How a .99c notebook helps me with anxiety

It’s listed as .99c but with tax well it’s a little over a dollar. I often splurge and get the 2.99 version (thanks Walmart!). I take notes almost every day. Not the type of notes you would take during a college lecture but when something occurs to me “crap I am at a quarter tank of gas, I need gas soon” I try and jot down a quick note. I know this seems manic to a degree but hear me out.

First you don’t have to get the notebook, you use the notes app on your I-phone. More importantly the notes help me sort out the random panic thoughts from the actual “I need to do this” stuff that comes up every day. I look at this notebook once a day, often more but I sometimes rewrite the notes in numeric order this helps me know how many things I need to do.

Once a task is complete I cross it out. While this may seem a simple and a common task for those of us with anxiety we can be invaded at any moment with literally hundreds of random thoughts that pull us back, in some cases, decades into the past. As an example, I had a random thought while I was driving from 1985 I remember saying something to Nancy Fargene (name has been changed) that was less than pleasant. Not only that it was in the company of others, let’s just say it wasn’t one of my more chivalrous moments. This “thought” expanded to replaying many scenarios from that time of my life out in my head.

No, I am not putting that in my notebook, but my point is it was random, there was no trigger for me. For you, if you are unsure of some of the thoughts you are having, by writing them down and revisiting them later you can sort them out and create clear lists of things that you have to do. This organizational trick helps relieve some of the overwhelming feelings you might get from too many things bouncing around in your head.

Additionally, you might come out of it with an actual task list, and when you finish a task you get an instant anxiety reliever. This isn’t meant to give you something else to do, but rather help to organize the randomness of things that might be coming into your mind. By sorting through the items and organizing just a little bit you could save yourself grief down the road. For years I would try and remember all the things I had to do and had varying success.

In the end any small tool we can use that helps us manage our anxiety is a good thing. Next time you are at the store and see a notebook (I like hard covered ones myself) and its within your price range give it a shot. Try this for a month, if its not for you your only out a couple of buck’s tops. If it helps you a little bit, it was priceless.