Worry Is Waste

Our goal, with this essay, is to combine, and then, explore, two ideas: worry and waste.

You can find, within this essay, three practical ways of managing your worries.

Outside of the above, though, you can also find a series of descriptions that elaborate on the idea that worry is waste.

Regardless of those specifics, though, let’s begin!

On The Nature Of Waste

Give yourself a minute or two to imagine.

To imagine the following scenes:

• A vast ocean, once rich with clear, blue water, now filled with urine, feces, oil, and plastic; among other forms of waste.
• A valley, rich with light and dark green hues, tall hills, and aged trees, now covered with plastic wrappers, stained paper, dark black garbage bags; among other forms of waste.
• A pleasant bedroom, filled with all of the things you love and require; submerged with old food wrappers, crumbs laying across the bed and desk, and dirty, stained clothes over every piece of furniture.

Give yourself a minute or two to imagine each one of those scenes.

Right after you imagine those scenes, allow yourself to imagine the following three scenes:

• A vast body of water — something akin to a reservoir, such as the Hoover Dam — blocked and stagnant with dark water, rich with feces, urine, and trash.
• A once magnificent garden, corroded with dead plants, decaying trees, fallen statues, fountains filled with dead leaves and green water.
• A magnificent palace within a vast desert; no longer being constructed, the palace sits submerged in stagnant water, backwash from a far-off ocean, and all manner of trash/waste.

Every single one of the six scenes outlined in this section serves as a clarification of waste.

Or, more specifically, the ways in which one can envision, and experience, waste.

Worry Is Waste

Our bodies and minds exist as spaces and entities of rich, unending flow.

A rich, unending flow that is at one with the infinite beauty of our being and the infinite richness of our world.

Or, at least, that appears to be the ideal.

Our bodies and minds often — or, at least, too often — appear to exist within a slow, rather stagnant, flow.

A flow that is aligned with the six scenes outlined in the previous section.

You see, when we allow worry — anxiety, fear, doubt, loathing; and so on and so forth — to exist within our being — to exist and live within ourselves, as if they belong and we have given them a home — we obstruct our natural flow.

And, when we obstruct our natural flow, we waste.

Or, more specifically, we create waste, we experience, and we waste away within the only moment that is truly guaranteed: the moment you are experiencing right now.

Our vast, rich ocean — the one that we exist within and the one that we are — is obstructed, allowing waste to flow into it and erode every facet of this ocean.

Or, on another note, our beautiful bedroom — the space in which we are comfortable and at home, existing in peace, harmony, and, in my experience, possibility — becomes weighted with elaborate messes and excess garbage.

You see, when we allow worry to exist within us, we give worry permission to obstruct that which exists.

Rather than existing within the infinite beauty, endless possibilities, and limitless gifts that we are, are a part of, and have access to — among many other descriptors — we exist within a stagnant flow.

• A stagnant flow that erodes our very capacity to exist within this beautiful world.
• A stagnant flow that erodes our very capacity to allow new, beautiful gifts to arise.
• A stagnant flow that erodes our very capacity to remember, and act, from our limitless creativity.

No matter what, we must be conscious of what we give a home to within the garden of our mind.

And, when we can, we must only water and nurture the seeds that nurture us; faith and expectancy; creativity and possibility; gratitude and wonder; and so on and so forth.

Going Beyond Worry

Our contention is that worry is waste.

Right within this contention — outside of it, actually — there is another contention: you can go beyond worry.

Or, at the very least, you can select other experiences and nurture those, allowing worry to move away from you.

You can find, right below this next set of paragraphs, three points that will allow you to go beyond worry.

Or at least, these points have been useful to me, when it comes to dealing with worries.

Right before we go over these points, though, there are two points we must clarify.

Our first point is as follows: I am a worrier.

Or, at least, I often entertain my worries and allow them to overwhelm me.

Slowly, but surely, this pattern of behavior is becoming undone; new patterns of behavior are being shaped and sculpted.

Our second point is that the points outlined below are simple ideas that you can apply if you would like to manage your worries with greater ease.

Or, more specifically, that’s the ideal.

You may find them to be ineffective. And, depending on your situation, you may find that therapy and medications, among other possibilities, are of great use to you.

Some within the spiritual community believe that therapy and medication are “unspiritual” or, even, dangerous.

None of those beliefs are held by me and, in the end, what works for you is what works for you; allow yourself to experiment with, and find, what allows you to go beyond worry and to live a truly rich, abundant life.

Regardless of those notions, though, here are the three points you may find useful:

• Right when worries arise, you can distract yourself; for me, this involves diving into a writing project, reading a book, listening to music, or pursuing a subject that interests me.
• Coming up with 33 things — give or take — that you appreciate; just as an example, you can appreciate the space you live in or the clothes you are wearing or the people in your life.
• Outlining some of the possibilities and intentions that excite me; visiting my Grandparent’s home, in Portland, soon enough, and going to Niagara falls — these are two possibilities that excite me.

Regarding the second point, if you do this often enough, you will pave over those worrisome neural pathways and, in doing so, replace them with neural pathways of gratitude.

And, with the above in mind, the third point serves the same basic function. But, it also serves to clarify some of the things that you wish to experience and, in turn, the wishes you will bring to fruition.

Conclusion

You can forfeit worry and, in doing so, step into the moment.

The rich, infinite moment that we all belong to.

Or, at least, that’s the idea: maybe it’s true, maybe it isn’t.

No matter what, my hope is that you enjoyed reading this essay. And, furthermore, my hope is that you enjoy the points outlined in the previous section and that, in employing them, you go beyond worry.

As always, if you wish to reach me, you can do so by sending an email to this address: “maxwellcakin@gmail.com”

Best wishes and please have a lovely day!