I keep pre-living pain to protect myself from surprise

Dear Delyara, It doesn’t really protect me. It just exhausts me early. That’s what anxiety does in me so often. It rehearses. Predicts. Simulates bad outcomes, awkward conversations, withdrawal, disappointment, mistakes, regret. It tries to make me ready by making me miserable in advance. And then, if nothing bad happens, the energy is still gone. If something bad does happen, I’m already depleted. It’s such an expensive strategy. And yet my mind returns to it automatically. I’m tired of surviving so many imaginary futures.