How to protect your peace this season
This last week I’ve been inundated on my social media feed with vitriol from every camp in every topic it seems. People are passionate about their views and that passion has elevated and it’s spilling out of them and dumping onto us.
It’s desperate energy because people are scared. And when we’re scared we focus all of our attention on the “what if’s” instead of “what is.” We start catastrophizing and imagining everything that might go wrong, from the big things to the little things.
And it doesn’t stop there. There’s often an arrogance with it because in order to feel safe, we must believe that WE ARE RIGHT. So it doesn’t seem to matter what the views are, so much is presented with, “I’m right and you’re wrong. And you’re an idiot.”
It’s exhausting, even when you don’t have a strong opinion either way.
And if you do have a strong opinion on a certain subject, it can be really difficult to not get pulled in. We believe in what we believe because we’ve thought it through and have come to what we feel is an educated decision. When someone challenges that, of course it’s going to bother us.
But is responding to a stranger on the internet over whether or not raw milk is safe to consume a good idea? (I swear someone is baiting me because I’ve seen so many of these posts and I do have strong feelings on this one.)
When was the last time someone changed your opinion on a subject by disagreeing with you in a comment thread?
I’ve definitely gained valuable information from people in posts and comments, whether it’s them sharing a resource or just sharing their own experience or perspective. That kind of interaction is what social media is for in my mind. How cool that we can be exposed to so many views that might be different than ours!
But once it becomes toxic, is it really worth it?
The kind of content I’m seeing right now has a massive impact on our nervous system. When it moves from educational to accusatory and fear based, our guard will automatically go up, as it’s designed to do.
The kind of content we consume, even if we don’t interact with it, just reading and watching, can easily throw us into our Fight or Flight mode. Even when we agree with the information! When it’s fear based, it’s going to cause fear to rise in us, which then triggers our nervous system to do what it believes it needs to in order to protect us.
Our nervous system doesn’t understand “what if”. It doesn’t understand imagination.
Have you ever imagined something like going on a hike, and you see yourself walking and then suddenly there’s a bear, or you’re walking next to a cliff and suddenly you see yourself falling, or some other dangerous situation? Our mind often likes to imagine worst case scenarios when we’re not paying attention (especially those of us who lean toward anxiety).
What happens to your body in those moments? Maybe you’re sitting on your couch and you are, in reality, perfectly safe. But your heart will start pounding, maybe you even physically jump back or inhale quickly. You will have a physiological response even though it is a completely imagined scenario.
That’s because our nervous system can’t tell the difference between a real threat and an imagined one.
So if the content you consume is focused on all the things to fear or fight, how do you think that’s going to impact you?
Being informed is a good thing. It’s, in fact, important. How can we come to a conclusion unless we’ve done our due diligence to learn what we can about a subject or situation?
But so much media, unfortunately, is not informational. It’s biased and vitriolic. And that’s true of most “news” outlets as well.
All of this means that if we want to be able to find a sense of peace in our daily life, we must be selective in the media that we consume.
It can give us a false sense of peace when we consume media that agrees with our views. It gives us a sense of reassurance that we’re not alone, that there are other sane people out there. But if that media is accusatory and fear based, then is it really benefiting us? Is it fueling a fire of fear and anger in us? Is it truly protecting our peace?
Existing in a state of fear sets us up to struggle both mentally and physically. Plus it’s just not fun.
So what can we do to protect our peace when this is the reality of our world right now?
We need to set some boundaries.
The first important boundary is around time.
Even when you’re consuming information that is unbiased, a lot of things happening in the world are disturbing. And while we don’t want to live with our head in the sand, we also don’t want to overwhelm our system with things we can’t control or change. Spending too much time with disturbing news can cause anxiety to rise in us.
We must strike a balance in the amount of time we devote to these things. And when we’re going through a time period where maybe our stress resilience is lower, its okay to step back and do a full on news detox.
Protecting your peace is not selfish, it’s necessary for you to live. And you knowing how many people died in the most recent conflict doesn’t change just because you know about it.
Do an audit of how much time you’re spending consuming any kind of media and then decide if it’s too much or if you need to cut back. Or maybe shift. My relaxing content that I consume is gardening videos. I have a few accounts I follow on YouTube and it’s the most uplifting and satisfying content for me. What kind of show or media does that for you?
Which leads us to the second boundary: start getting really picky about what you’re exposing yourself to.
Ask yourself these questions:
How am I benefiting from this source?
Do I feel worse or better after consuming this media?
Does this media lead with fear or is it based on education?
Is it asking good questions or is it focused on blame?
Am I attracted to it because it supports my views, and if so, is it truly beneficial for me?
Protecting your peace has a dramatic affect on your overall health. Just like we try to limit the toxic foods or ingredients that we know are bad for us, we must do the same things mentally.
There are a lot of things we can’t control, but there are a lot of things we can control. And how much and the kind of media we consume has a much bigger impact on us than I think most of us realize.
If you want some extra help in this area with a fantastic tool you can use to calm your nervous system, I did an Instragram live with my friend Gunjani Patel-Oza who is a licensed therapist who is a wealth of knowledge in how the body and mind works and has a long list of modalities that she uses to calm and heal the nervous system. In this live we discussed this subject and she walked us through an EFT Tapping series that you can use on a daily basis to calm your mind and body.
And if calming your nervous system and learning how to feel safe in your body is something you’re working on, then you definitely want to look at my course Regulate + Thrive since it has now officially launched!!
In this course you will learn:
How to understand your reactions: You are not broken. Your body is responding the way it is for a purpose. Understanding this is key to moving out of those reactions.
How to shift your mindset: The provided worksheets help you to dig into what’s keeping you stuck and help you to find what needs to shift in order for you to move forward.
How to develop self compassion: In order to feel safe in our body we must have compassion for ourselves and all we’ve lived through. This course helps you to start this process.
How to rewire with tools: You’ll learn specific techniques that will teach you to rewire your nervous system responses so that they are appropriate to each situation. Resetting the dial on your nervous system responses means turning down your anxiety triggers.
How to develop a daily routine for stress resilience: We cannot live stress-free, but we can learn how to manage our stress more effectively. This course will help you develop a menu you can turn to when life gets bumpy.
How to create safety in yourself: Your nervous system keeps you in your Fight/Flight/Freeze response as long as it thinks you are unsafe. To change that, we have to learn how to feel safe with ourselves first. This course teaches you how to do that.
Use code BlackFriday10 for my lowest introductory cost plus an extra $10 off! The price will be going up in December.
I’m already getting great feedback from those who got access early. Now’s your chance to grab it at the best deal.
