Unpack your saturation point

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Last week I heard the phrase ‘concurrent pandemics’ for the first time. Wow. Yes.

Clients have recently been sharing that they are experiencing a build-up of pressure; saying things like, ‘I just can’t take one more thing thrown at me,’ and ‘I am beyond maxed out.’ My favorite was ‘The s**t is hitting the fan from too many directions.’ One client expressed that they felt like a ‘sponge that cannot take on any more water’. He was saturated. For him, that felt like numbness. For others, panic.

At this point, 8 months into COVID (the umbrella pandemic), we are feeling the cumulative impact of multiple and concurrent underlying stressors: parenting anxious children, increased pressure at work, being out of work during an economic downturn, serious concerns around short and long term financial stability, staying safe and healthy, the impending election, lack of socialization, and the list goes on. And on.  

As it looks like we might be here for a while, it seems necessary to figure out a way to ‘wring out your own sponge’ when you reach a saturation point. I went through the following exercise to wring out my own sponge. Perhaps try it for yourself.

• Imagine COVID is a large river that dams, and the related (or unrelated) stressors as tributaries flowing into that river

• Make a list of your tributaries

• Acknowledge that each of these tributaries by themselves would be stressful enough

• Realize that individually, the tributaries have their own cycles, energy, flow, and specific challenges

• Notice that you respond to, and cope with each of these tributaries differently. Not all the tributaries are the same length. Some are deeper than others. Some flow quickly, some flow so slowly they appear stagnant

• Chart the highs and lows for each of these tributaries over the last 8 months. (See visual below). Notice that the tributaries peak at different times

• Observe that sometimes, one or more peaks occur concurrently. They flow into the river and dam breaks. You’ve reached a saturation point

Here’s why this exercise was helpful for me. When I feel the pressure reaching saturation point, I remind myself that I’m experiencing the cumulative impact of multiple stressors. I look at my list and figure out what’s peaking and focus on accessing the coping mechanisms for that particular stressor. If it’s two, or god help me, three concurrent stressors, I step back, or away. When I’m ready (which might not be until the next day), I prioritize, and tackle the individual challenges in bite size chunks, Releasing the dam one tributary at a time.

Ok. I feel like my ramble is rambling, and my analogy is getting unwieldy! Take what resonates with you and explore. If you try the exercise yourself, I’d love to hear what was useful and what you learned. If you want some support unpacking your saturation point, please reach out to me, or a loved one.

One. Stressor. At. A. Time. Please.

Resilience as a skill

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"Resilience isn't a single skill. It's a variety of skills and coping mechanisms. To bounce back from bumps in the road as well as failures, you should focus on emphasizing the positive." (Jean Chatsky)

Chatzky draws our attention to the multiple applications of one of my favorite words, resiliency. This year has kindly provided us with inexhaustible opportunities to develop our resiliency. Thank you 2020! We are facing relentless simultaneous challenges and being tested daily. Unfortunately, I don’t see much sign of it letting up. Many of the challenges that have surfaced this year;  an increase in violence and prejudice against people of color, COVID, wildfires, and a deeply troubling political landscape, are symptoms of chronic issues that will be the hallmarks of the first half of the 21st century. So, settle in, we are going to be here for a while. Resilience needs to be one of everyone’s favorite words!

I specifically wanted to focus on resilience as a skill, a behavior, a practice, rather than the idea of resilience as a trait. We all have some level of resilience, but it’s not a static attribute. Unconsciously, resilience looks like the slow build up of tolerance, like a callus, that comes from living through life’s painful chapters. Consciously, resilience is an active response; choices we can make albeit under duress and with great effort, to manage difficult periods.

“No matter how bleak or menacing a situation may appear, it does not entirely own us. It can't take away our freedom to respond, our power to take action.”  (Ryder Carroll)

Unless we recognize and pay attention to our resilient behaviors, we can’t practice them. We can, and should, intentionally develop resilience. What are three new resilient behaviors you have noticed or developed in 2020? For me, they are flexibility, creativity, and enthusiasm.

Flexibility – Despite 17 years of yoga, I remain tight as a board, on and off my mat! I like to be in control, and therefore work really hard, physically and mentally, to improve my flexibility. In relation to resilience, I see flexibility as our ability to be responsive, adaptable, to think on our feet, and get comfortable with working around obstacles. Human beings and our institutions, LOVE to do things the way we have always done them. COVID has required us to do things differently. If we can’t celebrate a loved one’s birthday in person, how are we going to do it? If we can’t sing with the church choir, how are we going to make music together? How many times have you said in the last 8 months, ‘It’s not as good as in person, but it’s better than nothing!’ That’s flexibility.  

Creativity – I have welcomed the breaks in the incessant news to hear the light-hearted stories about people baking sourdough, brewing beer, quilting, and planting vegetable gardens. These pastimes are not just escapism, they are necessary creative outlets for expression and a form of coping. When we bust out the KitchenAid or garden rake, we are practicing resilience. This skill is related to the last one; in order to be flexible, we get creative.

Enthusiasm – When experiencing so many externally imposed restrictions on our normal way of doing things, we can find ourselves working really hard to find cracks for the light to shine through. When I catch even the smallest glimmer of light, I have a disproportionate amount of enthusiasm for it! My creative outlet this year has been to experiment with baking. I love to cook but until this year, I had never owned a muffin pan. The sense of achievement, bordering on delirium I felt when turning out an edible quiche crust and delicious corn muffins, far exceeded the norm. I savored the moment. Literally.

Angela Duckworth, psychologist and author of Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance wrote, “Enthusiasm is common. Endurance is rare.”
I read here that she sees enthusiasm as a pre-requisite for endurance. By behaving and responding enthusiastically, we build endurance. By building endurance, we become more resilient.

I hope you will take a little time to reflect on newly acquired resilient skills. I’d love to hear from you with what you’ve noticed and learned. I’ll end how I started, with Chatsky’s quote, “To bounce back from bumps in the road… you should focus on emphasizing the positive.”

So, what are you enthusiastic about?