Anxiety Management In Action
Here’s a few examples that might help you to see how the anxiety management strategy of alternative thinking can be used:
Challenging In Action. 1: Dealing with anxiety about a Friend
“Sara is late for our meeting. She might have had a car crash and have been injured.”
1. Are there reasons for my having this worrying thought? Yes, there are: I read about people being killed in road accidents and she is traveling on a main road where she could have an accident. So I am not being completely ridiculous.
2 Are there reasons against my holding this thought? Yes, there are: plenty of people use that road day in and day out and never have an accident. The weather conditions today are very good for driving and so an accident is even less likely than usual. Even if Sara were in an accident, she need not be badly hurt – quite a few of my friends have had accidents and experienced only very minor injuries, if any. There are road works on the road she uses – they could account for her being late.
3. What is the worst thing that could happen? The worst thing is that she’s had an accident and is injured.
4. How could I cope with this? This would be a difficult situation for me, but I could get my husband to support me. We could contact the accident services at the hospital to find out how badly she’d been hurt. I would want to visit and could take my husband with me. I would tell myself that she will be well looked after in the hospital.
5. What is a more constructive way of viewing the situation? It is unlikely that Sara has had an accident and she’s probably late because of road works. If she has had an accident, then she is not necessarily badly injured; and if she were, I could reassure myself that the hospital staff are the best people to deal with this and use my husband to support me if I am distressed.
