When I'm Stressed

It's somehow kind of frightening just how much stress in my life is created by my own mind.  Something can happen that really isn't that big of a deal at all, and my mind will seize upon it and turn it into something that will make my life more difficult, that will get me fired from my job, that will cause someone else to be angry with me.  Very rarely, these things actually will happen, but to be honest, most of the time I'm simply creating negative events and thoughts in my own mind, and I'm causing myself stress with my thoughts--the situation itself isn't really causing me to feel anything.

I do know where this tendency of mine comes from.  As a child, there were very few things I could do that didn't get my father angry for some reason or another.  I was always walking on eggshells, always afraid that something would set him off and cause me to feel his anger again.  In my adult years now, my mind is simply trained to see any sort of thing that could create conflict or that could be "wrong" as something that's going to get me into "trouble."  My brain was trained that way.  I do all that I can now to combat this tendency of mine to think this way, but the many years of training were very effective, and I constantly have to battle the feelings that come up rather automatically.

Don't worry--this isn't an attempt to blame a parent for all the ills in my life.  It's simply a straightforward explanation of how I've come to think in certain ways in certain circumstances.  I've had many years to deal with the effects of my early training, and I've come a very long way from where I used to be.  But I still have quite a ways to go until I'm free from the training that happened so long ago.

It's very important to me that I keep this in mind whenever I start to feel stress about something having to do with my job or a relationship.  I have to be careful that I don't allow my fear of being blamed--and then punished--for things that are beyond my control, rob me of my peace of mind from day to day.  Something might have happened at work that doesn't seem right, but sometimes, such things happen.  I can deal with it and make it right without feeling the stress of the fear of being blamed.  I'm very capable, and very good at what I do, so there's no need for me to worry so much.

I write this because my brain kept me up for a couple of hours in the middle of the night, focused on something that happened at work yesterday.  And it's something very trivial, but there are some things I'm going to have to explain--and they're fully explainable.  There really is no problem, but my mind has decided to fill me with stressful feelings that keep me awake at night.  It's rather silly and unfortunate, but it is what it is.  As long as I keep in mind that the stress is a result of years on negative training, I can hopefully circumvent it and not allow the situation to make me miserable for a certain amount of time.

Sometimes, it really is important for us to know the source of some negative feelings so that we can deal with them effectively and still live our lives fully.