Maybe you feel like there’s something wrong with you that you continually feel overwhelmed?
Or that you can’t seem to shake the grief, fear, or anger? Or that sometimes you don’t feel anything at all, but are simply stunned or numb?
Perhaps you’ve heard the following sentiment (and if you haven’t, listen closely):
whatever it is you’re experiencing emotionally is okay.
There is no guidebook or “right answer” for how we should be navigating these past couple years. I don’t have a magic solution to help us feel better. I often feel as helpless and inundated as many of you, and it’s because we truly aren’t built to continue taking one hit after another over a sustained period of time. Yes, we’re wired to tap into survival, to be resilient, and to use our inherent strengths. But living amidst a collective trauma - withother traumas layered on - is a whole different ask. Our bodies, our brains, and our moods are really feeling the impact.
We’ve been pivoting and relinquishing control for 2.5 years amidst a global pandemic. Many of us already had our own sto- ries of grief, trauma, anxiety, and depression prior to that. Mi- nority groups already carried weights of oppression and systemic inequity. And life has done what it’s always going to do: continue to be unpredictable and serve hardships. Our reserves are maybe lower than ever before.
How do we begin to try to make any sense of it all and move through it when it simply seems impossible? It’s also a privilege for many of us to be able to turn off the news or insulate ourselves from certain realities. This is not the case for everyone.
We may not necessarily be built for it, but inevitably we will figure out how to keep moving forward because that is survival, and we have skills available to us that we can use to help us do our best. We have more agency than we might think over calming our nervous system.
Our nervous system is our body’s command center, and when it gets hijacked, we can get stuck in a hyperarousal or hypoarous- al state. Hyperarousal is the state of fight or flight. It’s rife with agitation, irritability, anxiety. Hypoarousal is the state of freeze wherein we may feel numb, depressive symptoms, and low ener- gy. When we understand what state we are in, we have a better
chance of choosing appropriate coping skills to put us back into our optimal window of tolerance where emotions are regulated and our nervous system is soothed. As we consistently practice these soothing skills, we increase and improve our individual windows of tolerance. And because of neuroplasticity, we are ac- tually rewiring our brain and our responses.
If we’re in a state of hyperarousal, we need to choose ground- ing skills to bring us back to the present moment and calm our hypervigilance or agitation. If we are in a state of hypoarousal, we need to choose skills that cultivate more energy or perhaps co-regulate with others to help us ignite motivation. Knowing that coping skills are very individualized, it helps to have a lot of options in your personal “toolkit.” Sometimes coping is really about trial and error — what “works” today may not “work” tomorrow. We can choose skills to help us process an emotion, solve a problem, or to simply distract ourselves. Our goal should
be to increase intentionality around choosing a coping skill rather than defaulting to avoidance or simply staying stuck in an emotion. We often cannot make an uncomfortable emotion com- pletely go away, but we aim to decrease its intensity so that we can feel more regulated and move through life.
[Contact me to receive a free list of coping skills broken up by levels of effort @ yepiototherapy or juliet@suncounselingandwellness.com]
The theme of this issue is great escapes and while I’m sure we wish we could all sign up for just that – a great escape from the chaos and suffering – we can learn to create our own necessary respites of solitude and serenity. Find grace for yourself to be able to acknowledge, without judgment, whatever emotional experi- ence you are having and then intentionally choose coping skills aligned to what your nervous system needs. This will help you navigate the valleys. And, remember, we’re all in this together!
