12:30am, normally asleep by 9pm, and for the fourth job in a row I am falling into a place where, after 9 months to a year, writing a single email comes with incredibly painful and debilitating mental block. Anxiety rises and rises — exponentially until chest knotted, heart palpitates, and I can see no way out.
Well I can see ways out, of course, but they are not massively appealing:
- Resigning — it is a great job and well within my capabilities if I was functioning at even 25% of ability (my own view may be subjective here — just saying — but you get the idea I hope).
- Finding some adrenalin focus — deadlines were always a great catalyst for me and loved the buzz of it. That was years ago — now the adrenalin tap, the fear chaser, just doesnt cut it. Nope I sit at the keyboard frozen.
- Fatalism — homelessness, and perhaps worse, but some sort of disappearing act would definitely appeal if I knew how to do it without hurting others.
So you see — I have options. They do not feel very appealing do they? I have taken the interim, potentially job ending, decision of taking a few days holiday to clear my head.
It is all in my head. I mean it has not been a straightforward year:
- Divorce, new home, Mother diagnosed with Altzheimers, Dad’s myriad health issues taking ever more mobility and life away from him, relationship with kids not working.
- This was the first job after a period of burn out — unable to work for 7 months — working through headache inducing neurofeedback trying to stave off, or fix, the mental health anchors that seem determined to see me on the scrap-heap or in the ground.
- Adjusting to life post divorce, shaping relationships — or not, living alone for first time in life at aged 50 and generally a sense that I have made too many bad judgements to recover from.
Labouring these points above, a little, to get across the sense that these demonds have some merit — but no way do they deserve the influence they are getting. Reading some good books on the growing acceptance that our bodies play a huge part in any mental health recovery plan. Sure — yoga, tai-chi, daily exercise, weights, all rolled out as important and potentially “fundamental” to mental health. I am finding it is more basic than that — simply learning the ability to pay attention to the sensations in the body and “listening” (not thinking) to those sensations. Keeping the cognitive mind at bay is not easy, meditation helps for sure, but if you can you will find that many of the sensations that drive the panic reside in your body. Helpfully, these sensations can lead you to different emotional events that helped shape the fear you currently feel. Anxiety is fear after all — yes?
So above you see some triggers (divorce, new home, new job, poor relationships with kids) and you see some fears (too many bad judgments to recover from, homelessness) and some stress reactions, adrenalin focus — fight, resigning — flight, Frozen at the keyboard — freeze. You also see the contextual situation of poor mental health that means, perhaps, that the engine at the heart of these things is not firing as it should.
So what to do?
Now — if you came here looking for some inspirational bollocks (ala self-help land, american positivism, hollywood mind-hack, yadda yadda) this is where you get disappointed.
Nope. The answers now are much more like hard work.
- Breath — I mean really breath, focus on it, do the in (4), hold(5), out (6) or something similar. Really works does that breathing. It can take the most critical edge off — useful if you are to avoid any one of a million coping mechanism (maladaptive or not).
- Five seconds — reset your horizons. Only ambition here is to maintain thinking in a healthy state for 5 seconds — and if you can follow it with an action for 5 seconds.
- Values — go in the direction of your values (the best of you) — using that breathing, those 5 second horizons, rince and repeat — keep taking the most microscopic steps in the direction of your values.
Just at this moment I am not allowing you any judgment, any thinking, nope, nadda, nyet. That thinking brain is a big issue with this anxiety and stress stuff — no thinking allowed. Breath, 5 seconds, breath, 5 seconds rince and repeat — only when you starting to lose track of the breathing or the 5 seconds because you are now doing something you recognise as aligned to your values do you stop. Now I did you no thinking — well there is a tiny but — that direction of your values bit requires some thinking.. but its basic… love — do something loving (water a plant), tidyness — move a magazine, friendship — drop a quick note to a friend (hi will do), fitness — stretch… you get the idea.
I know the things above work — but sometimes you have to do more. You have to call time out beyond that — get off the wheel. It is OK to get off the wheel — there may be consequences that is OK, they may be great big huge consequences but that is also OK — for now we are not in a consequences place yet. We are in a stabilise the damned fucking stupid nervous system phase.
Your executive functioning, pre-frontal and all that, is essentially off line when you are stressed so no point trying to think about consequences just now with the brain of a monkey or fish — nope just doesnt cut it.
So for now:
- Regulate — breath, 5 seconds, breath, 5 seconds — repeat.
- Rest — this stuff kicks ass- it can exhaust you. Expect to be exhausted — rest.
- Diet — have you eaten — no? Get some food in your system (we don’t stop for a biscuit if a tiger is chasing us — so it sends good safe signals to the mind).
- Sleep — that it,
Regulate, Rest, Diet, Sleep — is all that matters for now.
Tomorrow we will worry about tomorrow — prefrontal cortex may be back on line then — if not then it is Regulate, Rest, Diet and Sleep until it is. Consequences will wait — trust me — getting out of this place is more important than your job, your relationships, your money worries because if you don’t your health goes… then all your problems are worse.. so for now.. do NOW.
Nothing sexy or quick about it — no brain hacks here — just slow diligent repitition with dozes of self love, forgiveness, acceptance.
Now to bed.
