(יא) שלשה מביאין לידי דאגה. צער גדול. וגדול צפרנים. ובגדים פצועים:
Three things bring anxiety [de'agah]: great pain, long fingernails, and ripped clothing.
If there is anxiety [de'agah] in a man’s heart, let him quash it, And turn it into joy with a good word.
אלא משום דכתיב לא תעיל דויא בלבך דגברי גיברין קטל דויא
...Do not introduce anxiety [davya] into your heart, as anxiety has killed mighty men (Ben Sira 14:1; 30:29)
Can Anxiety Be Good?
Happy is the man who is anxious / fearful [mifached] always, But he who hardens his heart falls into misfortune.
Rava said: After departing from this world, when a person is brought to judgment for the life he lived in this world, they say to him in the order of that verse: Did you conduct business faithfully? Did you designate times for Torah study? Did you engage in procreation? Did you await salvation? Did you engage in the dialectics of wisdom or understand one matter from another? And, nevertheless, beyond all these, if "the fear of the Lord is his treasure" (Isaiah 33:6), yes, he is worthy, and if not, no, none of these accomplishments have any value.
There is a parable that illustrates this. A person who said to his emissary: Bring a kor of wheat up to the attic for me to store there. The messenger went and brought it up for him. He said to the emissary: Did you mix a kav of ḥomton, a preservative to keep away worms, into it for me? He said to him: No. He said to him: If so, it would have been preferable had you not brought it up. Of what use is worm-infested wheat? Likewise, Torah and mitzvot without the fear of God are of no value.
What To Do with Anxiety: Suppress, Share, Sublimate, or...?
§ The Gemara explains another verse in Proverbs: “If there is anxiety in a man’s heart, let him quash it [yashḥena]” (Proverbs 12:25). Rabbi Ami and Rabbi Asi dispute the verse’s meaning. One said: He should forcefully push it [yasḥena] out of his mind. One who worries should banish his concerns from his thoughts. And one said: It means he should tell [yesiḥena] others his concerns, which will lower his anxiety.
Name It, Label It, Reconnect it to the Divine
Baal Shem Tov, Tzava'at HaRivash, 87 (1700-1760, founder of Hasidism)
Each [thought] has an erev /evening and a boker / morning. Erev is an expression of ta'aruvot / mixture, i.e., having an alien thought [machshavah zarah - a thought that is disconnected from an awareness of the Divine]; and boker is an expression of bikur / visit), i.e., visiting God [an aspect of the thought that is connected to God.]. [One should strive to work with the alien/intrusive thought by reconnecting it to its Divine analogue, as in...]
When you see something of which you are afraid, say to yourself: “Why should I be afraid of this? It is but a human like myself-let alone if it is but an animal or beast! As the awesome God, blessed be He, is vested in that being [enabling it to exist], how much more should I fear [God] Himself!”
Set it aside - for now...
R' Schneur Zalman of Liady, Tanya, Likkutei Amarim, chap. 26 (circa 1800)
translated by R' Norman Lamm, The Religious Thought of Hasidism
I offer this advice on how to purge one's heart of all anxiety and of every trace of worry in mundane matters, even about 'children, health, and sustenance.' Everyone knows the dictum of the Rabbis that 'just as one must recite a blessing for the good [so must one recite a blessing for misfortune.'] (Mishnah Brachot 9:5) The Gemara explains that one should accept bad news with the same joy with which he would greet manifest and obvious good news, 'for this too is for the good' [gam zu l'tovah] (Brachot 60b.), except that it is not apparent and evident to human eyes [...]
As for the sadness in regard to spiritual matters [i.e., the anxiety that comes about as a result of moral and religious introspection and self-criticism], one must devise ways to rid oneself of it, and most certainly so at the time of divine worship, when one must serve God with joy and a glad heart. [...]
Hence, whether the melancholy seizes him during divine service -- Torah study or prayer -- or it befalls him at some other time, he should persuade himself that now is not the time for genuine sadness, not even for worry over serious transgressions, God forbid. For this, one needs set times and the right occasion to reflect with a calm mind on the greatness of God, against whom he has sinned, so that thereby one's heart may truly be rent with sincere contrition. It is explained elsewhere when this time should be, and, further, that as soon as his heart has been broken during these specific times, he should completely remove the anxiety from his heart and believe with a perfect faith that the Lord has dismissed his sin and is abundantly forgiving. This is the true joy in God which comes after anxiety, as mentioned above.
"...The most propitious time, specifically appropriate for most people, is when one is in any case troubled by mundane worries or dejection, without apparent cause. Then is the right time to transform the sadness by becoming one of those 'masters of self-examination' mentioned earlier... thus ridding oneself of the dejection occasioned by mundane affairs." - ibid., Chapter 31
Visualization: Meditate on the Miracles
Rabbi Shlomo Wolbe, Alei Shur I, Shaar Sheni, Avodah b'Emunah (1914-2005)
We have already said that the image is the key to faith. Images awaken and strengthen our faith and is the basis of our thought-process. Thus, the Rambam wrote "For faith- this is the correct and truthful image". So, the one who wants to strengthen and deepen one's faith, this is their work, according to what Yehudah Halevi wrote in the Kuzari:
"The righteous person is commanded to depict, to take the glory of the images that are found within their memory, to imagine the idea of seeking out Godliness, [to imagine things like] standing at Mount Sinai, Abraham and Isaac standing at Mt. Moriah, the Mishkan, Seder Ha'Avodah...."
This is a great thing, to make oneself an image: how the Exodus from Egypt appeared, the splitting of the sea, the song of the sea, where Moses sang and the masses of Israelites answered after him...
Cultivate Joy!
Rebbe Nachman of Bratslav, Eitzot, Joy #27 (1772-1810)
When a person despairs, their intellect and mind go into exile. This makes it very hard for them to concentrate their mind on teshuva, returning to God. The main reason why people are far from God is that they do not stop to consider what the main purpose of their existence is. But when someone is happy their mind becomes settled and they are able to understand things clearly. Joy is freedom. When a person fills their mind with joy, their intellect becomes free from its exile. They can control their mind and intellect however they want so as to concentrate on their goal and return to God.
How do YOU cope with anxiety?