Staying Calm in the Midst of Chaos
Chaos. Everything is crashing down around you. Your life feels like the second half of Titanic when the ship is sinking but also on fire. What do you do? How do you stay calm?
Try Grounding
In mindfulness circles, “grounding” is the process of “getting back to what’s real. If you want to get into things like meditation you absolutely should but if all of that is a little far-out for you, there’s a way for you to ground without all of the mumbo jumbo.
Ask yourself, realistically, ‘what’s the worst that could happen?’ Because we can get a little confused when we’re scared or nervous, try asking this question out loud with someone else around so that they can help you to think through it.
Most of the time, when something goes wrong, we can perceive chaos when the worst thing that can happen isn’t really that bad. No matter how bad it is, once you realistically have a worst-case scenario in mind you can more effectively focus on a solution or possibly a back-up plan.
Recognize Your Social Resources
While you’re finding that person to ask that question with, take a look at the other people around you. We tend to worry about material resources without thinking about our social resources. These are the people that can help to support you when you feel like you’re on that flaming, sinking ship. Look around you and find the people that would let you sit on the door – or better yet, someone who would realize that both of you could fit on the door.
Don’t Give Up
Don’t lose hope. When you lose hope, you stop looking for solutions and when you stop looking for solutions you are far less likely to find them. In this way, coming to the conclusion that there is no hope can be a “self-fulfilling prophesy.” Twentieth century American Industrialist Henry Ford is quoted as having said “Whether you think you can or think you can’t, you’re right.”
Focus on a Solution
On a related note, one way to stay calm is to focus on finding a solution. Trying to find a solution can give you hope and help you to feel like you are doing something. Further, it actually moves you towards a solution. Finding people to blame or just feeling sorry for yourself doesn’t help anyone – least of all yourself.
Remind Yourself of Your Past
A similar solution to grounding is to ask yourself when you’ve felt like this in the past and ask yourself what happened. Either you succeeded and everything was great or you failed and you stuck around long enough to feel that way again.
As much as we might hate it, that feeling of chaos is very much a part of life. When we look at chaos as a part of life, it becomes much more manageable.
Focus on Things You Can Do Something About
Just like you don’t need to be into mindfulness to benefit from grounding, you don’t need to be religious to benefit from living by “The Serenity Prayer:”
“Give me the courage to change the things I can change,
The Serenity to accept the things I can’t change,
And the Serenity to know the difference.”
Sometimes when we have that chaotic feeling it’s because we’re dumping all of our emotional energies into worrying about things that we can’t do anything about. You can’t fix the economy or change who is running your country or end world hunger. However, if you direct your energies into the things that you can change, you will find that you feel better about your life and can actually make a difference in the things that matter most to you.
In most cases, the feeling of chaos isn’t a realistic reaction and it gets in the way of coming up with solutions. Learning how to stay calm can help you to feel better and live longer but it can also make you a more effective agent of positive change.