Don’t give in to your horrible imaginings

The mind has a habit of fixating, of spinning stories about worst case scenarios and impending catastrophes. The actual danger or discomfort we might face is usually much less severe than the stories our minds make of it. — Tribune News Service

In March 2010, I achieved a long-held dream of mine to perform at the famous Cavern Club in Liverpool, home of The Beatles during the early 1960s. My band at the time was made up of Beatles fanatics and we were delighted to have been invited to play at what we considered our musical home.

Despite our dream-come-true moment, I was extremely anxious on the day we were due to play. In fact, performing in a band always made me anxious – which is partly why I did it. In secondary school, I struggled a lot with social anxiety. My favourite author was JD Salinger not only because I enjoyed his seminal work, Catcher in the Rye (1951), but also because he had then lived a reclusive life for the next four decades – and I wanted to do that.

Some years later, I heard a story about the life of Thai Buddhist master Ajahn Chah and his struggles to overcome lust as a young monk. Whatever he tried, he couldn’t overcome it. Nothing worked. So he decided to be ruthless with himself. For three months, he resolved to look at the ground and keep his eyes fixed there whenever he might be in the presence of women. It took every bit of self-restraint, but he managed to pull it off.

After the three months was up, as soon as he caught sight of an attractive young lady, the lust came back even stronger than before. The experience taught him a valuable lesson about avoiding his feelings.

When we try to avoid what we feel, it causes more problems than we start with. The mind has a habit of fixating, of spinning stories about worst case scenarios and impending catastrophes. The actual danger or discomfort we might face is usually much less severe than the stories our minds make of it.

When it comes to anxiety, the emotion is self-validating. Let’s say you’re scared to walk around a shopping mall on weekends due to the crowds. So you decide to stay at home, which allows the anxiety to say, “See! Because you avoided the scary situation, you kept yourself safe from the terrible outcome”.

There’s no way to outthink anxiety or fear. And they’re not bad emotions – quite often, they serve vital functions in the service of keeping us safe. On the other hand, they’re not terribly clever and can fail to see the difference between a stroll in a busy shopping mall and, say, being hunted down by a tiger.

This is where it’s helpful do engage in what’s referred to as “reality testing”. By testing reality, we look at what’s happening in the real world and compare it with what our emotions predict.

For example, before I played at the Cavern Club, my anxiety was telling me I didn’t belong there; that my voice was sure to fail; that the crowd would stand and stare – and perhaps even laugh – as I struggled to get out the notes. On the other hand, this was something I had wanted to do for a long time. I was scared but I did it anyway. I had enough experience of anxiety to know it’s typically overdramatic. We performed well enough; the catastrophe would have to come back another time.

Much of anything I’ve done since has come from being scared but doing it anyway. There is never a right time or perfect condition to do something and, try as we might, nothing we do is without its imperfections.

But as the saying goes, it’s better to do something imperfectly than to do nothing perfectly. Perhaps our minds will tell us whatever we do will never be good enough, but if we pay close enough attention, it’s the same old voice telling the same old story.

When I went onstage at the Cavern, my anxiety was through the roof for the first few minutes until I saw that the world wasn’t going to collapse in on me, and all the sounds were coming out as intended.

Our “horrible imaginings” can make us feel like the world is constantly waiting for us to slip up and make fools of ourselves, but in reality the world has other things to think about. If you ever find yourself wanting to try something or pursue an ambition, you might find that anxious voice telling you all kinds of stories. It’s OK to feel scared – do it anyway.

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Sunny Side Up columnist Sandy Clarke has long held an interest in emotions, mental health, mindfulness and meditation. He believes the more we understand ourselves and each other, the better societies we can create. If you have any questions or comments, email [e-mail]. The views expressed here are entirely the writer's own.