Worry windows: a creative approach to managing anxiety

If the pandemic taught us anything is that there are many people around the world who experience anxiety. Some of it is environmental, some of it is physical (hello menopause!), and some of it is work-related. We can get caught up in an anxiety spiral, and let our days be consumed by worry relating to conversations, discoveries, relationships, and so on.

Worry windows offer a measure of control by scheduling a set chunk of time daily to focus solely on worrying. That way, we can park our concerns in that timeslot rather than get on the hamster wheel when we exercise, when we are dropping off to sleep, when we are sitting in a meeting, or commuting to work.

Self Magazine published an article describing one person’s adoption of the technique. In the article, they quote a therapist who says: “A worry window gives your anxious thoughts a seat at the table, but not the whole house, so you can acknowledge them without letting them take over your entire day.”

I am the kind of person who likes to schedule my week. I mark out my training sessions in my calendar, I set aside time to keep on top of my paperwork for my consultancy, and I meal plan to avoid food waste and frequent takeout suppers. There’s a whole bunch of other stuff I schedule and it takes the pressure off in trying to remember payments, health care appointments, social gatherings, maintenance checks, pick ups, etc.

So you can see why the idea of scheduling a targetted time to actually focus on whatever is bothering me instead of it drifting in at the worst moments is appealing. It’s like the organizational approach of a brain dump — where you note all the things you have to do and then you weight them by priority. Instead, I schedule a window, set the timer, dump all the worries, and then deal with them.

A worry window allows you to hold space for the issue that’s stressing you. You can focus on it exclusively without interruption. It also gives you the opportunity to deal with it. I like the concept of boundaries — “I don’t have to think about that now” — and I like the idea of containment — “I will think about this for 15 minutes and then have a cup of tea.”

Acknowledging the things that cause us low-grade anxiety is important, and heaven knows, these days there’s a lot to worry about. Setting a worry window is like clearing the snow off your car after a snowstorm. If you need to get to your destination, you need to see where you are going, and a windshield of snow and ice won’t let that happen safely.

I often ask my workshop or meeting participants to take a moment before we start to clear their windshield of the things that could hinder their seeing clearly in the meeting. Maybe they had a stressful conversation with their partner about the division of labour, or their offspring refused to put on what once used to be their favourite shirt, or they ran out of milk for their coffee … and these worries cloud their intention for the day.

Opening the worry window daily for a 15-minute block allows me to acknowledge the things that make me anxious, find a solution (but not always, as sometimes just naming the lurking thing is all that is needed), wipe that metaphorical windshield clean, and go on to deal with the things that matter.

What about you? Would you see worry windows as a helpful strategy? Let us know in the comments.