Time Anxiety

Do you ever wake up on a weekend feeling so grateful that you have the whole day to accomplish the tasks you want to get done or achieve, yet you still feel anxious about getting them all done?

Do you ever not allow yourself to sleep in on a day off or on the weekend because you feel like you are losing time in the day to get all the things done you hope to get done? 

THEN you put things off that cause you anxiety thinking that will give you relief, but in reality that procrastination causes you to be more anxious about the growing lack of time. 

Writer Marissa Gainsburg of Women’s Health wrote an article about this topic in last months issue and it has been sitting heavy on my heart to write a post about it.  

For people who are motivated by making a difference in other people’s lives, or who enjoy creating an impact, time anxiety is something we experience often. And it’s not just our time that we worry about wasting, it’s other people’s time as well. 

Essentially, time anxiety is a fixation on the passage of time. When you base your happiness and success on our ability to be purposeful, to add value in some way, you feel discomfort by the thought of letting time pass by. 

These are the people who can watch TV, but they probably have to be doing something else at the same time. These are the people who have a hard time sitting through a whole movie because they feel as if they are wasting time; unless maybe it’s a documentary about being more productive (lol). 

Gainsburg referenced a psychologist, Kevin Chapman, PhD, in her article who says “The problem isn’t that time is infinite, it’s the perception of time being out of your control that creates a negative relationship.” You end up stuck in a vicious cycle of anxious thoughts. 

This vicious cycle leads to chronic stress, which is taxing on your physical and mental health, which makes being productive even harder. 

So, what can you do? As I plan to talk about in more posts to come (so stay tuned), you need to train yourself and your thoughts. You need to train yourself that it’s okay to have these thoughts, but they are just thoughts, they are not a part of who you are. 

One you are able to separate and see your thoughts as something different than who you are, you can let these thoughts pass by and not hang on to them. You can let go of your obsession with not having enough minutes or days. You can comfort these thoughts by telling yourself “I do have time to focus on one thing, and I am going to do that one thing well until it is complete”. 

Also, it may be helpful for you to attach a purpose to everything you are doing. For example, if you do not set an alarm for Saturday morning, and instead allow yourself to sleep in/wake up without an alarm, you can attach a purpose for this such as your body needs rest in order to be present in the activities of the day. 

As I mention with my clients, I encourage you to keep a gratitude journal and write about 3 things that went well each day. It can be as simple as you were able to do a load of laundry or maybe you are feeling like you crushed your workout that day. Whatever it may be, you are making progress; recognize that and believe in it.