Lessons From A Donut
Lessons can come from anywhere
Even Donuts.
Not just any donut, but my absolute favorite donut ever made from potatoes in a shop in Maine. Every summer we drive up the New Hampshire and Maine coast on our way to vacation in Acadia. Just south of Portland we stop at our favorite donut shop where I order a chocolate sea salt donut. It's heaven.
But they sell out sometimes on the weekend.
So you need to get there in time.
It was an early Covid summer, so we waited a very long line in drive thru. With every passing minute my impatience grew. I complained about what a waste of time it was and how upset I am that I wouldn't get my donut. Then they came out with a sign - SOLD OUT.
FREE DONUTS!
To say I was worked up was an understatement.
Finally we round the corner and there is a person standing there talking to each car. I see her hand a bag to the car in front of us. We pull up. "I'm sorry" she says. We sold out of donuts today but are offering free from what we have left over. The only flavor we have is chocolate sea salt". She hands me a bag with 2 donuts. Chocolate Sea Salt. Exactly what I wanted. For free.
My partner, who spent the last 20 minutes trying to calm me down, looks at me and says "no was all that anger and frustration really worth it? You got exactly what you wanted.". I laughed nervously, thanked the girl and proceeded to drive away.
Immediately I realized how unnecessary my frustration was. I was negative from the moment I saw the line. I assumed there was no donut for me, I complained about wasting 20 minutes in line for nothing. But what really happened is I wasted 20 minutes being upset for nothing.
So What Did A Donut Teach Me?
It brought awareness to my tendency towards worse case thinking. That worst case thinking is not really serving me. For most of my life I thought it was good to be prepared for the worst. Which may sound like a good idea, but I never really prepared for it, I just worried about it. I knew there had to be a better way.
I would stress about being late, and making someone upset. I'd stress about there not being any available tables to walk into a restaurant, or that we're not going to deliver the software on time or that the customer won't be satisfied. Almost anything big or small carried worry, dread, fear, or frustration for it not working out the way I wanted. An unresponded-to text meant someone was mad at me. A pain in my head certainly meant the C-word. And so on.
In Psychology it is called this catastrophizing. But whatever you call it, it is Exhausting.
How often you worry and stress over potential future things that are yet to come true?
Worst Case Thinking Is Not Only Exhausting, It's Not Useful
Psychology today says Catastrophizing is "a cognitive distortion that prompts people to jump to the worst possible conclusion, usually with very limited information or objective reason to despair. When a situation is upsetting, but not necessarily catastrophic, they still feel like they are in the midst of a crisis."
So what I was doing is constantly putting my mind and body into crisis mode. And the reality is, no real crisis existed. But that constant worry led to increased anxiety and depression in my life.
While it is normal for the brain to have a bias towards negativity, that is how we survived as a species, this hypervigilance is not useful for non-life threatening situations (ie, most situations).
Instead, Try These Steps to Reduce Worst Case Thinking
Awareness: The first step to change any habit is to open your awareness to it. Recognize when you start going down a worry spiral.
Compassion: Don't beat yourself up when it happens or if you're thinking it happens more often than it should. Congratulations, you have a functioning normal brain this just trying to protect you.
Factify: Okay, that isn't a word, but list out what in your worry is 100% true and what is the worry story you're telling yourself. Do you know for sure that your worst case will come true? Likely you do not.
Go There: This may seem counter-intuitive, but challenge yourself. If the worst case happened, what would you do? How do you want to show up? If I didn't get the donut, I could have continued my drive to Acadia and decide to not let it ruin my day. Most of the time, we would be just fine if the worst case happened, as we get to choose how we want to show up in that situation.
Redirect: When the worries come up, remind yourself that the opposite (the positive outcome) is also likely. Also remind yourself that you already created a plan for the worst case and you don't need to worry about it anymore. I even like to thank my brain for trying to protect me and saying to it "We are going to be fine, I got this".
And If That Fails Ask One Question
What about this do I have control over?
Sometimes we worry about things that are out of our control. Nothing we do or say could change the outcome. In those cases, whether you believe in God, The Avengers, or some other life force in the Universe, Surrender your worry to it.
Spend your energy focusing on what you do have control over. You will be amazed at how much relief can come when you let go of what you cannot control and take control of what you can.