Life is too stressful and I’m LOSING myself 😭
What do you do when you just don’t know what else to do?!
Hi friend!
If you’re going through a traumatic event right now or some stressful situation and you feel like you’re losing yourself through it, then this may be for you!
First a reminder —
You are so not alone in feeling the way you do.
I know the feeling…Because I too, have been in these murky spaces where life has gotten so stressful to the point where I felt like I was losing myself.
Life can get really hard right? If it isn’t one thing, often times it’s another.
Life can throw so much shit at us and sometimes it just becomes too unbearable to hold.
And so like how do you not lose yourself when you feel like your whole world is falling apart?
Through my own self healing journey, I’ve discovered that there is a way to preserve our energy, to remain grounded, and not so lost in the mess of whatever it is we are going through.
I have learned that we don’t have to lose ourselves in the midst of chaos.
…And that’s what I want to share with you here.
But first we need to understand something about life.
“…we don’t have to lose ourselves in the midst of chaos.”
There’s a natural flow to life.
We can call this ‘natural flow’ — the zone of resilience.
This zone of resilience is where most of us strive to be in our day to day lives. It’s when we can stay afloat and move through our days without resistance & instead with ease.
For many of us, we do live day to day in this zone. We wake up, we eat, we run errands, we go to work, we come home, we shower, we go to bed. Nothing major or disruptive happens to throw us off course. We just naturally flow through the day.
Sometimes though…traumatic or stressful things happen that disrupts that flow.
And what I’ve learned is that when a traumatic or stressful event happens, there’s 3 things that can occur:
The High Zone
1. We can get stuck in the HIGH zone which leads us to feel edgy, irritable, anxious, angry & panic'd. We may be stuck in a thought loop of racing thoughts, difficulty concentrating and hyper focused on everything “bad” that’s happening or going wrong.
And/or
The Low Zone
2. We can become stuck in the LOW zone, leaving us to feel numb, depressed & exhausted. We may get stuck in a rut where we withdraw, disconnect from ourselves and others. We may lose hope, get lost in doubt. We may feel depleted, fatigued, lethargic.
The Third Zone (back to center)
The third thing that can occur when a stressful or traumatic even happens can be to remain in the zone of resilience without getting tossed around like some rag doll.
The third zone is a skilled zone that we can learn to develop or strengthen to help us maintain our sense of resilience. It’s the zone that allows us to feel the highs and the lows without getting lost in either.
& there are several ways to do this.
Below are 5 skills I use to help me remain resilient and maybe these skills can help work for you too.
Taking deep breaths to stay calm —Deep breaths help to regulate our emotions and also helps us to maintain composure during stressful moments, preventing an escalation into the high zone.
Assessing the situation realistically— Taking a step back to realistically look at what we are experiencing objectively can help us to get clear about what’s happening so that we can understand the challenge. This can then help lead to better decision making & prevent getting lost in distortion and becoming emotionally disregulated.
Focusing on problem-solving rather than giving into the overwhelming emotions — Instead of getting lost in the big uncomfortable feelings, we can choose to instead think about what we can do to make things better. This can help us to take control and not let our emotions take over.
Seeking support from others — Connecting with others is medicine. Talking to friends or family when things are tough can be helpful because this gives us an opportunity where we can get an outsiders support, advice, or just have someone to be there for us. It's like having teammates when you're facing a challenge.
Reminding yourself of past successful coping strategies— Seriously though…think back to moments in your past when you faced problems and got through them. This is helpful because it can remind you that you're strong & capable and this can empower you to figure out how to handle what's happening now.
In summary— You can do hard things my friend. You have what it takes to remain centered even through chaos. Breathe, connect to the present moment, remember who you are, reach out to someone if it’s too heavy and above all TRUST yourself & your process.
You got this.
SENDING YOU SO MUCH LOVE
BLESSINGS & namaste 🙏🏽