Anxiety Lesson 1: Try-not-to-try method

Difficulty Level: Moderate

Frequency: For when you’re feeling anxious about something familiar to you

Duration: 5-10 minutes

How to do it

The try-not-to-try method should only be done to resolve anxiety in familiar situations that involve intuitive, gut-level thinking (1). Do NOT use this technique if your stress is related to explicit, rational-based information or knowledge. More on this point in the first step below.

1. Before engaging in the tactics, confirm the type of stress. You want it to be related to procedural knowledge. This is in contrast to the other type of knowledge, called declarative knowledge:

Procedural knowledge is “knowing how” to do something and typically involves unconscious thought. It comes naturally for many of our automated, motor-type behaviors, like walking. But it gets turned on anytime you’re doing something in which you’re an expert (2).

Declarative knowledge is “knowing that” something is this way, or that it ought to look like this. It comes with conscious, effortful thought. It’s good to have in certain times. But it can override our automatic intuition by forcing us to engage in rational, analytical thinking.

Run a checklist to see if the following properties of procedural knowledge are present in the situation you’re stressed about. If they are, you’re good to go:
 

• Related to an area of expertise and domain knowledge
• Cannot be easily articulated in words or hard logic
• Task-based and related to problem-solving
• Formed by doing, not thinking
• Related to bodily sensations

2. Now, turn off your rational mind. Stop analytical conscious thought and engage your intuitive, unconscious systems. Here’s how you do it:

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Switch tasks or take a break. Let’s say you’re feeling anxious or tense about a deadline because you keep running into problems. Go on to another task that is relatively easy-to-do but still requires some concentration. Alternatively, take a break. The best kind is to have a casual conversation with someone (unrelated to the stress!) (3).

Take a nap/go to sleep. Similar to the above point, sleep is the best break you can get. During sleep, it’s all unconscious activity that’s happening.

Engage the body. The body operates on unconscious automation. Engaging in physical movement can evoke the brain’s unconscious systems by relying on the spontaneous and natural intelligence of the body (4). Even walking is enough to help.

Daydream. Find opportunities to let your mind wander. Stare at a fixation point on the wall in front of you, or a point on your computer screen. Relax your gaze. Don’t “see” anything. Let your mind go blank. Don’t control your thoughts, instead let the stream of consciousness float on by (5).

• Why you should do it
• Improves effectiveness (6)
• Solves problems automatically (7)
• Enhances creativity (3)
• Prevents over-analysis (5)

The research

In one study, researchers gave participants difficult problems to induce moderate stress. The solution to the problems (and their reduced stress) was in a series of ‘hidden’ rules that might or might not get discovered. After analyzing and attempting to work through the problems, some people were told to take a break. Some even napped. Upon returning to the task, those who had taken a break, particularly those that napped, found the hidden rule more often than those who hadn’t (8). It was precisely the lack of effort – the “not doing” – which led people to arrive at a solution and ease their anxiety.

It’s especially relevant for your emotional life. When you’re feeling stressed or anxious, the mind’s default response is to consciously think (and often obsess) over the problem. It reverts to making hyper-rational cost/benefit analyses in order to solve your way out of the stress. But in many cases, thinking more and trying harder becomes counterproductive. It can make you feel even more stressed or worried (9).

How it works

This lesson is a bit of a paradox. How you do it is by … “not doing.” By not actively striving towards a state of reduced anxiety. The concept is borrowed from an ancient Taoist principle, called wu wei, and was first written in the Tao Te Ching (6). Wu wei is the cultivation of non-action and learning to be still in one’s thoughts. The idea has been around for thousands of years but is now finding a new home in contemporary cognitive and psychological science.

When you overanalyze a stressful situation, two brain regions are particularly active, the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). These higher-order brain regions are the seat of conscious, rational thought. The problem is with the following: The ACC’s job is to fire off warning signals in the midst of any uncertainty or stress, which then triggers the PFC to execute the best course of action to solve the problem (10). But the thing is, moments of high anxiety cause the ACC to fire off signals erratically. The poor PFC gets flooded with signals, leading to multiple computations as it tries to figure out the best recourse. The result is you trying to solve your way out of the stressful situation without a clear course of action. To the brain, this processing is effortful and highly inefficient.

Trying-not-to-try decouples this link. The control can then get passed to the subconscious, automatic systems (deeper in the old part of the brain), where things can get resolved with greater ease and efficiency. The result is a less striving mindset, which naturally leads to a reduction in anxiety and stress (11).

The evidence

1. Butler, A. C., Chapman, J. E., Forman, E. M., & Beck, A. T. (2006).
   The empirical status of cognitive-behavioral therapy: A review of meta-analyses.
   Clinical Psychology Review, 26, 17-31.
   
   
2. Braun, J. D., Strunk, D. R., Sasso, K. E., & Cooper, A. A. (2016).
   Therapist use of Socratic questioning predicts session-to-session symptom change in cognitive therapy for depression.
   Behavioral Res Therapy, 70, 32-37.
   
   
3. Calero-Eliva, A., Frojan-Parga, M. X., Ruiz-Sancho, E. M., & Alpanes-Freitag, M. (2013).
   Descriptive study of the Socratic method: evidence for verbal shaping.
   Behavioral Therapy, 44, 625-638.
   
   
4. Neenan, M. (2009).
   Using Socratic questioning in coaching.
   Journal of Rational-Emotive and Cognitive Behavior Therapy, 27, 249-264.
   
   
5. Overholser, J. C. (1993).
   Systematic questioning.
   Psychotherapy: Theory, Research, Practice, Training, 30, 67-74.
   
   
6. Padesky, C. (1993).
   Socratic questioning: changing minds or guiding discovery?
   Keynote address at the European Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Therapies.
   
   
7. Beck A. T.,, Rush A. J., Shaw B. F., & Emery G. (1979).
   Cognitive Therapy of Depression.
   New York, NY: Guilford.
   
   
8. Burns, D. B. (1980).
   Feeling good: The new mood therapy.
   Harper: New York.
   
   
9. Teasdale J. D. (1988).
   Cognitive vulnerability to persistent depression.
   Cognition and Emotion, 2, 247–274.

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