Prompt Library

Worry & Anxiety

Twelve build-a-world prompts for clients carrying worry or anxiety. Use sparingly — most sandtray work is non-directive — but indispensable when a client is stuck, when time is short, or when a focused frame supports the work.

12 prompts Approx. ages 6 through adult (notes per prompt) Print-friendly

Before you begin

A directive prompt narrows the symbolic field. That can be exactly what an anxious client needs — too many possibilities is its own source of overwhelm — or it can short-circuit the unconscious work the tray would do on its own. A few principles:

A note on evidence

Several of these prompts are direct adaptations from established protocols — externalizing language from narrative therapy (White & Epston, 1990), the safe-place intervention from EMDR (Shapiro, 2018), the "future self" work used across CBT and ACT, and the worry-character work common in CBT for childhood anxiety (Kendall & Hedtke, 2006). Sourcing is noted on each prompt so you can cite it in supervision and documentation.

Externalizing the worry

1. Worry has a shape

Externalizing · Ages 6+
"If your worry was a creature or a thing in the world, what would it look like? Find a figure that feels close to it — or build it in the sand — and put it where it usually lives."
What to watch for Does the figure go in the center (taking over) or at the edge (peripheral)? Buried, exposed, fenced off? Does the client name the worry, or stay quiet? The client's relationship to the figure they choose often mirrors their relationship to the worry itself.
Adapted from narrative therapy externalizing practices (White & Epston, 1990) and CBT worry-as-character work (Kendall & Hedtke, 2006).

2. The worry's voice

Externalizing · Ages 8+
"What does your worry say to you? Build a tiny scene that shows what it's saying — or who it's saying it to."
What to watch for Critical inner voices often appear as authority figures (teachers, parents, judges) or amplified animals. The build can make the inner monologue speakable for the first time. Resist correcting or reassuring; just witness.
Externalizing dialogue, narrative therapy (White, 2007).

3. The worry's job

Externalizing · Ages 10+
"Worry usually thinks it's helping somehow — even when it isn't. Build a scene that shows what your worry is trying to protect, or what it's trying to do for you."
What to watch for This prompt softens shame around the symptom. Clients often discover the worry is guarding a younger self, a relationship, or a fragile sense of being okay. Useful precursor to parts work or IFS-informed approaches.
Aligned with Internal Family Systems "protector parts" framing (Schwartz, 2021); compatible with ACT cognitive defusion.

Building safety

4. A place where worry can't follow

Resourcing · Ages 6+
"Build a place — real, imagined, anywhere — where the worry isn't allowed in. It can be tiny. It can have walls, or weather, or a guardian. Whatever makes it feel like yours."
What to watch for The "guardian" choice often reveals what kind of safety the client is reaching for: solitude, a protector, a familiar relationship. Save a screenshot — this image becomes a touchstone you can return to in later sessions.
Adapted from EMDR safe/calm place protocol (Shapiro, 2018).

5. The team in your corner

Resourcing · Ages 6+
"Build a circle of everyone — or everything — that has your back. People, animals, characters from books, anyone. Real or imagined."
What to watch for Note who is included and how close they are placed. Note who is missing. Pets and stuffed animals count and matter. Photograph or screenshot the build — this is identity-affirming material that supports a strengths-based plan.
Strengths-based / resource-installation; aligned with EMDR resource development (Korn & Leeds, 2002).

6. Anchor in the body

Somatic · Ages 6+
"When you feel okay in your body, where do you feel it? Build a tiny scene that shows that place — or what 'okay' looks like inside."
What to watch for For clients who struggle to access felt safety, this prompt is sometimes too abstract — they may build a generic "happy" scene without somatic specificity. That's fine. The act of trying to look inward and find okay-ness is itself the intervention.
Body-based / somatic resourcing (Levine, 2010; Ogden & Fisher, 2015).

Working with the relationship between self and worry

7. You and the worry, in the same scene

Self-in-relation · Ages 8+
"Find a figure that feels like you. Find a figure that feels like the worry. Place them on the tray however the relationship feels right now."
What to watch for Distance, eye-line, height difference, who is facing whom. Some clients place the self facing away from the worry; some place the worry on top of the self; some bury one or the other. All of it is data. Ask: "Can you tell me about how they're standing?"
Sandtray sociogram, adapted from family-of-origin work (Satir, 1972/1988); compatible with IFS Self-and-parts mapping.

