Let's start by admitting that we all worry. Some may worry more than others, but we all do it. Right now I am in the middle of finals week. Just by me saying "finals week," some of you already have a feeling of worry. Finals week makes me nervous and at times makes me worry, but I have also been in bigger moments of worry than just finals week:

I've worried about if we would lose our house or not.

I've worried that I would never get married.

I've worried about not getting a car to drive when I was sixteen.

I've worried that I would fail a class (or two).

I've worried about not having a father to take me to the actual Father-Daughter dance.

I've worried that I would lose my parents sooner than expected.

I've worried that I am not good enough.

Some of these were/are very real, but most of these are based on unknown circumstances. You may relate to all of these or at least one of these. But the truth is that your amount of worrying is not equivalent to your circumstance. I know some people (myself included) that will worry about passing a class when they have literally made all A's on every exam prior to the final. My question is why? Why do we do this to ourselves? I don't know about you, but for me, I bet at least 9/10 of my worries do not come true or even have the possibility of coming true. Yet, here I am still worrying about things that are out of my control.

I recently discovered, what I believe to be, the key to kissing all your worries goodbye. However, like anything in life, it's going to take effort on your part. My hope is that you would take all of the energy that you have been giving away to worrying about the unknowns in your life then you can use that same energy to combat the real problem: Self-talk, the very conversations that you have with yourself daily.

What does your self-talk look like? I challenge you to take a day and take mental notes of what and how you choose to speak to yourself. If almost all of what you are thinking is negative, then ta-da, that's your worrying problem.

Your worrying is a combination of a direct reflection of how you choose to think and speak to yourself daily and who you are deciding to talk to about your concerns.

Worry is when we talk negatively to ourselves about our problems (or perceived problems) and we allow this negative self talk to take place when we choose not to include God. So how do we do less negative self-talk and more God talk? It's prayer. Duh! And I feel like I should define prayer or at least the kind of prayer I'm speaking about. Prayer is simply a conversation with God.

Instead of having a conversation with yourself all day, make the effort to redirect your focus to someone other than yourself.

Let's be real. If you are someone that worries a lot, then talking to yourself is not going to help at all. I am not saying that self-talk is bad, but if you are worrying a lot then it's most likely because your self-talk is negative. And the only way to work on that is to invite God into your self-talk.

Prayer is when we include God in the littlest of things, day to day, and we have a continuous conversation with Him about our concerns and requests.

Don't talk to yourself about your concerns (what good would that do?). Prayer (conversations with God) invites God into your situation so that worry has no other choice but to leave.

So to the worrier: I encourage you, over these next few days, make the effort to talk less to yourself and more to God. And watch as worry leaves and peace enters. My prayer is that through this change of habit that you will go from a worrier to a warrior that boldly fights negative thoughts the moment that they enter.