Recently, a lady was wondering about her death anxiety:
“Everyone keeps telling me to “think about something else” but even when I am calm, the people I love are going to die. No matter what I do it’s going to happen and I’m so scared the anxiety of this will take over and I’ll just go crazy.”
As someone who was struggling with this same issue from the age of about 6 years old up until I was around 29, I feel somewhat qualified to answer.
Feel free to make your own opinion based on my opinion.
What You’ll learn About Death Anxiety today
- The two “sibling” problems that ruin your happy life
- What causes death anxiety
- What most of us get wrong about death anxiety
- Worry or don’t. Either way it’s OK
- How to use death anxiety to your advantage
- How to overcome whatever life throws at you easier and faster
First of all, I believe this is normal to feel like that.
Especially, if you know that you have anxiety.
What’s more, if you have heightened anxiety, it would be weird if you weren’t worried about such important things as death.
After all, it is true that we all die.
Realizing our own (and others’) mortality is what makes us human.
But it also makes us susceptible to overreacting and making our lives worse (to put it mildly).
As my mom used to say “cows don’t commit suicide”.
Today, I’m going to share the ideas that helped me keep the death anxiety at bay.
What’s more, these ideas produced a powerful sense of purpose in my life.
This sense of purpose gives me strength when I have no motivation, no power, no focus.
These ideas liberated me from the constant worries about death, about how to live my life, about what to do and what not to do.
You can use your fear of death to build a stronger, more resilient you.
A new you who will make decisions in life easier, faster. A new you who will be happier.
The two “sibling” problems that ruin your happy life
In my humble opinion, the lady in question has two separate problems. Yet, they are related.
Hence the term “sibling”.
To tackle the death anxiety issue as a whole, we first need to tackle each of these siblings separately.
Together they’re too strong.
The two “siblings” are: worrying about the fear of death, and the fear of death itself.
Each of them is enough to make one’s life a living hell, but they often come as a team.
This makes it even worse.
What causes death anxiety
As the lady mentioned, she was worried that her fear of others dying would ruin her life.
This is a typical symptom of anxiety disorder.
Worrying about worrying.
As Claire Weekes mentioned in her lecture – Hope And Help For Nerves, “normal symptoms of stress often cause people to fear stress”.
This doubles the stress and causes a stress spiral.
That’s when anxiety becomes an “anxiety disorder”.
Anxiety is normal.
Anxiety disorder is not. It’s when you feel so anxious that it interferes with your life.
It must be assessed and dealt with.
You can read about how to do that here: Can’t Overcome Anxiety? Why not Outsmart it instead?
There are countless courses, books, and free videos online that help you do that.
I too have a course called Outsmart Anxiety. It teaches you how to overcome most of the problems associated with anxiety.
It’s a little expensive but (in my opinion) worth every penny because it provides you with practical steps that you can start applying TODAY.
What most of us get wrong about death anxiety
As I mention in my course, the only way to stop worrying about something is exposure.
What is exposure?
Basically, you experience your worry, let it “do its worst” to you and then see that there was no real-world damage from your thoughts.
Just like hunger doesn’t mean you will die right now, the same applies to any fear or anxious thought.
A human can stay hungry for days and still survive.
You can be scared of death and still live your life as usual.
And if you do so, you’ll quickly realize that the fear itself doesn’t do any damage. It’s not dangerous.
And if you keep it going long enough?
And as you keep “exposing” yourself to these thoughts and situations you will see that they don’t have the same effect on you as they used to.
They become weaker.
In that lady’s case, she can experience worry and fear, and be OK with it.
Worry and fear are not real.
When you see that, they lose power.
I cover this and other mental skills that help you lower (or defeat!) anxiety here: How to overcome anxiety with just 6 mental skills
Worry or don’t. Either way it’s OK
But even if you do worry…
Here’s an interesting fact:
According to a research conducted by YouGov, a UK-based international market research firm “the vast majority of Britons say they are more worried about the death of someone they love (66% of women and 60% of men) than their own death (6%). 22% say they fear both equally.”
About half of people are afraid of dying, and half are not.
So, that lady is a perfect example of a normal person.
Here’s the full results of the study. It has produced some surprising (to me) results! https://d3nkl3psvxxpe9.cloudfront.net/documents/YouGov_-_Death_big_survey.pdf
To summarize, whether or not you’re afraid of death (your own or others), your experience is normal.
It’s totally human.
You’re not worried about the fact that you’re breathing, right?
Breathing is as normal as worrying (or not worrying) about death.
There’s no reason to worry about the fact that you’re afraid of death.
By the way, it’s scientifically proven that you can lower your worry if you treat your body the way it was supposed to be used.
Also, if you read this article and APPLY what I mention, you may improve your health, and postpone your death by YEARS!
Here is the article: Why anxiety scientists like tragic accidents?
And this brings us to the second part of the lady’s problem…
The fear of death itself. The death anxiety.
