Challenge Your Worries Worksheet
GinaMarie Guarino, LMHC
Worksheet updated on November 3rd, 2023
Worrying consumes more time and energy than we may realize. It is a feeling that is often hard to shake, especially when struggling with anxiety and stress, or feeling out of control.
Clients often struggle to cope with worrying, and may not even realize how severely they are affected by their worrisome thoughts. Teaching a client how to take control of their worries by learning healthy thought patterns can help with challenging worries and coping with feeling overwhelmed.
Dealing with anxiety or stress related to life complications can be difficult, and clients tend to not realize that they have the power over how their thoughts affect their tendency to worry. Fortunately, cognitive behavioral therapy offers skills for clients to learn how to reduce their anxiety and worry in difficult situations.
About This Worksheet
This is the Challenge Your Worries worksheet. It is a therapy worksheet that incorporates exercises from cognitive behavioral therapy to help clients feel more in control of their anxiety and worry. It offers a thought-challenging process to reduce the intensity of worrisome thoughts and feelings.
A balance between worry and control is incorporated into this worksheet to help the client understand how to control their worrying and improve their coping skills for anxiety. It also helps them learn how to manage their thinking patterns to prevent further emotional upset.
The Challenge Your Worries worksheet can be used with adolescents and adults. It is best utilized in individual counseling sessions.
Instructions
To begin, review the introduction and directions with the client. Explain how effective thought-challenging exercises can be used to manage worrisome thoughts to make them feel less intense.
Allow the client time and space to respond to the reflection questions. They may need guidance, so remain engaged with them while they complete the worksheet.
When the client is finished, review their responses and check in with how the client is feeling. Discuss how using this process in between sessions can help the client learn how to manage their worrisome thoughts so they are less overwhelming and impactful on their day.
