Our guest this month is Professor Martin Rossman, whose work has paralleled mine for several decades, during which time we have been colleagues and friends.
There seems to be so much to worry about these days – from global warming and peak oil to our children’s schools, our jobs, and even whether the food we eat has been contaminated – it seems impossible to predict what will come next.
If you’re one of the people who worries about any of the concerns I just mentioned – or about your teenage kid, your job, your health, or what those people in Washington some folks call “idiots” are going to do next – then this is a show you would definitely be interested in.
Did you know that there’s good worry and bad worry?
Apparently nature has wired us to worry, and so Dr. Rossman explains in his book, The Worry Solution, that it’s futile to try to stop. The good news is that worry itself is a neutral function of our imagination — a reflection of the brain’s ability to look at a problem from many different angles and to identify different pieces of the puzzle. In this interview Dr. Rossman will share the difference between good worry and bad worry, and tell us how to use worry effectively, that is how to worry well!
You will learn the value of having an inner pow-wow, the importance of utilizing a different state of mind to make worry more efficient and less wasteful, and how to use affirmations to put energy behind your choices among several options. We’ll talk about image rehearsal and the use of positive emotion and visualization for success.
We’ll also explore the nature of “bad worry” and learn some of the ways we can free ourselves from it. Dr. Rossman is a wise and careful doctor and with a lot to teach us all.
Dr. Rossman, a pioneer in mind-body medicine, is the founder of The Healing Mind, the co-founder of the Academy for Guided Imagery, a Clinical Faculty member at the University of California San Francisco Medical School, and an advisory board member of Dr. Andrew Weil’s Integrative Medicine Program at the University of Arizona. Dr. Rossman’s cutting-edge research in guided imagery has contributed to the current paradigm of holistic health and has influenced the work of many of its prominent leaders, including Drs. Weil, Dean Ornish, and Rachel Remen.
Dr. Rossman has authored numerous books and CDs, including Guided Imagery for Self-Healing and Fighting Cancer from Within, and his work has been featured in academic, trade, and popular national media outlets including O, Self, Body & Soul, and CNN. The Worry Solution (Crown Archetype Books, Dec 2010) is Dr. Rossman’s latest ground-breaking contribution to the field of preventative medicine. It teaches readers how to capitalize on the powerful mental force behind worry – utilizing the imagination to facilitate positive growth, change, and healing, instead of letting it run us into the ground with debilitating stress, anxiety, and disease.
About The Worry Solution:
Nature has wired us to worry, Dr. Rossman explains in The Worry Solution, so it’s futile to try to stop. The good news is that worry itself is a neutral function of our imagination — a reflection of the brain’s ability to look at a problem from many different angles and to identify and tease apart the different pieces of a puzzle. What makes worry negative or positive, Dr. Rossman explains, is the way we use it. Unproductive worry sets us off on a mental hamster wheel of obsessive thoughts — effectively triggering the stress response that is behind a slew of chronic and/or life-threatening illnesses, from fibromyalgia to obesity to heart disease. Productive worry, to the contrary, helps us solve problems, prevent disease, and achieve peace of mind.
The Worry Solution offers not only helpful information but also its practical application — providing readers with numerous hands-on, easy-to-use guided imagery audio techniques that can be done in the comfort of one’s own home. For those who prefer audio exercises, the guided imagery methods outlined in the book are also available on CDs or audio downloads that can be purchased on The Worry Solution website. Scientific research has demonstrated that these kind of simple, 15-minute guided imagery exercises can reduce anxiety by nearly 90%. As such, The Worry Solution is not just a book about preventative medicine. It is preventative medicine — a manifestation of the holistic, “more skills, less pills” approach to health care.ns