Lesson 4 of 6 · A worry appointment and one real number
The appointment
Pick a slot. Fifteen minutes, the same time on most days, not in the last two hours before bed and not in bed. Six o'clock at the kitchen table is a real example that works for people.
Outside the slot, when a money worry turns up, you write it down in a line and go back to what you were doing. You are not banning it and you are not solving it. You are giving it an address.
Inside the slot, you take the list and you worry, deliberately, for fifteen minutes. Most people find that half the list has gone stale by the time they get there.
Inside the slot it also helps to sort the list into two piles. Things with an action available this week, which are jobs rather than worries and come off the list by being done. And everything else, which stays in the slot and is not meant to be solved.
Be straight about where this comes from. Setting a fixed time and place for worry is a long established clinical practice, and the original study behind it was small and old. It is worth doing and it is not a cure, and you should hear that from us rather than discover it later.
What the research says
This is the original study behind the worry appointment. People who postponed worry to a fixed half hour in a set place, catching and deferring it the rest of the time, reported worrying less. It is one small early trial, so treat it as worth trying rather than as settled.
This is the original study behind the worry appointment. People instructed to postpone worry to a fixed half hour in a set place, and to catch and defer it outside that slot, reported greater reduction in worry than controls. It is one small early trial, which is why this step says the technique is worth doing and is not a cure.
Borkovec TD, Wilkinson L, Folensbee R, Lerman C (1983). Stimulus control applications to the treatment of worry. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 21(3), 247 to 251 doi