The Dangerous Anxiety That Comes From Wanting To Control Time

Having in mind your concept of time and the way in which you want to organize your days with respect can serve to remove anxiety and, therefore, to improve the quality of your life. Anxious people make a fundamental mistake: they believe that the more they worry, the more likely they are to solve the problem.

Those who suffer from anxiety tend to believe that the simple fact of grumbling about an issue means facing it, but in reality the opposite happens: in doing so it gives rise to the desire to control everything, to the tendency to evaluate the surrounding environment, without being able to actually control anything. It is a little daily torture that we undergo because we are unable to govern our mind, we are unable to stop it.

Don’t try to manipulate time, it will end up swallowing you

You have probably often heard yourself say that in order to organize your life you must first organize your time. Well it is right to try to organize your activities to be as productive as possible,  at work as well as for any playful activity. The truth is that the outcome of everything will depend on the energy and focus we put into doing it.

The problem exists when you always look for the right time for everything: planning every little detail  and establishing a precise time for everything can be synonymous with good organization, but it can also turn into an obsession that imprisons us and leads us to let time pass, rather than to live it.

Avoid the concept of future time to free our mind in the here and now

Perhaps one of the best known and wisest expressions ever uttered is “Carpe Diem”. Two simple words that contain the will to rebel against that postponed life, those ignored desires and that freedom locked up in a prison of prohibitions, hindered by bars as iron as they are invisible. Carpe Diem means going in search of the present moment, eradicating the fear that we have been kidnapped – by ourselves, by our mental programming or by others.

For some people it is the present that requires the greatest attention, it is in it that one’s fullness of life resides. For others, the present represents only a dead time within continuous past and future events, which seem to swallow it up. In this sense, each of us has his own history and his biological path: not all of us are able to apply positive principles for our well-being, perhaps because in the past we have been influenced in the wrong way.

Hence the importance of exploring oneself, of being dynamic and of finding a balance in which to feel that life is made up of substance, not of lost times.

Don’t manipulate time, flow with it

Often the Eastern conception relating to certain philosophical themes is far removed from the Western one, especially as regards the way in which problems are faced and a solution is found. With this we do not mean that one is fairer than the other, but rather understand that what is different, if understood, always brings learning.

Thinkers like Jiddu Krishnamurti have been heavily criticized for some of their positions on the human psyche, points of view that can reach very different heights from the ideas we are used to. If in Western culture the vision of time is focused on the future and on planning, according to other perspectives, time should not be based on this dimension.

 “We want change because there is pain, discomfort, conflict in our life. But is the conflict overcome with time? If you say it is only a matter of time, you are still embroiled in the conflict. You can argue that it will take twenty days or twenty years to get rid of the conflict, to change who you are; but all that time you are still in conflict and time, therefore, does not generate any change.

When we use time as a means of acquiring a quality, a virtue, or a state of being, we are actually postponing or avoiding what is; I think it is important to understand this point. “

-Jiddu Krishnamurti-

Regardless of the procedures tested for the treatment of anxiety, the ideal would be to revolutionize some fundamental concepts such as that of time or how our thinking relates to our individual perception.

We should try to focus our thoughts to better organize ourselves, while remaining open to possible changes and unexpected turns. Pay attention to our body and our sensations, our mental well-being and focus on the present. Know that investing in self-knowledge always brings great benefits.

Images courtesy of Patricia Ariel