As our brain is trying to process experiences that feel threatening it generally gets stuck in one of the following three places. Thankfully we can also intervene at each of these points to get it unstuck and below you will find concrete strategies for doing so.
This article is designed to help professionals and ordinary people deal with a wide variety of stressful situations. Please take responsibility and apply strategies only in ways that feel safe and appropriate to you and those you are working with.
Three Common Places our Brain Gets Stuck in Anxiety and Distress and How to Get it Unstuck
- Feeling alone: When stuck at this point our brain is essentially saying, “I feel stressed and overwhelmed and I feel alone in it.” Typically, this stuckness is accompanied by the feeling that there is no one to help me with this, or that no one would be glad to be with me if I shared this distress with them.
- Not knowing how to act under these conditions: When stuck at this point, our brain says, “I feel stressed and I don’t have any examples on file of how to deal with this kind of stress and still act like a compassionate, creative, life giving person in the midst of this.”
- Not knowing how to regulate my distress or address the threats: When stuck at this point, our brain says, “I feel stressed and I don’t know what to do about it.” Typically, the consequence is that our brain spins the problem around and around without getting anywhere productive.
Strategies for Getting Our Brain unstuck From Each of These Points.
1) Getting Unstuck from Feeling Alone: Co-Regulation Strategies
IF IN IMMEDIATE DANGER
Get capable help if there is imminent danger: If you are truly in immediate danger start by locating people who can help you handle this threat, especially people who know how to deal with it or have had success dealing with it in the past. Or a team that can at least support one another in doing their best to work together to deal with it.
IF NOT IN IMMEDIATE DANGER
De-stressing partnerships: Agree ahead of time with specific people that you will be there for one another to share your feelings and decompress while the other validates and affirms your feelings without trying fix or dismiss them. These check-ins can be very brief even as short as two minutes but can be extremely helpful.
Creating a Culture of Validation
Make an agreement among your team or select a team of people you can connect with over phone, etc. who will have a validating culture. Agree that when someone starts sharing frustrations the other people will simply listen, resonate and validate the person’s feelings without dismissing them or trying to fix them. This takes some getting used to as we tend to either minimize each other’s feelings by saying, “I’m sure you’ll do great,” “I’m sure it will be ok,” etc. Or we may immediately jump in by trying to fix the problem and offering the person solutions. Both of these bypasses the important need our brain has to feel like SOMEONE IS REALLY WITH ME in this stressful situation.
Instead, focus on helping the person feel seen, heard, and valued, and to make facial expressions of empathy and compassion. You might try statements like, “Man, that is really tough, that sounds like a ton of pressure you are under.” Or, “Wow, that really upset you when you had yet another huge problem on top of the load you were already carrying. Is there any way I can support you?”
2) Getting Unstuck from Not Knowing How to Act Under These Circumstances:
Find people in your life who are handling this well. Are there people you know right now or who you have known in the past who you can look to as examples who are able to stay calm, compassionate, and creative even while taking seriously the concerns of the day. Can you talk to these people and ask them how they deal with such stressors?
Taking in stories from people beyond your own personal life who model how to be under tough circumstances: It might be a good time to read about Harriet Tubman, or Ghandi, or Mother Theresa, or even learn the stories of present day refugees or asylum seekers who have navigated immense challenges and made it through intact and often full of love and compassion.
Sharing stories with each other: Take some time with friends (online if needed for social distancing) and share stories of people you each know who have modeled abundance, compassion, and love even under tough circumstances. Watch your brain begin to store these as models for how you too can be centered and compassionate amid distressing circumstances.
3) Getting Unstuck from Not Knowing How Help Myself Regulate Distress or Address Threats.
TOP DOWN STRATEGIES
If the stress is partly due to a lack of adequate knowledge or information, then get the information you need: For example learning the best strategies to protect yourself and others from Covid 19 such as handwashing and social distancing.
BOTTOM UP STRATEGIES
- Hold your hands above your head for a little while and you will likely notice a calming effect
- Relax your lower jaw completely letting it hang open for a little while.
- Butterfly tapping cross your hands over your chest and tap your shoulders alternating back and forth.
- Deep breathing for one to three minutes or longer.
How to make self-regulation strategies automatic:
How to get strategies to stick so you actually remember to use them when you need them: If you don’t try the strategy several times under milder circumstances and verbalize what difference it makes you probably won’t think to use them under times of high stress. So, try the following:
- Notice a quick snapshot of how you are feeling right now
- Choose one of the strategies for example relax your lower jaw completely, letting it hang open as you take several slow deep breaths.
- Once you start to feel some relaxing, notice what feels different than when you started. Get words for it and say what shifted to yourself or a friend.
- Now repeat the same strategy throughout the day under milder circumstances so that it becomes more habitual.