How to use death anxiety to your advantage
Yes, death is real, but fear of death on its own doesn’t do anything to avoid death. What’s more, you can use your fears to improve your life.
And fear of death is a powerful tool you can use to make your life much happier.
How?
If you are afraid of death, you’re closer to living a full life because death is a part of life.
People who ignore this are in for an unpleasant surprise later in their life.
Midlife crisis.
You, on the other hand, are already familiar with thinking about death, so it’ll be easier for you to overcome it and learn to use it to your advantage.
First, you can do the life-purpose discovery exercise (I talk about it in detail in my Outsmart Anxiety course).
Basically, you ask yourself:
Imagine that you could sacrifice your life by pushing a button that would instantly kill you.
No pain. No suffering.
Instead, the “magic button” would solve one problem in the world. What would that problem be?
What problem is important enough for you to sacrifice your life for?
Once you know what that problem is, then you can simply start working towards solving it in your daily life.
This is how you discover your purpose in life, and this is how you can start living in accordance with your purpose.
Next question you can ask yourself is this: how should I live so that I don’t have any regrets in my final moments?
I learned this question from my grandpa’s death.
I think he died a happy man. But that’s a story for another day.
If your life is aligned with your values, your purpose and your goals you will live a happier life.
Do you remember that anxiety when we’d have an upcoming test at school?
Personally, I was always worried about not being ready for the exam.
Not about the test results.
Because if I am ready, then the test takes care of itself.
I’d often worry:
“Am I ready?”
“Do I know everything that I need to know for the test?”
“What did I forget?”
All these questions bothered me much more than the test itself.
After all, the test is just sitting at the desk, writing answers, in a safe environment.
I think of death the same way.
The only worries I have is not having said everything I wanted to say. Not having done everything I wanted to do.
But if you align your actions with your values and purpose, all that worry goes away.
How to overcome whatever life throws at you easier and faster
So, after pondering those two questions for a long enough time, you should have a strong internal purpose-driven engine.
Next, let’s make you stronger by learning about the grieving process.
And when you’re stronger, you’re less worried.
Many people think that they need to distract themselves from “bad thoughts”. But in my experience, it only makes it worse.
It prolongs your suffering.
This same process of grieving occurs not only when someone actually dies, but any time you experience negative situations.
Lost your wallet? Grief.
Lost your job? Grief.
Break up with a loved one? Grief.
Moving to a new house? Grief.
Learning how to “grieve effectively” will let you become stronger.
If you know how to process setbacks (big and small) you will be more resilient. You will gain confidence in yourself and in your ability to deal with life’s situations.
And as you get more confident, your anxiety will subside.
You will know that you’re able with anything life throws at you.
So, how do you “grieve effectively”?
Grief has 5 stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.
I experienced it first-hand when my son had eye cancer.
We acted fast, so the time from the initial diagnosis to treatment was around a week.
It was the most painful week of my life.
Each day felt like I was descending deeper and deeper into hell.
Each day I was told:
Day 1 – Your son probably has cancer.
Day 2 – He may lose his vision or his eye.
Day 3 – He may die.
Day 4 – We will take out his eye, and then we’ll know if he’ll die within half a year.
Words cannot describe the pain I felt, but I let it happen.
And it was real. Not fuelled by my anxieties, insecurities or fears.
I didn’t know what to do. There was nothing else I could do!
Only take in the pain and deal with it.
I cried every day.
And crying, in my experience, is the sign of the depression-acceptance stage of grief.
This is what you need to aim for.
If you feel like “I can’t take this pain any more”, when you cry from the overwhelming sadness you feel, you’re in the right place.
After this, you usually feel acceptance and relief.
I had to go through this every day.
It took another half a year after the operation to then get completely used to the new reality that my son had one eye.
But this process also taught me that I can deal with anything (or almost anything) life hits me with.
I became stronger. More resilient.
That same year (when my son had cancer), I lost my job.
“No big deal.” – I thought.
I started my business with a partner and she quit two weeks in!
“Been worse” – my inner voice replied.
Nothing could defeat me anymore.
I’ve been through worse, so what a total financial disaster could do to me?
There are many other techniques (that go beyond the topic of this article) I used to overcome each of these situations and I talk about them in the Outsmart Anxiety Course.
Learn the five stages and next time you have a setback in your life learn to spot these stages happening in your mind.
Then you will learn to do it quicker and easier.
You will know that death is there. It can happen. It WILL happen, but now you will be calmer.
You will be calm enough to realize that life is another side of death.
That living is what’s important.
Living your life to the fullest will be the gift that death and the fear of death will provide.
You will enjoy your time with your loved ones.
You will say what you want to say.
You will do what you truly want to do.
You will have no regrets, no things unsaid, undone.
That’s a great life!
You can find other 6 mental skills that help you overcome anxiety here: How to overcome anxiety with just 6 mental skills
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