about it, we stop
having anxiety about it and wejust start dealing with it.
If I'm worried about having aflat tire and thinking, oh my
gosh, I don't have a sparewhatever, that creates a ton of
anxiety, but as soon as I have aflat, the anxiety goes away and
I start problem solving, okay,who can I call?
(02:56):
Maybe I call AAA, maybe I calla friend, maybe whatever.
But now I start problem solving.
So sure we have some fear andunhappiness that go about the
bad thing that happens.
But now I start problem solving.
So sure we have some fear andunhappiness that go about the
bad thing that happens.
But anxiety's job is done assoon as the thing happens.
So we have to remember that andthat is good news that anxiety,
when you're feeling it the thinghasn't happened yet, always
(03:18):
something important to remember.
Our brain always does a greatjob of trying to keep us safe.
Sometimes it does too good of ajob.
Our brain is going to fill inany gaps in knowledge with
fabricated facts, and thesefacts are not the positive
outcomes that you'd always hopefor.
So I call it msu, making stuffup, or any other s word you want
(03:41):
to put in there.
Usually the made, the made-upfacts are worst-case scenarios.
They are only our imaginations,though still None of these
things have happened.
And if I look at the evidence tosupport all the things that I
have worried about over theyears, what, maybe 1% of them
have actually ever happened?
(04:01):
It just doesn't work out likethat, and I have to remember
that.
So if we take a moment andconsider the actual fear, we
usually find there's littleevidence to support it.
We have to be aware of what thethoughts were entertaining and
be careful of those kinds ofthings.
So let me ask you the questionwhat types of thoughts do you
(04:22):
tend to entertain?
So, with all this in mind, whatare we going to do with all of
these Well, let's call themintrusive thoughts when they
show up, how do we handle thatin the moment?
Well, here are six ideas andsix things that you can think
about.
They are practical.
The idea is to give yousomething very tangible that you
can do.
So the first thing I mightrecommend is this thing I call
(04:45):
eliminating the variables.
What that means is we can't getrid of all the unknowns, but
the more information we have towork with, the better.
And again, this goes to thisMSU thing, where my mind is
making up all the worstscenarios that aren't going to
come true.
So the more information I have,the less opportunity my brain
has to make those things up.
(05:06):
So how do I eliminate variables?
Well, I'll give you an example.
If you're worried about acontentious conversation you
need to have with a coworker ora friend or whoever it might be,
and, of course, you'verehearsed this conversation 6
million times in your head andit always ends up pretty bad and
you can always imagine theworst scenarios and how this is
(05:28):
going to turn out.
The way you eliminate thevariable is you actually have
the conversation, schedule it,put it on the calendar, go have
the conversation and then, evenif it does turn out bad, you're
not worried about it.
You don't have anxiety about itanymore, because then you have
something that you can actuallyaddress.
The more proactive you can be,the less reactive you have to be
(05:49):
, and that's really the goal,right, if I can start to
anticipate something and that'sbased on facts, I don't have to
be reacting in the moment, andthat gives us a lot more sense
of control, which is a greatanecdote to anxiety.
The second thing I might suggestis focusing on what you can
control Now.
(06:11):
We can't control the future.
That's where anxiety lives.
We can't control the past.
That's where regret and allthese other things live.
The only place that you havecontrol is in the present.
So ask yourself what you needto do next, like the next thing
you need to do in this moment.
Focus on that and that's it.
(06:32):
One thing at a time.
Don't worry about tomorrow'sproblems.
Stick with today's problems.
One thing at a time, it's allyou can control.
When I look at everything inthe world, the only thing I can
really ultimately control ismyself and, to be perfectly
honest, I kind of suck at that.
So staying in the present is agreat strategy, because it's
(06:55):
still something that I canactually act on and tangibly
manipulate.
The third thing I might suggestis focusing on the trees, not
the forest.
Now, I know that's backwardsfrom what we've normally heard,
but sometimes the forest is justtoo much.
Staying in the present allowsus to not be overwhelmed by
everything in the forest.
(07:16):
If I can just focus on one treeat a time, that's all I got to
do.
If I do that enough times, theforest takes care of itself.
This is a good sports analogy.
If you're at the free throwline and the game is on the line
and you're worried about whathappens when you miss the shot,
that's the wrong thing to befocusing on.
It's much better to focus onthe things you can control, and
(07:40):
in that moment, the thing youcan control is focusing on and
executing the mechanics ofshooting a free throw.
If I do that correctly, theshot takes care of itself.
I don't have to worry aboutanything else.
So focus on the trees, not theforest.
The forest can feel huge, buteach tree keeps it very
manageable.
And again, one thing at a time,and sometimes the next thing is
(08:03):
the best thing to focus on.
Number four what you know versuswhat you feel.
Let me explain this one.
