Tag Archives: anxiety

Reality Check: Feelings for the Future

Imagine the future. Maybe your daydreams are happy ones—winning the lottery, lazing on sandy beaches surrounded by loving friends and family. It’s a future with happiness, health, and good will. Or perhaps the future that springs to mind is filled … Continue reading

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Reality Check: Can you do this?

Do you consider yourself highly motivated? Does your motivation come naturally to you, or do you have to work at it? For some of us, motivation seems to require an occasional kick in the pants, so to speak, to keep … Continue reading

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Reality Check: The Stories of our Scars

If you’ve spent much time at all on this earth, you probably have a few scars to show for it. Some people view their scars as embarrassing. They agonize over them, and buy not-so-magical potions in efforts to get rid … Continue reading

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Reality Check: Relaxation and Everyday Anxiety

Last time, I mentioned that Dr. Martin Seligman has a couple of suggestions to lower everyday anxiety levels. One is progressive relaxation, also known as progressive muscle relaxation. This technique is hardly new; apparently first described nearly a hundred years … Continue reading

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Reality Check: Loose Ends and Everyday Anxiety

Curious things can happen if we detach ourselves from technology for a while. I call that time “vacation,” an opportunity to notice things I might not pay attention to otherwise. Knowing I’ll have no electronics, internet, or email to entertain … Continue reading

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Reality Check: Can your Belief Change your Reality?

Many of us feel stressed. Challenges, fears, upsets, and disappointments abound. People, institutions, politicians, employers and many others don’t behave as we want them to. A lot of those stressors are outside of our control. And even though we know … Continue reading

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Reality Check: Choosing your Worry Boundaries

Can we choose to worry? Can we choose not to worry? If you identify yourself as a worrier, then the idea that you could choose not to worry probably sounds unrealistic. So let’s try this different, but related, question: Can … Continue reading

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Reality Check: An Anxiety Alternative

If we choose to worry, there’s plenty to worry about. Thanks to the mixed blessing of access to information from all over the world, we can worry about things that we have absolutely no control over and that may never … Continue reading

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Reality Check: The Meltdown

A thousand miles away, my usually sunny friend—she who chooses the most positive possible interpretation of everything—had a meltdown. It’s understandable. She’s been living with the reality of several family members diagnosed with cancers. Then, her mom took a tumble … Continue reading

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Reality Check: When you doubt yourself

While unjustified confidence can be perceived as arrogance, justifiable confidence is a positive quality. Self-doubt, for any of us, can result in a lack of enjoyment of our lives. An athlete who loses confidence can lose their enjoyment of the … Continue reading

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