What percentage of your days are spent worrying about Covid-19; thinking about it, trying to problem solve it or make sense of it?
These days our brains are constantly ‘on’ trying to cope, come to terms with and manage the impact of Covid in our lives.
While the mind is a very adaptive piece of biology, it does have its limitations and with the current situation, many are learning this first-hand.
I could put my hand up here, human to human, and admit that I have days now where my mental reserves feel alarmingly low despite my knowledge in the area of mental health. Surprised? I’m not. Wellbeing is work, and some days, and some YEARS in this case, we have to work really, really hard at it.
Part of that means minimising, as much as we can, the amount of stress we are exposed to, and finding ways to manage those stressors we can’t. Remember that our bodies are designed to maintain a balance of homeostasis, and while they can adapt to stress in the short term, in the long term this adaptive state can turn into exhaustion or burnout. At this stage we have depleted our physiological resources and start to notice a decline in many bodily functions including emotional regulation, immune function and cognitive performance.
So how do we work at it?
First off, here is a quick tip for those of you who feel like the wheels are about to come off.
Step 1: Call it. Pay attention to your emotions, thoughts, sensations and behaviours. What are they telling you? Be willing to admit to yourself if you are not okay. – ‘Hey, me, my wheels are about to come off!’
Step 2: Reach out to someone that can make a difference. Do not withdraw and isolate yourself. – ‘Hey, you, my wheels are about to come off’.
Step 3: Let yourself off the hook for not being bulletproof and know that being honest with yourself and others is courageous and an act of strength, not weakness.
I know it’s easier said than done but we don’t just preach this stuff – I did this today. Yes, it felt awkward and embarrassing…and I’m so glad I took that step.
Our take on the ACT mindset: Accept & Act
Part of dealing with life as we now know it is accepting that there is not much that we can truly do to change what is happening around us and to us. Waiting for things to return to normal only to be disappointed when it doesn’t, takes a toll. Rather than resist what is, or live in anticipation, we can borrow from the principles of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and reduce our suffering by firstly accepting that it is. ACT has been repeatedly shown to be an effective tool in supporting mental wellbeing.
Someone once described ACT to me like this: Resisting what is, is like flailing around in quicksand. The more you struggle against the quicksand, the deeper you will sink. Acceptance means to stop flailing about and go: ‘Well, this is happening. I don’t like it, but I am willing to sit with the discomfort of knowing that this is my reality right now and might be for some time.’
Do you have an acceptance mindset?
Acceptance is about being willing to feel what you feel and think what you think without judgement. Are you frustrated? Are you sad for what’s been lost? Are you worrying about what the future holds for you? All of that is okay. Acceptance is the prerequisite for moving forward.
Notice and focus
So what can you do next time you notice your emotions and thoughts being triggered by worry?
Well, first, pat yourself on the back for noticing. Second, take a mental step back to give space to those thoughts, emotions and sensations, allowing them to rise and fall naturally. And third, gently refocus your attention to what is important for you in this moment and then lean in to that.
It’s not until we are willing to accept, that we can take meaningful action.
Act
While acceptance is necessary to ease psychological stress - or distress - acceptance doesn’t equal surrender.
Taking control of our thinking is important, but sometimes a little bit of action is needed. It may be awkward and imperfect, but unless your thoughts can pick up the phone and ask for help, it may be necessary.
It’s time to take imperfect action. It’s the simplest bit of action you can take right now, without overthinking, over-preparing or overanalysing, to address a source of your stress.
An American study of 7000 professionals showed that by May 2020, 75% of employees were feeling burned out, with the most commonly cited causes being lack of separation between work and home, unmanageable workloads, and worries over job security.
Below are a few examples of taking action to deal with stressors:
Stressor: No separation between work and home.
Action: Create a routine, i.e. a defined work space, defined work hours and communicate it to everyone that needs to know.
Stressor: Unmanageable workloads.
Action: Ask for clear priorities from your line manager to increase clarity and set achievable targets.
Stressor: General worry.
Action: Practice self-care and do things that fill your tank. Family time? Family time-out? Foot spa? Learning to crochet? When you notice excessive worry return, simply acknowledge the worry: “Mmmm…hi worry, I see you’, and then refocus your attention and energy: ‘I choose to focus on making a nice cup of tea’.
In addition to addressing the overwhelming stressors – the ones that threaten to tip us over the edge - ACT encourages us to commit to self-care as a regular practice.
So why not take a few minutes, and using the habit forming method of frequency, time, duration and location, set yourself a plan for your physical, social, emotional and workplace self-care.
For example:
Social self-care plan: I choose to join my friends for brunch. I will do this the first weekend of each month (frequency) at 10 am (time) for 2 hours (duration) at Columbus café (location).
The landscape of our lives have changed, in many way, arguably, for good. It is in times like these when we have the opportunity to lean on our knowledge of good mental wellbeing practices to move us through this landscape safely.
It is not without effort, neither reward.
As stated so aptly by Art Williams – “I'm not telling you it's going to be easy - I'm telling you it's going to be worth it.”
Blog by Ance Strydom