I am feeling really scared. What if the pandemic never ends and we have to be confined to the house and study from home year after year? My career is really important to me — my parents have taken a loan to send me to engineering college and I have to return the loan amount. There is so much uncertainty about my career that I am extremely worried. Please suggest how I can overcome my negative thinking.

When times are bad, it is normal to sometimes allow negative thinking to overcome your mind. Negative thoughts take root in us and create a hole in our self-confidence. Negative thoughts, in some form or the other, plague all of us:

“What if nobody likes me and I am left alone?”
“What if somebody finds out that I am not good enough?”
“What if somebody thinks I did not try hard enough?”
“What if the pandemic is never over and I lose the opportunity to make a good living?

I think many of these negative thoughts stem from a feeling of being incomplete. But the question I often ask myself is, what if we were born complete and the journey, in life, is to keep playing with our strengths and to engineer different versions of our own selves?
At a time like this we need to keep that faith, not only in the belief that the world will eventually find an answer to the pandemic but also that you will find a solution to the situation as the changes unfold. Most of us learn much later in life that life is never certain, nor can you plan it to the last detail. It likes throwing you surprises and not always pleasant ones. Unexpected and negative things can happen at any time. Therefore, it is even more important that we are always ready for change because it is the only constant in our lives.

By worrying about the situation, all you will succeed in creating is more negative energy within yourself. My suggestion is to stay productive so that all that anxiety can be locked out. At a time like this we can either worry about how things will not turn out the way we had planned or embrace what we have and make the most of the situation.