When Positivity & Affirmations Just Won't Cut It

Lately I feel that I have turned a corner. I have always been a naturally positive, happy person but over the past few months I have really found an inner peace and happiness. This has a lot to do with the positivity, empowering self-talk and meditation I practise most days.

On top of my sunny disposition we are at the beginning of the festive season which I absolutely love and my son, who I have not seen since February is coming home for Christmas. Even better, he is coming home a week earlier than expected !

However, at the beginning of the week I started to feel a bit off, despite my son surprising us with an earlier arrival date. I couldn’t understand why I had lost my sparkle.

I spent all day Monday and Tuesday trying to muster up positivity and excitement but it just didn’t happen. I was feeling anxious, worried, that I had no time and was aware that my bank balance was rapidly decreasing (as well as being the time when business slows down at our garage). Even having to stop for petrol seemed like too much – more time, more energy and more money !

So Wednesday morning I went out on my dog walk and started repeating an affirmation I have used for years when I feel overwhelmed : “I have plenty of time, money and energy. I have plenty of time, money and energy. I have plenty of time, money and energy.” This did provide a small amount of relief, but it wasn’t really cutting through the grump I had found myself in.

I am a real advocate for positive thinking and affirmations, when practised regularly they can make a profound improvement to your attitude and outlook. However, I also know that when you are on a negative vibe the last thing you want to do is “just be positive” and telling yourself, by way of an affirmation, how great everything is just seems like a downright lie.

There was nothing left but to look into exactly what was causing my overwhelm, so that I could face up to it and work through it. So I let it all out :

How am I going to manage to feed another two adults for 4 weeks when I just about have time to feed the three of us during the week ? I need and want to cook them nice meals but haven’t got a clue what to cook every day. I thought I had 2 weeks to get prepared and now I only have 5 days. When am I going to go food shopping ? I need to make up their room, clean the office they will be using, make some Christmas biscuits, pick them up from the airport, arrange for my youngest son to get a lift to football that day. Plus I have a Christmas party that night so will not be there with them on their first evening. Then, whilst they are here, I will have another two people to look after and I barely have time to look after the three of us. The house runs like clockwork with the three of us in it, all of our routines are going to change and I don’t have time for any inconveniences !

I am constantly spending money at the moment, petrol costs are going through the roof and I am driving so much, work is slowing down, I still have so much to buy and pay for before Christmas. There’s more money going out than coming in. My weekly food bill, electric, water is all going to go up over these next few weeks.

My evening and bedtime routine is going to be really disrupted because my son and his girlfriend work US working hours so will be working until 11pm at night. I will be worn out because I still need to get up at 6am. We will have to be really quiet of a morning because they will still be asleep as we get ready for work and school.

Exhausting !

No wonder I was feeling overwhelmed and anxious. I was focussing on all the potential drains on my time, money and energy which was exacerbating the overwhelm of no time, money and energy.

These and many other thoughts just spilled out and I felt so guilty because I really, really cannot wait to give my son a hug and have him close to me for a while.

I then gave myself a good talking to – this is ridiculous, Louis-Rae is finally coming home, something you have been looking forward to for months and you are spending the few days before worrying and fretting rather than getting excited about the time you will be spending with him.

As is normally the case with anxiety, I was telling myself stories of what might happen, causing me to worry and feel overwhelmed. The “what if’s” were running wild and causing me to miss precious time excitedly anticipating seeing my son after many months.

I slowed down my breathing (did you know slowing down your breath actually gives the feeling of slowing down time) and took a moment to stop on my dog walk to enjoy the view – again providing the feeling of having time. From this calmer state I ran through everything I needed to do to enjoy this wonderful time of year and my festive sparkle back – practical actions and reality checks.  

Giving myself the time to get every thing organised in my head from a practical point of view and changing my focus to the morning when I first see him coming through the departure gates was exactly what I needed to calm myself down and put a stop to the anxiety.

It’s crazy how things work out because it is now Friday morning and odd things have happened that have provided me with more time such as football training being cancelled one evening.

Rather than try to push down my anxiety and worry and cover it up with positivity and affirmations I listened to it, worked through it with practical action and some reality checks such as, my son really will not care if the bathroom is not sparkling nor what he eats every day, money really is fine and always goes down this time of the year, it’s great that I can afford to buy lots of presents and nice food !

Worry and anxiety is almost always caused by thoughts of things that have not yet happened, things that you are thinking about in the worst case scenario, problems that have not yet arose and probably never will. This time of year is often fraught with worry over time and money so do yourself a favour :

Stop, breathe and give yourself some time to look into what thoughts are causing you to feel anxious. What can you do to relieve the worry ? Do you need to be more organised ? Do you need to take some sort of action such as chase up a delivery, plan your food shop, Christmas gifts ? Do you just need a reality check because what you are worrying about is ridiculous ?

Crack on and then get back to your positive mental attitude and empowering affirmations !

Most importantly, enjoy this magical time of year.

Lisa x

Title picture of hand-drawn lady by ElisaRiva, Pixabay