If you are just a little bit like many who I’ve spoken with over the last few weeks, you might be still a bit exhausted, overwhelmed and or frustrated by the ongoing uncertainty and changes. Our current environment is putting a lot of stress on all of us. Everyone responds differently. Some manage quite well. Others not so great.
You might be a victim of “Cruel Optimism” – without realising it.
Bestselling author Johann Hari has written another thought-provoking book on human health and wellbeing. It’s title “Stolen Focus: Why you can’t pay attention” sounded very promising to me when I had trouble concentrating a couple of weeks ago. Same as many others, our family was impacted by a variety of Covid-related events. The book has given me a few new perspectives on how to deal with stress.
The basic idea of the book is very much aligned with my book “Naturally Successful”. I believe you can only be sustainably successful if you holistically manage all levels of self, other people and the surrounding systems well. There needs to be an everchanging balance and everything is interconnected.
“Stolen Focus” makes us aware that individual solutions to deep, societal problems won’t cut it.
Stress doesn’t just come from a failure to be mindful and calm. It’s also caused by many systemic causes that then will need to be improved on with what Zen-Master Thich Nhat Hanh called “engaged Buddhism”. Meditation and mindful living help but we also need activism for system changes.
Johann Hari writes that “(…) ’Cruel Optimism’ is a concept of taking a really big problem with deep causes in our culture – like depression, obesity or addiction – and you offer people, in upbeat language, a simplistic individual solution. It sounds optimistic because you are telling them the problem can be solved, and soon - but it is, in fact cruel, because the solution you are offering is so limited, and so blind to the deeper causes, that for most people, it will fail. (…)”
And then we might feel, we didn’t have enough will power or discipline to change our unhelpful habits where in fact, external forces were making it nearly impossible to change.
This is exhausting and we need to be more aware of it.
A few years ago, I participated in a 10-days Nature Vision Quest on Flinders Island near Tasmania. It’s very windy on the island and when I pitched my tent for the first night in the dunes, I fully underestimated the forces of the wind coming from the beach. It nearly blew my tent away and I had a very unpleasant first night. The wind didn’t change the next morning and I decided to move my tent – as best as possible out of the wind. It worked and the next 6 days were a lot more calm and less stressful.
If you are unhappy with your current job or other areas of life and feeling more and more exhausted, it might be beneficial to pause, take stock and honestly look at what is really causing your stress and exhaustion. For some challenges, it might be helpful to work on your individual habits and resilience. In some cases, you will have to change your environment. The system around you might not change fast enough for you to recover enough from your exhaustion to show up as your best self again.
Think of it like the wind – sometimes you have to bunker down and wait until it’s calm again and sometimes, it makes sense to pitch your tent somewhere else until the storm has passed. The wind is not your fault and you can’t change it. You need to be aware of how it’s impacting you.
Individual resilience is good as a solid base. Community resilience is great support. Engaged activism to change a system that constantly challenges your resilience is a necessity.
To be naturally successful as society, organisations and individuals, we need it all.
Naturally yours,
Ingrid