Humans are hardwired to react to fear, distress and danger in these 3 basic ways. In most cases one response tends to be dominant. However, depending on multiple factors, we’ll vacillate between the three.
FIGHT doesn’t always mean rushing in blindly with our dukes up. In some cases it can look like THRIVING and being on top of your game when it seems like everything else is imploding. It can manifest as going on a cleaning frenzy, being on fire to take the next big leap, feeling massively energized to start a new project, racing to take immediate action, reacting to social media posts and/or jumping into arguments, feeling irritated, annoyed, judgmental or downright pissed by other’s behavior. For many of us it’s easier to feel angry or on fire (in a good or not so good way) than to really feel our fear or grief.
FLIGHT can be literally running away from a threat. It can also look like binge-watching Tiger King, baking a triple batch of brownies and inhaling most of them in a single sitting, day drinking a box of wine, totally ignoring any distress and instead focusing exclusively on the positive and/or disregarding the advice and directives from wise experienced authorities and feeling exempt from the rules. Avoidance and denial are ways we try to keep ourselves safe. This is particularly true when something is SO BIG we can not fathom its magnitude.
FREEZE is when we feel cornered so shutting down becomes the most viable option. We mammals are hardwired to freeze as our last resort. This response is programmed into our lizard brain. In earlier times when Lions, Tigers or Bears were a real threat, playing dead often tricked the predator into leaving prey alone. At the very least they’d let their guard down convinced they’d won the battle. That offered a second chance to make a run for it. Today danger is rarely as obvious as a big hairy beast chasing after us. SO instead of playing possum or acting like a fainting goat, freeze can look like bone-tired, world-weary exhaustion, dropping the ball and forgetting steps even for simple tasks, losing our train of thought and going silent in middle of a sentence and sleeping way more than usual. When we hit overwhelm and can not see a plan of action or an escape route, this is the natural response. Think of it as hitting the control, alt, delete keys to force a reboot of the system.
As you can see each response looks completely different. Yet the core is the same for all three… fear, distress and sense of danger. Right now nearly every person on this planet is processing the threat of CoVid-19 in some way or another. We’re inclined towards kinship and connection with people who process in a similar way. Simultaneously people who cope in different ways may baffle us or even stir up judgment, anger and frustration. Ironically this reactivity is yet another expression of the understandable emotional intensity most of us are experiencing these days.
SO here’s the thing… many of us are triggered in some way or another right now. We’re all more vulnerable, uncertain and doing the best we can. Our chains can get yanked more easily. It’s likely we’re quicker to jump to conclusions, make up stories and revisit trauma from our past. Cultivating acceptance, compassion and kindness for ourselves and others is crucial.
As we all go through this unparalleled ordeal here are some suggestions for navigating it…
- Identify your stress response MO. We make better choices when we know and recognize what we do on autopilot.
- Notice how you perceive and react to people’s behaviors. It’s a lot easier to understand choices and actions that contrast with our own when we can identify another’s stress response.
- Check yourself before you wreck yourself. It’s easy to fly off the handle, jump to conclusions, hit share on a piece of clickbait and/or do something you’ll regret later when we’re operating from one of the 3 Fs. Hit the pause button and take a breath before engaging with an annoyance. Count to 10 before cutting and pasting a meme or rant that mirrors your own indignation. Investigate your deeper agenda before criticizing and/or expressing judgement.
- Stop to consider: Does this choice support or deplete me? Will engaging contribute to the solution or to the problem? Is this pushing my buttons and why? What do I really need right now?
- Own your emotions 9 times out of 10 intense reactions to someone else’s behavior or choice arises from our unreconciled issues and/or uncomfortable feelings we’re trying to deal with or avoid.
- Be extra kind to yourself and to everyone else. Assume we are all doing the best we can. Some of us have more resilience. Some of us have more resources. Some of us are running on fumes. Some of us are so triggered and stressed that we can’t see the forest for the trees.
Victor Frankl once said… “When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” There is no doubt these are unpredictable and challenging times. While we can not know how long this will go on, what the long term effects on our civilization will be and how we’ll come out on the other side, we can use this time to cultivate mindfulness and emotional awareness.
So as we circle around the last days of our first month of quarantine here in the US, I’m wishing you mindful awareness, relief from reactivity and the Grace that comes with acceptance of what is and Deep Connection to the Universal Heart of Love
