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Managing Anxiety in the Age of Everything

Feeling overwhelmed? You're not alone. This updated post from an August 2020 KQED Forum episode has expert advice on how to be compassionate with yourself at the end of another pandemic year.
Carly Severn
Two friends sitting on a park bench, one with their arm wrapped around the other to comfort them.
Amid so many stressors, how can you safeguard your mental health? (Mental Health America)

Updated Tuesday, Dec. 21.

The ongoing COVID pandemic. A deepening climate catastrophe. An international refugee crisis. Widespread racial injustice. Extreme wealth inequality. Financial distress. Social isolation.

It's beyond doubt: A long list of stressors is playing havoc with our mental health.

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As The Washington Post reported in December, more than 4 out of 10 adults — or 43% — said they suffered from anxiety or depression, according to a Census Bureau pulse survey taken in November 2020. The pandemic's prolonged impact on youth mental health has proved "devastating" according to a public advisory from the U.S. surgeon general.

There's the sheer number of stories detailing the graphic deaths of, and attacks on, people of color, particularly in Black and Asian communities. From 2019 to 2020, crimes targeting Asian and Asian American people in California increased by 107%. Such stories can reignite trauma and instill fear, and they disproportionately weigh on people of color.

In August of 2020, KQED Forum's Mina Kim spoke with experts about how to manage what might seem like an unmanageable amount of stress. This is an updated post, with advice from:

  • Tracy Foose, psychiatrist with a focus on anxiety disorders and associate clinical professor of psychiatry, UCSF School of Medicine
  • Spring Washam, author of "A Fierce Heart: Finding Strength, Courage, and Wisdom in Any Moment," and meditation teacher and co-founder, East Bay Meditation Center in Oakland
  • Emiliana Simon-Thomas, science director of the Greater Good Science Center, UC Berkeley

If it feels especially difficult right now, there's a really good reason

The world might seem overwhelming right now ... because it is.

A pandemic, racial injustice, wildfires, lives turned upside down: What these things have in common, says psychiatrist Foose, is "a kind of cumulative uncertainty."

Each one of these stressors, things "that we have no ability to predict and no ability to control at the individual level," she says, are momentous in their own right. But put them all together, and the challenge can feel insurmountable.

You might also feel like you're getting "compassion fatigue": an inability to keep caring, keep feeling loss and grief as more terrible things keep happening in the world.

This can lead to a person "just feeling exhausted," says Simon-Thomas, "feeling disconnected and hopeless, or what some might call callous, about the possibility of anything ever changing."

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And it's not just the number of things happening right now, Foose says, but the fact that they're taking place on a global scale — and don't seem like they'll stop anytime soon.

When we look at previous traumatic periods in history, we can see both how events started and when they ended. But we can't foresee the end of our current traumatic experiences.

It's something Foose calls "trauma limbo," saying that, collectively, "we're going through a lot of unresolved, unfinished, unclosed traumatic experiences" and have no way of knowing what we — and the world — will look like on the other side.

Approach your problems in a new way

With the pandemic, we also can't manage our stress the way we normally do.

Normally we cope in three basic ways, says Foose: connection to other human beings, physical activity and what she calls "meaningful, purposeful, intentional activity" — the sort of "solvable problems that we look for in our life."

Solvable problems, she says, are the challenges you're pretty sure your skills can overcome if you have enough time, like work tasks, baking or gardening.

But right now, you might not be able to see all your loved ones. And the kinds of problems you're faced with are huge — not solvable in the ways you normally use.

Three friends with painted nails sitting on a couch
Normally we cope in three basic ways: connection to other human beings, physical activity and "meaningful, purposeful, intentional activity." (Gender Spectrum Collection)

So what do you do?

First, you can accept the truth that you "really do need these three things for wellness," Foose says. Then, adapt: How are you going to get physical activity? How will you find social connection? And how might you take a situation that "feels so out of control and uncertain" and break it up to comprise a solvable problem you can, in Foose's words, "chew on every day"?

Breaking down issues into manageable parts and attacking them from new angles — while recognizing that you've never really had to do this before — is "the inevitable path to wellness, even during all of this uncertainty," Foose says.

Stop judging yourself and expecting perfection ...

The East Bay Meditation Center's Washam says self-compassion is "an ingredient that you could really cultivate right now."

We're all "kind of hanging on," she says. So acknowledging you'll have good days and bad is crucial, so you're not surprised when the bad days hit.

Our emotions are "triggered or activated where we're experiencing things that we haven't before," Washam says. "We may need a moment to fall apart a little bit or take a break or pull out."

But we shouldn't be shy about asking for help. "I think we need to just make space for that with each other and be really honest when we need support," she says. "Like, 'Hey, I can't do this right now! Can you come over? Can you help, or can I call you?'"

... and start talking more nicely to yourself

Simon-Thomas recommends "giving yourself that same supportive inner voice that you would give a neighbor or a friend who might tell you that they're also struggling with this challenge."

"We're actually pretty good at supporting each other but oftentimes adopt a much more critical inner voice towards ourselves. And this really just worsens the problem," she says.

Smiling person in a white floral shirt smiles at themself in a mirror next to a bush filled with red flowers.
Listen to how you speak to yourself. Are you showing the same understanding and compassion you'd extend to a friend? (Mental Health America)

The problem with "enduring, hypercritical self-talk," she says, is it can make the challenges you're experiencing feel exaggerated beyond proportion and, accordingly, make your so-called failures feel huge.

So the next time you catch yourself using a harsh tone inwardly, remember: You're not seeing things for what they really are.

Don't pretend you're fine when you're not

Many of us have a tendency to "mask a lot of things," Washam says. We reflexively say we're doing fine and "hide the levels of stress that we really experience." That's not actually helpful right now, she says.

"I think really it's a time to be very real with yourself, with our families, and come together," and not to attempt to shoulder your emotional burdens solo, she says. "It's too much for any one person. ... We need to be more real about what's happening."

So if you're struggling, don't keep it to yourself. Speak up and call on your support networks. Putting a brave face on things won't help, and might actually be harmful to your well-being.

Try to find the positive (even when it seems impossible)

This might sound like it contradicts the idea of feeling your feelings. But at the Greater Good Science Center, Simon-Thomas says staff encourage folks with practices and exercises that "enable a different emotional profile."

"So instead of getting kind of lost in that downward spiral of negative self-talk, or complaining or worrying or feeling anxious about all the things that could go wrong," she says, be intentional about the kinds of thoughts and judgments you're making in each moment.

If you can talk with a friend about what's going well in life — rather than badly — you might find you're able to "just shift the balance a little bit and bring yourself moments of levity," she says.

It's not about putting a "brave face" on things, or straining for a falsely positive spin. It's about finding some feeling of safety, she says, to "balance the scales, so that you're not always in fight-or-flight mode."

For more tips on managing stress and anxiety, including advice on mindfulness and resentment, listen to the full KQED Forum show.

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