My ramblings on our connected world and its worry culture

My ramblings on our connected world and it’s worry culture - Podcast

It would be easy to stay in bed and cry,

Wring your hands and frown,

Allow the worst-case scenarios to fill your mind.

It would be easy to let worry rule your life,

Thrive on the need to control,

Believe you can change all you see, read, and hear on social media.

It would be easy to think you have a duty to solve all the problems of the world,

Cure a loved one’s sickness,

Right every wrong, even those in the past.

It would be easy to crave the high of helping,

Soak up fear and despair,

Fill with stress and frustration at your limitations.

Focus on being a hero,

Helping no-one,

As you drown.

It would be hard to greet each day as a new beginning,

Open your palms and smile,

Allow the day to unfold as it will.

It would be hard to let acceptance rule your life,

Thrive on no control,

Distance yourself from what you see, read, and hear on social media.

It would be hard to think you cannot change the world,

Cannot stop your loved ones from dying.

Cannot right the wrongs of yesterday.

It would be hard to crave the quiet,

Fill with trust and understand your limitations,

Focus on being alive,

Helping everyone,

As you fly.

_____________

Worry seems to be accepted as the norm, what the selfless people do, and it’s hard to break the habit, to change the mindset, but I think we need to, for ourselves and all our sakes. 

We live in a connected world, technology has opened many doors and windows on the lives of others in the world right now, today. 

This connectedness and immediacy is not a bad thing, it helps us to understand we are all part of the same species, the human race, that we are not alone. There are many wonderful and beautiful stories shared on social media, there is more information at a fingertip than ever before, there is much shared experience and joy. 

Connecting should be a comfort, should pull us together with shared understanding, and yet a disproportionate amount of sharing is negative. The suffering, the problems, the false news, the fear, and the conspiracies our wonderful complex brains create from seeing links that are not there in reality. 

In the past we were aware of our immediate local world and its issues, then we discovered machines and printing, newspapers arrived, and we were part of a wider community with more complex problems, radio and television arrived and we were aware of our country’s problems, world problems, the internet arrived and now we are aware of everyone’s problems. 

In a short period of time, we have shifted our love and energy wider and wider until we are stretched so thin and stress chemicals are a constant. 

In a family unit, we share our worries, health issues, and difficulties, not to drag our family down into our despair but to gather support, to trust them, to be reassured of their love, to know they are there to hold our hands, to catch us when we fall. Once shared these issues are not as frightening, we trust our family to be there for us, not to judge, not to make it all better, but just to be there. However, it’s not always easy to do this even in a small family unit. We try and protect each other from sorrow and grief, we know how some people in the family will worry and we may choose not to tell them anything until all questions have been answered and we know what the next steps are. But when we are ready, we share. 

If it’s not easy to do this emotional sharing in a family unit, how much more stressful is it when we are hearing stranger’s stories of woe and despair, and how much easier it is for us to share with strangers, we do not know them, what will make them sad or worry, we are not protecting them. 

Our connected world allows strangers to share with us their problems, their sorrows, their grief, their anger. We do not know them and yet our bodies and minds react as if we do. Stress chemicals flood us as we empathise and wonder how we can help.

Their photos and posts sharing their suffering and hardship somehow make us feel that we are responsible, that we can make a difference to someone’s life in another country, that we should be making this difference although it is impossible to do so, so we do the only thing we can to make ourselves feel better and share their social media post, passing the stress on and magnifying it, while we feel inadequate and frustrated.

It’s a lovely ideal that we are a one-world family, but I don’t think we are capable of sustaining that deep level of trust and love in an immediate family situation to strangers across the world. It’s too much. We need to put ourselves first. 

This may come across as selfish, harsh, as sticking our head in the sand, or ignoring the problems of others but it’s not this, please read on. 

In the pandemic everyone was experiencing the same issues, all over the world, and yet it was not a comfort, it was terrifying because our fragility was pushed to the forefront of our minds. No one was exempt and because we are blessed with intelligence and imagination many worried about the worst-case scenarios, what if the virus gets stronger? What if the vulnerable people in my family end up in hospital? What if a new strain targets young children, what if…? what if…? what if…? And because we have technology and social media those thoughts were shared and magnified not soothed as they would be with a family member when discussed with understanding of where the thoughts were coming from. 

