Jennifer Beall, LCPC, LCADC
I keep a copy of The Monster at the End of This Book on display in my office. It’s a classic, it was one of my childhood favorites, and it makes an important point about anxiety.
The premise is simple: loveable, furry old Grover learns that there’s a monster at the end of the book, and he’s afraid. He begs the reader not to turn the pages, because each page turned gets closer to the monster. He ties the pages together, nails them together, and, finally, builds a brick wall, all in an attempt to keep the reader from getting to the end of the book.
Of course, his attempts are unsuccessful. Before he knows it, he arrives at the end of the book only to find, to his embarrassment, that HE is the monster! He had nothing to be afraid of after all.
This lesson isn’t just for kids; it’s relevant for adults, too. Often, the objects of our worries aren’t the real problem; the real problem comes from the limitations the worries put on us.
Grover’s fear was resolved in the space of a dozen or so pages. While it’s not usually that simple in real life, specific worries like “I’m going to fail the exam” or “I’m not going to get the job” might be easily dismissed once the person has passed the exam or gotten the job. Or the person doesn’t pass the exam or get the job, but they find a way to be ok anyway.
Worries about concrete events are not so easily resolved, though, if they’re part of a larger pattern. And sometimes people have vague worries that aren’t easy to challenge because they don’t examine them closely enough to do so.
Melissa Kirsch, a writer for the New York Times, writes a column called “The Good List.” On June 17, 2026 she wrote about worrying, and the “what ifs” that are part of it. There are lots of possible “what ifs”, like “What if I ask someone out and they reject me?” or “What if there’s a huge rainstorm and my basement gets flooded?”
In the column, Kirsch says that she taped a note to a kitchen cabinet that reads “What if it all works out?” It’s a reminder that positive outcomes are also possible, and they may be as likely as the feared outcomes. In any case, reading the note temporarily interrupts the flow of negativity and offers a chance to consider other possibilities.
A therapist employing cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) will likely use various techniques to challenge a client’s worries. For instance, they might recommend that the client do what Melissa Kirsch does: think of possible outcomes other than the disaster they’re expecting, then evaluate the relative likelihood of the positive, negative, and neutral outcomes.
The therapist might also invite the client to mentally step back and imagine that the thing they’re worried about has already happened, then picture what the results might be. If a client does this, they’re likely to realize that they could handle it if their worry was realized.
As always, though, CBT has its limitations. The logical analysis of the possibilities can be invaluable in helping a client to dismiss their worries, but if there’s an underlying pattern, it’s likely that CBT will not be enough to change it. In this case, “bottom up” approaches like Internal Family Systems (IFS), Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), Brainspotting, and sandtray therapy are much more likely to work.
Like Grover, you may have tried a variety of things, including building mental walls, to keep your worries at bay. And, also like Grover, you’ve probably realized that those approaches don’t work long-term. If you’re tired of worries taking over your life, I’d love to discuss how I can help you to reclaim your peace of mind. To get in touch, please fill out a contact form, book a consultation, or call or text me at 410-888-0590.