Somebody over the weekend commented that I seem like the kind of person who never worries (not true) and that she ‘worries when she has nothing to worry about!’ That’s to say when something she had been worrying about gets resolved the worry doesn’t just stop, as you might expect, but lives on in a kind of vacuum waiting for some other idea or imagining or expected event to latch onto like a microbe waiting to infect a host. Why would someone (my friend) worry about not having a worry?

If someone is of a pessimistic bent then they may worry defensively and not want to ‘tempt fate’ by being too happy because ‘well you never know what’s just around the corner do you!’ To worry defensively at least affords you the opportunity to say ‘I told you so’ if or ‘when’ things do go wrong. So worrying needlessly or finding stuff to worry about may be a form of psychological insurance. It does seem like a lot of effort though.

Actually there are effective ways to worry (see our Learn how to worry well and benefit from stress article )
Worrying used wisely and discriminately can be a tool for benefit as long as it is controlled and doesn’t make us emote rather than reason or stop us getting satisfactions and enjoyments from life. Strong emotion blocks rational thought.

According to this article approximately 1,000 people died after the 9/11 terrorist attacks from the result of worrying about flying and assuming it was now more dangerous than road travel. These were the extra road traffic accident stats-frightened flyers killed on the roads.

So the ‘logic’ of worrying if we are too emotional can cause us to miss the bigger picture.

As for worrying about not having to worry-that sounds like habit of mind. Not trying to second guess what may or may not happen coupled with wise precaution and solid ambition could also become a habit. As no less a luminary that Aristotle (not the shipping magnet) said: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”

Mark