1 December 2021

posted in:

Anxiety

So, in case you didn’t know, there’s a global pandemic happening. And, while we’re at it, we are facing the spectre of climate crises across the continent. Inflation? Sure, why not. These are just a few things happening around us, and, for many, it can be paralyzing (let alone distracting).

There are no easy answers to these things, and as often happens when major events are out of our control, anxiety can fester. We find ourselves growing more easily irritable with others. Our ability to withstand small social embarrassments erodes and so we feel naked when we say or do the “wrong” thing. Something that we might have been more able to work through previously — missing a transit link by a few minutes, for example — now sets off a torrent of self-recrimination or externalized frustration.

Some days, nothing feels entirely safe.

There isn’t an easy answer for this. I personally do not have a magic wand to protect myself from the unexpected. There is a phrase, however, that I like to remind myself of, which I came across while taking part in a seminar on mindful meditation: acceptance is not approval. What does that mean? Well, let’s take an example: you’re on a bus and it stops at a major intersection you’re getting off at, but when the doors open — instead of politely allowing passengers to disembark — people start pushing their way onto the bus, making it even harder for you to get off. It’s infuriating, not least of which because there’s no central villain involved. So, it’s okay to acknowledge that this situation is frustrating. It sucks rocks, and it’s unfair, and it shouldn’t happen. But it did. And here’s the thing: accepting that this happened is not the same as saying: this was okay, this was good, I liked this. You are, in other words, not approving of this when you acknowledge that it was a terrible mess of an experience.

Let’s also pay attention to our breathing. Sometimes, the easiest thing we can do to overcome an overwhelming situation is to remove ourselves for a moment — go to another room, log-off a call, take a stroll in a park — and find somewhere to sit. And after we’re comfortable we can begin to focus on breathing — ideally, breathing through our nose. And let’s do that for 5 or 10 minutes; deep, replenishing breaths that aren’t forced (we aren’t diving for oysters here), that allow us to reset our central nervous system in the process, making anxiety easier to stick-handle.

There are no magic wands or, for that matter, impervious people. We are all on this planet together, and I think there are ways to help each other out, also. But it begins with us, of course, and finding ways to work through (not around) our anxiety is a good first step to gaining a little bit more of that control we feel we’re missing.