module 1
anxiety:
a justified response in uncertain times
Some of the emotions you may have experienced in relation to the current world situation include:
Anxiety, Worry or Fear
Anger
Sadness
Denial
You might have experienced all of these feelings, or perhaps others that are not listed here. Whatever your experience, remember, these are not normal times! So, your reaction makes sense given the current world environment. Together we’re going to explore different ways you can manage your feelings at the moment.
It’s really understandable that we are all facing a high degree of uncertainty at the moment. This is, after all, a unique situation in which the entire world is affected and none of us know exactly what the future will hold. Although we cannot predict the future, we can cope with the fear of uncertainty.
Although you might be feeling strong emotions at the moment, and you might prefer they just went away, it’s important to know that our emotions can give us useful information - they communicate to us, to others and they motivate us into action. And that rather than pushing them away, it can be helpful to acknowledge them so they don’t sneak up on us later and cause us more problems.
Some of the normal emotions that might come up in a not-normal situation like this are:
ANXIETY and FEAR:
Anxiety pops up when our life, health or wellbeing are threatened. Makes sense right now, yeah? We’re going to learn lots of ways you can manage fear, worry and anxiety through this course, so stay tuned!
ANGER:
So do you know when the emotion of anger comes up? When a goal is blocked. That is, you had a plan or a goal and something got in the way - it hasn’t worked out like it was supposed to… sound familiar? There are plenty of things that are not going to plan right now! Take a step back, identify what was the goal? Great, now you know what’s important to you. Ask is it actually that important? We might need to reassess priorities, accept that we may need to put our goal on pause, or you might be able to do some brainstorming about other ways to meet your goal.
SADNESS:
It’s okay to feel sad, there are probably cancelled plans, missed holidays, disappointing adjustments that had to be made. Perhaps you or someone you love has been directly affected by the virus. It’s okay to feel sadness, disappointment and even boredom.
DENIAL:
I like to think of this as ‘the ostrich approach’. It can be tempting to stick our heads in the sand, and in some ways, this might be a useful coping strategy right now: limit the amount of news you take in, pretend you’re just choosing to spend your time at home. Of course, it’s not helpful to take this to the extreme - it’s not helpful to continue ‘life as it was’ at the moment - this would put both ourselves and others at unnecessary risk. At the same time, always avoiding our emotions is often not helpful either. We might need to balance denial with acceptance of our emotions and our current experience - otherwise, it might sneak up on us later!
And just briefly, let’s touch on GUILT
We don’t want to create any unnecessary guilt at the moment. How do we do this? By acting in line with our values (more on this later). The emotion of guilt pops up when we go against our own values or moral code. So ask yourself: Who do you want to be in this current situation? Do you want to be the person with a two-year supply of toilet paper while your elderly neighbours have none? Don’t worry we’ll explore this more in Module 4.