We borrowed trouble from tomorrow, stressing our bodies and minds which lowered our immune systems and made us more vulnerable to illness and infection, the very things we were scared of and depression moved in to live alongside so many. 

But covid has been side-lined, it is a thing of the past, positive news as it lessens in its severity, as we learn to live with another disease in our midst because the media frenzy has turned it head to a new terrifying happening. 

I’m not saying we shouldn’t know or should ignore what is occurring, just be mindful of how we react. 

I am in several author social media groups and I’m aware of my sadness when one of them is suffering, and yet I do not know them. Maybe my virtual hug or heart emoji lifts their spirits for a while, but I don’t fool myself that I can remove their pain. And for me all it does is sap a little more of my energy away, thinking about these people, being sad for them, takes away a little part of my life and I don’t want that to happen, so I’ve become aware of my reaction, distance myself from their pain, send a virtual hug and move on.

This sounds selfish and yet I think social media makes us selfish, we believe all these problems are our problems, that it is all about us. But it’s not. We need to learn to keep an emotional distance. 

I’m not suggesting we should be insular, but that we need coping mechanisms, a way of putting all this information into perspective, recognising what we can and cannot do, seeing that if we look after ourselves first, we can be of more use to others.

Living without worry is an attainable goal and every small step towards it makes this a better world to live in. It doesn’t stop heartache and sorrow when a loved one is dying but it makes everything easier to cope with. 

Here are a few techniques I learnt to use after a moment of stress and worry in my life that almost broke me. They were hard to do in the beginning, change always is, now it’s easy and I am more content.

Gently push the worry away 

If you meditate you will know that thoughts pop up and you gently push them aside, I do the same with worry. I recognise it is worry and I gently send it on its way. It may come back, so I send it away again, eventually it leaves. 

Examine a worry

What is it really?

Is it fear of an unknown outcome that may never happen? Worry cannot change the future or the past, so I let it go.

Is it fear of my lack of control over a situation? Worry cannot give me control, so I let it go.

Is it fear of how I will cope if the worst happens? Worry will only weaken me making coping with whatever happens harder, so I let it go. 

Understanding worry is not a superpower, it’s a poison

I recognise that worry cannot solve any problems, it only makes them. Stress chemicals fill my body, I do not sleep, I cannot concentrate or focus, and it drains my energy. It is not going to change the world, only lessen my ability to change the small things I can.

If I remove the poison, I am healthier, happier, and stronger. 

Realising not worrying is not selfish or uncaring

Looking after myself means I am healthy and capable of looking after others.

Realising that worry never solved a problem, means I can solve more problems as creativity is stifled by stress. The bonus here is I am more creative than ever, with boundless ideas and the energy to try them out. 

Caring about the people who surround me, physically and emotionally, means I are successful in helping others.

Accepting my limitations means my energy is put to where I can use it best rather than wasted on things I cannot do.

Accepting I don’t have control over what is happening somewhere else means I make a difference where I are.

Visualise a barrier

I am empathetic and tend to absorb other people’s emotions and worries so when I am going into a stressful environment I visualise a barrier, it’s a bubble of calm between me and other’s emotions. It doesn’t make me heartless, in fact it allows me to see the situation is not about me, and then I can lend an ear or a hand in a more helpful way. I am stronger and happier. 

Thank you for reading my rambling thoughts. 

I’m writing this to try and understand what is happening in the world, wondering why there is such a greedy frenzy surrounding any disaster, why so many people are worrying about things they have no control over. 

And yes, it may help someone else when they read it, but that is not its goal. Its goal is to help me, to get these thoughts and ideas out of my system. For me to consolidate my way of dealing with worry. 

I’m publishing and sharing this because I am an author, not because I want you to magic away the issues in my life, so please do not feel you have to take any action on my behalf. 

If you want to do something for yourself, well then, that’s up to you.