I am Calm: 5 Habits that Prepared Me Mentally for Crisis

Whether we like it, we all are stepping into the unknown. Things are going to look very different moving forward. Those with resilient and flexible minds will thrive. Those who stay rigid and attached, will struggle.

The day I realized things were really shifting was March 19. I was preparing to travel to Washington, DC, to work with high school students from across the country. Something told me to give the program a call and see if we were still on.

At 11 am it was.

By 5 pm, the program was canceled.

And we all know the domino of virus-related cancellations after that. And through it all, I have had this real feeling of peace, and even a little joy. I hear myself saying, “Oh yeah, it all makes sense now.”

Let me share a couple of things about me that make it truly miraculous that I am moving through this with such resilience. First, I have struggled with anxiety a good chunk of my life (and have done a darn good job of not letting anyone know). Second, I left my full-time, mission-driven, purposeful job about a year-and-a-half ago because I felt drawn to create experiences and leaders that foster authentic social connection. My new business clients are quickly shifting focus to layoffs, not leadership development. Despite this, I feel more relaxed than normal.

In some way I felt this coming in November. I had a weird onset of anxiety. I could not explain it. My mind was able to talk through problems, but my body kept triggering the fight or flight response. I found myself feeling extremely alone and craving real connection. It went beyond just me and my life. I felt sad for the world.

I sensed that we had hit a tipping point where we had so many ways to connect that none of us were really connecting! Responses to text messages, which used to come quickly, now took days. Voicemails were never listed to. I now had a Facebook page, Instagram page and Linked In page. I would open Facebook and have 21 new notifications (I cannot handle push notifications). I posted Happy Birthday on friends’ Facebook timelines instead of calling or sending a card. I would call a friend and not hear back. I would not feel mad.

I knew they were “over-connected” too. Email responses slowed or did not come. While on a walk, I would remember an email I had forgotten to respond to and then forget again by the time I got home. I heard myself saying, “I really don’t like the world right now” and “I’m not sure I can thrive if things stay like this.”

And then Corona came. We were asked to socially distance… my worst nightmare. And almost immediately, I thought, “This makes so much sense.” I let go of my plan, money, and how I think things are supposed to be and decided to trust the process. How did I get to this level of acceptance? I realize the things I had been doing over the last year had prepared me.

Stepping into the unknown made it a non-negotiable to invest in my personal resilience. I had space to grow and expand my creativity, discover hidden passions, let go of what other people want me to be, listen to my intuition, learn to have self-compassion, live in the present, and see the bigger picture.

Here are a few specific things that built my resilience:

I Asked Myself Tough Questions. I went through the process of creating my own website and had to ask myself, “who the heck am I?,” “how do I want to serve in the world?,” “what am I uniquely qualified to do?,” “what is your value?” These questions took me to some difficult, but valuable, places.

I Learned a lot About Addiction. For the first time I had two people in my life in different stages of recovery. As a coach, I know a lot about the brain and habit change, but not directly about addiction. I got curious about the experience of addiction and learned that the opposite of addiction is connection. I learned that our thoughts create our feelings and if we can observe our thoughts as something separate from ourselves, we can stay grounded in compassion and operate with more clarity. Most of us are addicted to something (technology is a huge one) and we choose our addiction to soothe us instead of connection or self-compassion.

I Write Daily Gratitude’s and Acknowledgements. I have been doing this for close to a year now. Gratitude makes us more trusting and connects us to that which is bigger. Acknowledgements build self-compassion. I acknowledge myself for the smallest things like taking a walk, complimenting a stranger, or going to a networking event when I did not feel like it.

I MOVE to Music. Some may call this dancing. I call it a moving meditation because I am not focused on steps or the beat, I just let my body move however it needs to and let go of thought. I let go of judgement and honor my intuition. If my arms decide they want to shake up and down or “swim” through the room, I let it happen. I connect with who I am without a job title, family role, list of achievements, social media hashtag, or that nasty inner critic. And, I learned to find comfort in a non-linear space.

I Prompt my Brain with Re-Framing Questions. “What belief or thought might I need to let go of to feel confident, calm, or safe again?” This question immediately separates me from the feeling and empowers me to make a shift. I get to decide if losing my job means I am going to struggle or just that I have a new priority I was not expecting- a job search.

So this last year or so, without knowing it, I put myself through an experiential master’s degree in resilience. The teacher was tough and did not give much direction, but I learned more than most of my other classes combined. Whether we like it or not, we all are stepping into the unknown right now. Things are going to look very different moving forward. Those with resilient and flexible minds will thrive. Those that stay rigid and attached to what was will struggle.

This blog originally appeared on Moga Living Blog, and has been shared here with the Nexus community with support from the author. Click here to see the original entry.