How to Stop Worrying About Loved Ones
Help People Struggling with Problems with Wisdom, Trust and Patience
Aug 15, 2009
Worrying about a loved one never helps because each person needs to sort out their own mess, learn their own lessons and experience the wonderful benefits of growth. Each person has skills to develop, mistakes to make, gifts to share, and lessons to learn. And most would agree that no one has the right to deprive a person of their life choices, nor does anyone know what is truly best for another.
So how does a person just sit back and watch while their partner, child, sibling or friend fumbles and flounders about? It requires wisdom, trust, and patience: wisdom to know when to step in and when to step away; trusting that the other person has their own answers and inner guidance; patience to allow them time to find their own path.
The Wisdom to Know the Difference
There are times when a loved one needs support, nurturing and direction, and times when these same acts of love interfere with a person's process. Caring and caretaking are two different things. Caring involves showing kindness and compassion for another. Caretaking involves doing activities on another's behalf. If a person is unable to perform their own activities, this may be appropriate, but if the person is somewhat capable, then caretaking can easily turn into enabling. This form of caretaking only disables a person further as everyone needs to learn to take care of themselves in order to thrive in life.
Access your higher wisdom and answer the following questions to help discern when to step in and when to step aside:
- Does this person need to learn to take care of themselves or solve their own problems?
- Will they grow stronger if they sort this out on their own?
- What is the best thing you can do to support them in their growth?
How to Trust When You're Worried
Worrying about a loved one creates further concern, confusion and fear on both sides. The one worrying feels out of control, afraid of what will happen to their loved one and this escalates fear, creating a negative downward spiral. The loved one senses the concern and this triggers doubt in their mind, which only makes the situation worse.
The best gift you can give to someone struggling with a problem is to see their inner strength, and trust in their ability to solve their own problems. People are not empowered by worry, fear and doubt, but by hope, love and encouragement.
Each person has their own inner wisdom and higher guidance. Reflect on the following questions to help you trust your loved one's process:
- What is this person learning through their struggles?
- What qualities or characteristics will they develop as they grow?
- How and where are they being divinely guided?
How to Have Patience with a Loved One
No one enjoys seeing another suffer. People want their friends and family to be healthy and happy. Seeing a loved one in pain tugs the heart strings, twists the stomach into knots, and causes the mind to race as one searches for solutions.
Compassion is one motive for getting involved in a loved one's dilemma, but another reason people tend to jump in and rescue is because of uncomfortable feelings triggered by what they see. Solving the other person's situation allows them to relax and re-focus on their own life. This unfortunately only thwarts their loved one's growth.
Explore the following questions to help you have more patience:
- Are any of your own past experiences, wounds or emotions being projected onto the other person?
- What emotions need to be processed and released within you so you can view the other's process with more neutrality?
- What supports you to be patient with your loved one's process?
A caterpillar doesn't become a butterfly overnight. It goes through a process of transformation before it finally struggles to break through its cocoon and fly. Stop worrying about loved ones and instead use your wisdom, trust and patience to allow them to create their own breakthroughs.
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