Accessing Peace in a Chaotic World
Last night I was mindlessly scrolling on my phone for a few minutes. When my partner called my name, I put my phone down and walked away from it. Over the next hour, I noticed my physical symptoms of anxiety start to pop up (increased heart rate, stomach knots, trouble focusing). I kept thinking to myself, “why am I feeling anxious?” I was actually having a very lovely evening after my toddler went to bed suspiciously easily. As I pondered what could have possibly triggered my anxiety, it hit me: I had seen at least five headlines while scrolling on my phone that left me feeling uneasy. And, while I wasn’t actively thinking about them anymore, they had certainly left an impact on my nervous system.
As I began to beat myself up for letting something impact me on a perfectly good evening, I stopped myself. “If I keep with these spiraling thoughts, the chaos wins,” I thought to myself. So, instead of adding insult to injury and continuing the unhelpful thought spiral, I stopped myself and did the following:
Took several deep breaths. I couldn’t tell you exactly how many but it was definitely more than five. I sat there and breathed and thought about how refreshing my deep breaths felt until I actively felt just a bit better (notice I didn’t do this until I was all the way better - then I would do this forever as this one coping strategy isn’t enough for me). However, this small moment of meditation gave me enough clarity of mind to engage in other helpful coping mechanisms, which is my goal when I take some deep breaths (this is also a helpful strategy for me when I’m parenting my very opinionated and intelligent toddler).
Put my phone away. Next, I knew that because my anxiety started with my phone, there were going to be very few helpful outcomes that came from it. Even if I was innocently checking my step count or a family text thread, I knew that there was a large chance I would end up mindlessly scrolling through social media without intending to. Because of this, I put it on Do Not Disturb, plugged it in for the night, and continued on with my evening without my phone acting as a ticking time bomb for my anxiety.
Told my partner what was going on. Just saying the words out loud is enough for me. I happen to have an incredibly supportive partner, who knows exactly what I need in these moments but even if they weren’t around, I still would have said the words out loud to get them outside of my brain and body. A simple, “You can’t fix anything but I just need to say I’m feeling anxious after looking at my phone” is good enough. Now I was outside of my own head.
Ask myself, “what about this do I have control over?” Most of the time, the answer is nothing, which is painful but clarifying to me as I navigate stopping the spiral in my own head. Last night, the answer was, “I cannot stop the current political climate or state of the world at large, but here is what I am doing to impact my world around me” then I named three very specific things I do that I know positively impact my world and the people in it (I’m not naming them for a reason here as it is not meant for you to compare yourself, it is only meant to highlight that you are probably already taking whatever control you can).
Practiced gratitude. Studies show that it is nearly impossible to feel anxious while actively practicing gratitude. So, I started casually telling my partner what I was grateful for. It was simple at first: “Wow, I feel so grateful that our kiddo went down so easily tonight - what a relief!” “I am grateful that the weather is finally turning for the season; I love the fall.” “Thank you for cleaning the kitchen while I worked today, it really helps our night start out on a good note when you do that.” That’s it - just three simple things that I noticed about my day that made it a good day.
Once I practiced some gratitude, I noticed the biggest relief from my anxiety. Because I am well versed in both anxiety at large and my own specifically, I knew this was my moment to push myself towards distraction so that the loop didn’t start all over again. So, I took the last step in this cycle:
Distracted myself. I suggested to my partner that we do something together and we landed on a board game. This was enough to distract me for the rest of the evening and as we were approaching bedtime, I caught myself thinking “I haven’t seen my phone in a while, I wonder where it is…” before I remembered why I had put it away for the evening. I smiled to myself, knowing this was a sure sign that my process had worked to stop the thought spiral. In that moment, I made the intentional decision to not pickup my phone again. It would have been very easy to think, “Look at me! I’m not feeling anxious anymore! I can totally scroll before bed and be fine.” But again, I know myself well enough to know that it would only start the spiral all over again for me. So instead, I pulled out the book I’m reading and very quickly passed out while reading.
I want to note that while last night it only took me one round of this process to stop my anxiety, more often than not, it takes me several rounds of this process. And it may sound cheesy, but eventually in the middle of practicing gratitude and an intentional moment of deep breathing, it is possible to stop the chaos in your head. When I first started implementing these strategies, I would sometimes have to repeat the cycle five times before I sensed any relief at all. But eventually, I gained more and more control over my anxious thinking patterns and now there are times where one time is plenty.
This process is a practice, not a cure. Nothing about this process is going to stop there from being scary headlines on your phone or make your parents suddenly unconditionally support you or change your partners mind about your most recent argument. What it will do is train your mind to find pathways out of the chaos, which is ultimately one of the only things we can control in life.