But I have to worry about my future! Well, yeah, sort of. I hear this all the time, the inability to stay present and enjoy your life, where you are, right now.
Years ago, during one of my son's first baseball playoff games ( and there have been many since), one of his Managers said to me, " we worry about the game we are playing today." We cannot worry about the lineup or, in this case, the pithing lineup until we finish this game. Like most of my life, I can make baseball a metaphor for anything. Clients will even ask, don't you have a baseball metaphor for this? Usually, I can find one off the cuff.
But why is there so much focus on worrying about the future ( your future)? Uncertainty, for one. Most people do not like uncertainty. Most people like things tied up in a little bow at the end. We want the villain to get what they deserve; we want the lovers to find their way back to each other, and we want the animal to find their way home. But that is not life. Sometimes the villain gets away, the lovers meet other people, and sometimes -- no, no, no, the animal always comes home.
When you focus too much on the "What ifs," you are not focusing on the now, you are deciding to focus on the future and not what is right in front of you. By choosing to live in the future, you are choosing to live in anxiety - By choosing to live in the now- you are choosing to live more mindful, peaceful, and in control. And, eventually, living too much in the future will only cause burnout.
Think about it this way, every time you worry about the future, you miss what you previously spent time worrying about. So you are in a vicious cycle of worry and never enjoying now.