Somebody once said feelingsmake great servants, but make
horrible masters.
Feelings can deceive us, so wehave to keep those in check, and
one way to do that and this hasworked for me on a number of
(08:26):
different occasions is making alist of things that I know for
certain, that are indisputable,that I know for a fact.
Then, when I start feeling andI start questioning and I start
wondering and I'm thinking, well, I don't know if I should go
back to my list of what I know.
And when I go back to that list, it grounds me in truth and
(08:49):
reality.
Feelings are transitory andthey will lead you astray in a
lot of ways, so focusing onsomething that I can count on is
much better.
I can trust facts.
I can't always trust myfeelings.
Number five I would say is toembrace adversity.
The only time we grow is whenwe are outside of our comfort
(09:11):
zone.
When everything is easy, wejust atrophy.
Adversity is a period of growthand we need to embrace that and
see it as opportunity, not thishorrible, horrible thing.
Now, it's not pleasant in themoment, don't get me wrong, but
sometimes it's about perspectiveand seeing things in a
(09:32):
different light.
When you think of the Stoicphilosophies, a lot of that
deals with not trying to goaround obstacles but embracing
them, because it's going to makearound obstacles, but embracing
them because it's going to makeus bigger, faster, stronger and
smarter.
And without that we're justgoing to deprive ourselves.
And I think this is true.
If you're dealing withstruggles with our children and
(09:54):
stuff, depriving them of thatopportunity to struggle a little
bit and have a little bit ofanxiety and figure out how to
manage it, you're doing them afavor.
As a parent, I know that's avery difficult thing to watch
sometimes, but we need to bechallenged in order to be
creative, adaptive and resilient.
The sixth thing I might suggest,and the final thing, is taking
(10:16):
care of yourself.
This is an easy thing tooverlook because we get so
wrapped up on everything elseand the anxiety of the future
thing that probably isn't goingto happen, that we forget to
take care of ourselves.
We get busy overworking, weforget to eat, we forget to
sleep, we don't.
We just don't take care of goodcare of ourselves.
So this is one little acronymthat I use.
(10:38):
It's called HALT.
It stands for hungry, angry,lonely, tired.
This is not an original thing.
Aa uses it.
I think some otherorganizations have used it too.
Halt is those times wheneverything is going to seem
worse than it really is.
It's going to seem like theworld is falling apart and it's
actually not.
(10:58):
It's just that I'm hungry,angry, lonely or tired.
The beautiful thing about thisit also serves as a good
checklist to createself-awareness.
When you start feeling anxiety,anger, any big emotion, ask
yourself am I hungry, angry,lonely or tired?
It's something you can actuallydo something about.
(11:19):
Sometimes I get busy, I forgetto eat.
I mean, they make commercialsabout this stuff.
You know Snickers, you're notyourself.
You know hangry We've got allkinds of words to describe these
things.
Sometimes I just need to go geta snack.
Sometimes I just need to take abreak instead of trying to
power through that difficulttask, and just need to take a
break.
Instead of trying to powerthrough that difficult task and
just trying to gut it out, it'smuch easier to take a 10-minute
(11:42):
break and come back with fresheyes and get a fresh start at it
.
Maybe I need to talk to someone, maybe I need to take a nap.
I don't know if you're a napper, a 20-minute nap is glorious.
So the goal of these six ideasis to give you something
tangible to do to counteract allof these negative thoughts that
we all have.
So if you feel like you havethem and you're the only one
(12:05):
that's actually not the case.
We all have them.
And don't even get me startedon waking up at 3 in the morning
.
The world will fall apart at 3in the morning, but it's all
made-up stuff and you know this,because when you wake up the
next morning, it all seemsridiculous.
So, focusing on eliminating thevariables, focusing on what you
(12:26):
can control, and that is in thepresent, it's not in the future
and it's not in the past.
Focus on the trees, not theforest.
The trees are tangible thingswe can deal with.
The forest can really overwhelmus if we let it.
Focus on what you know and notwhat you feel.
Feelings again are greatservants, but make horrible
masters.
Embrace adversity.
(12:46):
Just because it's hard doesn'tmean it's a bad thing.
We're going to get a lot ofgood mileage out of this.
We're going to get stronger,faster and smarter because of it
.
And finally take care ofyourself.
Hungry, angry, lonely, tired.
Make sure you eat, sleep, takea break, talk to somebody if you
need to.
It will make all the differencein the world.
(13:08):
If you do this, I think you cannot only rest and relax through
the toughest times, but you canalso thrive.
I know there are a lot of otherideas out there.
I would love to get somefeedback from you and what
things work for you to avoid theanxiety of uncertainty.
Leave a comment for us Happy tocheck those out and maybe share
(13:31):
them with other people.
Have an amazing day.
Thanks for joining me and we'llcatch you next time.
Thank you.
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