Published on 12, July, 2020
I wondered whether this article about:
"vorfreude? I recently came across this lovely word, which my German-speaking friend translated as “the anticipation of joy”."
...either described any of the strategies you already find helpful - or reminded you of other related ones you would recommend to our Community?
(I like looking forward to "meditation-in-motion" style activities such as Tai Chi, Gardening and "pretending" to catch fish stood on a beach by the sea!).
The vorfreude secret: 30 zero-effort ways to fill your life with joy https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/apr/09/the-vorfreude-secret-30-zero-effort-ways-to-fill-your-life-with-joy?CMP=share_btn_url
I avoid looking forward to anything and try and live in the moment, I also read this article ans was confused by it. My first thought was about setting yourself up for failure, what if the anticipated thing dosen't happen? I think I have adrenal burnout so my reations to things can be a bit extreme, I either dont' react at all or I go overboard, there's no such thing as good adreniline for me. I find the disapointment and crash in mood of something I look forward to not happening overwhelming, I also get myself worked up with hyperanticipation which makes the event never as good as I imagined or I end up not being able to do it as I'm a nervous wreck.
I can relate to a lot of this!
I did some CBT a while ago which was in some ways useful, one of the focus points was "being present" , thinking too far back makes people depressed, thinking too far forward to things we can't predict can make us stressed and anxious.
I overthink and script a lot, so I'd spend too much time doing that and trying to anticipate every eventuality if I think about events in the future, I usually think on the black side too so I worry about things going wrong.
I find I'm far better just living in the day I'm in , but I find it extremely hard to do so, something I'm working hard on doing because it really seems to be helping me with my anxiety.
It's more an issue to those around me though, I get told "don't worry that's ages away yet" if I think ahead, but get "why won't you look into booking a holiday, don't you want to go?!" (And other similar things) By my wife quite often if I don't.
I find a lot of people are a bit "no sooner done than thought about" and it drives me mad, I like to take time making descisions and don't want to be rushed into things. I get accused of being indesicive which I'm not, I just dont' want to be bounced into things and there are some things, like getting a new mattress which I need, I want to see them in person and see how they feel rather than get one online and then find it's not what I want.
Glad your appointment went ok, sounds like a good strategy. I imagine it's scary, I've been trying to not script and forward think recently and it's harder than you think, hard habit to break and also makes events feel daunting.
I like the idea of having things broken down, I seem to fixate on events, if they're planned a long time ahead I can spend the whole time ruminating and worrying about them, ruining the time between. maybe having smaller milestones might give me something to focus on that's not as far out of scary.