Life is one of those things that we can’t predict, but up until the pandemic we were much more aware of what the future looked like for us all. We had plans, hopes and dreams and for many of us, we looked out into the future through the eyes of these positive hopes of the future dreams. Some of us have lost loved ones and had their own life turned upside down with the illness which nobody would wish on their worst enemy. Many of us have had to cancel many things from just a holiday to a big event like a wedding or christening which is disappointing and sad as well. This readjustment is difficult to work through, as not only have things been hard but also at the moment we can’t seem to see an end to this and that for many of us can feel anxious and uncomfortable.
We are all creatures of habit, even those people who are super spontaneous there are still parts of them that follow the habits and rituals of life they just don’t know it. We all accept that every morning the sun to come up and night will turn to day and that unless we are a shift worker, not well, or a teenager not back to school yet! We will be getting up for our day. We all expect to do certain things like having meals, go to work, kids go to school, spend time with family, go to the gym, visit friends and at the end of our day go to bed. Within just one day there are lots of normal patterns and habits that we are just so used to living with and this is the same when we think about the future. We expect the seasons to come and go, our children to grow up, ourselves to get another year older every year. These are the rituals that we are used to expecting and these are just a tiny amount of what we do expect our world to be like. The pandemic has shaken the foundations of who we are and many of the things we thought were written in stone got broken. Things like going to work, the children going to school, hugging our parents and grandparents, visiting friends, going abroad all of these things over the last few months have been stopped or altered for most of us.
This is not normal for our minds and can cause us to get anxious and worried about what the future holds for us. Now with the new uncertain of this pandemic coming back, we need to not go down the “What if” route as this will not help it will cause us lots of negative issues. Now is the time to stop our minds spiralling into this zone as the what-ifs of life are normal not normally positive ones. What we all need to do is to stay in the moment and not let our minds run riot, because the truth is, we just don’t know what’s coming. The reality is though we have never known what’s coming even before this massive pandemic came along, we just thought we did. We have been holding on to our hopes and dreams for all of the time we have been living on this planet and each day is something we can never guarantee. This is something that doesn’t sit well for us creatures of habits, as we all want the guarantee that life will be as we expect and better still like our hopes and dreams.
Many of us have been too busy on the treadmill of life to even consider some of these things but now everything we look at, read, hear and see seems to come with change and uncertainty. What we have to do now though is not make it any worse by playing the “What If” game. What if we go back into lockdown, what if someone I love gets it, what if the schools close again, what if we lose our jobs, what if we can’t be with our family and friends again, what will Christmas be like. If we start overthinking the fears and negative options that could happen, we are just going to make ourselves worried and anxious. This can cause lots of negative things, it can stop us from sleeping well, increase our blood pressure, affect our moods, cause tension in our body and these are just a few of the negative things we can cause with the “What If” game.
Let’s take stock for a moment we all know and have always known that we don’t know what tomorrow will bring, as life has always been like this. The what-ifs don’t help they just hurt us and for what? We still don’t know what tomorrow will bring so why are we doing this then? For many of us, it’s just a habit that we have got into and even before the pandemic, we may have had this attitude to life. But now it is more important than ever to stop this as it is not helping we don’t know what’s coming and the biggest issue is the impact that this “what if” worrying is having on our wellbeing.
We need to stop this, change how we deal with life, as for maybe a while we are going to living in these uncertain times and we need to not let it impact our health, happiness and mental wellbeing by playing the “What If” game. Over the next few blogs, we will be looking at ways to help keep a more positive mindset and keep you away from the what-ifs and worries. But for today and going forward if your mind drifts off to a negative what if, then don’t let yourself dwell on it, always remember we just don’t know what the future will bring and this will not end well for you worrying in this way. Push those things away and get on with being in the now, it worth going back and reading the cat blogs again these will help you gain a better focus on the habits of worry. Here are the links for you Don’t Feed the Cat, The Cat is Back, The Cat lives On and I Can’t See The Cat.
Have a great day thanks for dropping by Sara x
HYPNOSARA 
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