anxiety at work about over serving & looking silly

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mmwillie928
Posts: 71
Joined: Fri Feb 27, 2009 12:55 pm

anxiety at work about over serving & looking silly

Post by mmwillie928 » Sat Sep 15, 2012 9:22 pm

Hi Everyone,
I work as a server. I am new to this line of work. started doing it cause i always thought it would be a fun line of work. after a while of doing it i started worrying "what if i over serve someone and they go out on the road and hurt someone else?". I myself use to party a lot, to the point where i was drinking and driving a lot. now i don't do that, and i am afraid of having anything to do with that cause i don't want to cause harm to others. well, after serving for a while, the thought occured to me that i could over serve someone. I have a fear of shutting someone off, or of not doing it and them getting on the road. I have heard these commercials on the radio that say "buzzed driving is drunk driving" and that has made me all the more paranoid of serving alcohol.
we went through training at work to help us safely serve alcohol. it has helped, but i still get this fear of having to shut someone off, and would i do it? I also think other people i work with aren't as concerned about this as i am, and i worry "what if i try and shut someone off and then they make a big deal about it and my co-workers find out i tried to shut them off and they laugh at me?
so, i am wondering if anyone can sympathize, has gone through something similar, and can maybe offer some helpful suggestions. I mean, i get anxiety over this that i dread going into work.

coachchris
Posts: 757
Joined: Wed Jun 06, 2012 2:34 pm

Re: anxiety at work about over serving & looking silly

Post by coachchris » Wed Sep 19, 2012 8:36 pm

We are so good at the 'what-if' thinking. Lucinda challenges us to try and "whatif" in the positive. See if you can use your creative mind to create some really good positive 'whatifs.'

Whatif work is really good tonight and I meet some fun people.
Whatif I get my best tip yet.
Whatif I choose to find the positive at work today and I feel really at peace.

Whatif.......:)

This really helped me when I went through the program and still use it a lot today to keep me in the present moment and under-reacting.

Hope this helps.
Coach Chris StressCenter.com

mmwillie928
Posts: 71
Joined: Fri Feb 27, 2009 12:55 pm

Re: anxiety at work about over serving & looking silly

Post by mmwillie928 » Sun Sep 23, 2012 10:22 pm

thank you Chris, that is helpful.
i also have this fear at work of one of the glasses breaking and a shard or shards getting in a glass without someone knowing it and a guest drinking it. i also worry about shards being on the floor and if something drops on the floor and someone picks it up without brushing it off then the thing might have glass on it...in short i worry alot about people getting glass in the food or drinks. but i have been telling myself lately that these horrible things with glass never seem to be happening. we always seem to get through a work shift just fine, and besides that i realize the restaurant survived before without me worrying about it. reminding myself that these horrible things never seem to happen anyway has helped me feel more upbeat about being at work. i have had a more positive attitude and enjoyed being around the people i work with.
it's funny though, cause i seem to have this fear of hurting people ALOT! like i worry about someone having an allergic reaction cause of cross contamination of food. i see hot mitts sitting on a bin of granola with nuts. it sits on the cover, but i think i have seen granola on the cover. and i think what if their is some oil from nuts or a fragment of a nut that gets on the mitts and then someone touched bread that just came out of the oven with the mitts? i think these kinds of thoughts a lot. one of the things i tell myself is, it's a restaurant so you can't control everything that goes on there and if someone has an allergy than you can worry and watch out for it.
yeah i seem to worry i will hurt someone. like when i was younger i use to worry that if i felt a bump in the road that i ran someone over and i would think it was me being anxious and obsessive but i would pull over and check lol. sometimes now i have thoughts like, "i think i was a lil too close passing that bicyclist on the corner. what if i caused them to fall over and hurt themselves?" it seemed real to me, and i tried to fight it, but i ended up going back to check on the biker. hmmm...now it seems more like it may have been fear as i write it out.
i have noticed one of my biggest fears is of what people will think of me. i didn't realize this so much till going through the program. doing the program has brought/bringing a lot of things to light.
when i worry what people think i say to myself "some people will like me some won't. i don't have to take myself so seriously. i can stand to look silly or wierd to some people. i can even laugh about it. it's probably not a big deal to them like it is to me.feelings are uncomfortable but i can do this anyway. float with the feelings. things always seem to turn out fine in the end."
thank you so much for your reply Chris. if you have any more suggestions, im all ears and would really appreciate it.

coachchris
Posts: 757
Joined: Wed Jun 06, 2012 2:34 pm

Re: anxiety at work about over serving & looking silly

Post by coachchris » Tue Sep 25, 2012 1:42 pm

This has become a bad habit so expect the negative to be there and be very consistent in; under-reacting to the lies, saying 'not true' to the lies and replacing with positive truths. I would be saying: I am good, I am safe. I choose truth.

You got this!!
Here to help.
Coach Chris

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