8. Move it one inch

Self-in-relation · Ages 8+
"Looking at how you placed those two figures — if you could move them one inch, in any direction, where would they go? You don't have to do anything dramatic. Just notice what feels true."
What to watch for Best used as a follow-up to Prompt #7. The "one inch" framing keeps the change small enough to feel safe but specific enough to be revealing. Clients often discover what they want before they know they wanted it.
Adapted from Solution-Focused scaling and "one small change" interventions (de Shazer, 1985).

Time-based prompts (looking forward, looking back)

9. The day after the worry shrunk

Future self · Ages 10+
"Imagine waking up tomorrow and somehow, the worry is half its usual size. Not gone — just smaller. Build the first scene of that day. Where are you? Who's there? What's different?"
What to watch for This is a Solution-Focused "miracle question" adapted for the tray. It surfaces what the client is reaching for and shows what an early sign of change might look like — useful for goal-setting on the treatment plan.
Adapted from de Shazer's miracle question, Solution-Focused Brief Therapy (de Shazer, 1988).

10. A letter from your future self

Future self · Ages 12+
"Build a scene of yourself five years from now — older, on the other side of all this. Then place a small figure or object in the scene that's a message from that you, back to the you sitting here today."
What to watch for Clients with severe anxiety sometimes can't access a future self at all — every imagined future is catastrophized or blank. That is itself a clinical observation. Try Prompt #9 first (one day) before #10 (five years).
Compassionate Self / future self interventions (Gilbert, 2010); narrative re-authoring (White, 2007).

11. Where the worry started

Origin · Ages 12+ · Use with care
"If you can, build a scene from when you first remember the worry showing up — or back further, before it was around. Don't rush. We can stop or move on whenever you want."
What to watch for Trauma-adjacent. Only use with stabilized clients and inside an established therapeutic relationship. If sympathetic or dorsal activation rises beyond the client's window of tolerance, abandon the prompt and shift to a resourcing prompt (#4 or #5). This is not for first sessions.
Compatible with TF-CBT trauma narrative phase (Cohen, Mannarino, & Deblinger, 2017) — though TF-CBT typically does this in writing or talk; the tray can scaffold it.

For brief school sessions

12. Three-figure check-in

Brief · Ages 6+
"Pick three figures: one for how you woke up, one for how you are right now, one for how you'd like to feel. Put them in the tray however you want."
What to watch for Ideal for 10–15 minute sessions. Photograph each session's three figures and you have a longitudinal mood map across the year. Pairs naturally with the 15-Minute Tier 2 Protocol.
Original; structured affect mapping aligned with ASCA Mindset M5 (positive attitude toward work and learning) and Behavior B-SMS 7 (effective coping skills).

If a prompt isn't landing

If a client's energy drops, the build stalls, or you feel them comply rather than engage — let it go. Say something simple: "This one isn't fitting today. Want to just play with the sand for a few minutes, or try something different?" The frame survives that flexibility. What it doesn't survive is your investment in the prompt being right.

Citations & Further Reading

  1. Cohen, J. A., Mannarino, A. P., & Deblinger, E. (2017). Treating trauma and traumatic grief in children and adolescents (2nd ed.). Guilford.
  2. de Shazer, S. (1985). Keys to solution in brief therapy. W. W. Norton.
  3. de Shazer, S. (1988). Clues: Investigating solutions in brief therapy. W. W. Norton.
  4. Gilbert, P. (2010). Compassion focused therapy: Distinctive features. Routledge.
  5. Kendall, P. C., & Hedtke, K. A. (2006). Coping cat workbook (2nd ed.). Workbook Publishing.
  6. Korn, D. L., & Leeds, A. M. (2002). Preliminary evidence of efficacy for EMDR resource development and installation in the stabilization phase of treatment of complex posttraumatic stress disorder. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 58(12), 1465–1487.
  7. Levine, P. A. (2010). In an unspoken voice: How the body releases trauma and restores goodness. North Atlantic Books.
  8. Ogden, P., & Fisher, J. (2015). Sensorimotor psychotherapy: Interventions for trauma and attachment. W. W. Norton.
  9. Satir, V. (1988). The new peoplemaking. Science and Behavior Books. (Original work published 1972)
  10. Schwartz, R. C. (2021). No bad parts: Healing trauma and restoring wholeness with the Internal Family Systems model. Sounds True.
  11. Shapiro, F. (2018). Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) therapy: Basic principles, protocols, and procedures (3rd ed.). Guilford.
  12. White, M. (2007). Maps of narrative practice. W. W. Norton.
  13. White, M., & Epston, D. (1990). Narrative means to therapeutic ends. W. W. Norton.