POSITIVE THINKING - SQUASHING THE ANTs

Hello,

Many of us might have struggled with ANTs in our daily lives.

So what are ANTs and how do we get rid of them?

In his book "Change Your Brain, Change Your Life," Dr. Daniel Amen talks about "ANTs" - Automatic Negative Thoughts.

These are the bad thoughts that are usually reactionary, like "Those people are laughing, they must be talking about me," or "The boss wants to see me? It must be bad!"

I had this ANT bothering me whenever I used to get a telephone call. I always used to think of the worst when the bell would start ringing.

My heart would beat furiously if the boss or a customer was on the other end of the line. I was always the dreading the worst; always concluding before picking up the phone that it was going to be a reprimand for a mistake I have made or a complain for not doing the assigned task properly.

When I started analyzing the cause of my anxiety I realized that it was my own creation.

I started keeping track of the calls and noticed that a majority of the phone calls were either enquiries or requests.

Even when I had concluded so, I could not help my heart from feeling the anxiety.

I had no one to coach me on how to handle these anxiety pangs and I learnt it the hard way.

I did not know that I was squashing the ANTs but this is what I exactly did.

If it was my boss calling I did not pick up the phone. Luckily my boss was always seated a couple of cabins away and so whenever I saw his/her number in the caller identity I just rushed across to their cabin.

The boss generally calls you when they need some clarification/ suggestion and this face to face interaction helped me gauge the mood in a better way. This helped in killing my anxiety and thereby improving my responses.

In the case of customers I adopted the simple technique of starting with a greeting. By the time we have finished the greetings formalities in the typical long drawn arabic style the complain, if any got whittled down to a friendly suggestion.

After practising it for some time I realized that I no longer panic when I get the phone calls.

I managed to squash the ANT and realized that it was only an artificial creation, a mirage that showed itself to quench my thirst for anxiety and worry.

Once the thrist was conquered the mirage disappeared.

Negative thoughts are nothing more than ANTs.

Squash them!

Best wishes,

Manoj