If you struggle with chronic anxiety, your life tends to revolve around three phases. The majority of your time is spent anticipating stress, a smaller portion is actually dealing with stress, and the briefest phase is the fleeting sense of relief once the stressor is resolved. This pattern happens because of what's called the "worry bin" in your brain, a space for stress and worry.

Understanding these phases, and how to manage them, will help you reduce anxiety by shrinking the worry bin.

Why You’re Always Anxious

Your brain has a set amount of mental energy reserved for stress. It doesn’t matter whether you're facing a massive life change or a minor inconvenience—your brain will fill that worry space. You might think that once you handle your biggest stressor, you’ll finally have peace. But as soon as one stressor is removed, another quickly takes its place.

I’ve experienced this firsthand. When I opened my practice, I spent months in a constant state of stress, rushing to get everything ready. I told myself that once the doors opened, I’d finally feel relief. And I did—for about half a day. Before I even left the office that night, my mind had already shifted to financial worries. That empty space in my worry bin filled up almost instantly.

If this cycle sounds familiar, it’s because your brain is trained to keep the worry bin full. So the goal isn’t to remove stressors one by one, but to shrink the size of that worry bin entirely.

Shrinking the Worry Bin

You can’t just tell your brain to stop worrying. But you can train it to allocate less space to stress. This requires intentional strategies—ones that go beyond problem-solving. Here are a few that have worked for me and the people I work with:

Mindful Reflection

Anxiety thrives on worst-case scenarios and past failures. Your brain loops through regrets and mistakes, reinforcing the idea that you’re not equipped to handle challenges. Mindful reflection flips this script. Instead of replaying moments of failure, you consciously recall times when you successfully navigated similar situations. This builds confidence and reduces the need to overprepare for every possible outcome.

If social anxiety is a struggle, for example, your brain might tell you, “I always make a fool of myself.” Instead, recall a time when you handled a conversation well. The more you reinforce those memories, the more your brain starts to believe that you can handle social situations without excessive worry.

Mindfulness Questions

In the moment of anxiety, your thoughts feel like facts. But asking yourself simple questions can break that cycle. If you find yourself thinking, “No one wants to talk to me,” ask, “What evidence do I actually have for that?” Look at people’s body language, tone of voice, and engagement. Often, you’ll realize that your fears aren’t lining up with reality. Training yourself to fact-check your anxiety can dramatically reduce its power over you.

Skillful Distractions

You can't eliminate stress entirely, but you can learn skillful distractions to train your brain to focus on more engaging and less stressful activities. The key is not just solving problems but changing how much mental space you allocate to stress and worry. This means intentionally engaging in activities that capture your full attention without triggering anxiety. High-stimulation, low-stress activities—like listening to an engaging podcast, solving a puzzle, or getting lost in a book—help retrain your brain to shift focus away from stress.

I’ve gone deeper into these steps in the video below, where I talk about how to move through these difficult feelings.

Anxiety isn’t something you can eliminate, but it is something you can manage. By shrinking the space your brain devotes to stress, you create more room for peace, even in a world that constantly throws challenges your way.

-Scott

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The Worry Bin - Why Your Anxiety Never Goes Away