How to Deal With the Stress of an Uncertain Future When You’re Generally Unwell
As someone whose brain is exclusively a storage unit for existential dread, I have extensive experience contending with an endless buffet of uncertainties. Take climate anxiety, for example. I can send myself into a spiral faster than you can Google, “How long do we have left?” Please. That’s child’s play! Call me when you Google the heat death of the universe (search at your own risk). Then we can party. And by party, I mean have a complete breakdown in the middle of Vitamin Shoppe at 2 in the afternoon. Will my student loan debt be canceled or not? I don’t know, but let’s go spend the money we don’t have at Target.
Then there are the worries that flash across my brain like push notifications—you know, the kind that accost your phone after you turn it back on after a long flight. Except I can’t disable them. As (heavily) medicated as I am, I am still not spared from the terror(s) du jour. Unless I take a hammer to all of my electronics and spend the rest of my days being consumed by moss in the middle of the woods somewhere (swoon), I can’t escape both the imminent and slowly encroaching threats to our livelihoods (AI taking over, needing to list my parents’ home as collateral in order to buy eggs) and humanity (global warming, the GOP) on the whole.
So, what do I do to deal?
The good news: all hope is not lost. It just feels like it is. While there are things we can do at the micro-level—that we hope will spur change on the macro—we are still sitting here, steeping in existential dread pretty much all of the time. I can’t control that, and neither can you, Gina. My secret? If things are going to get worse, SO AM I.
I am the last person to deploy any kind of adage or affirmation you would see on some text-based graphic on Instagram, but if I were forced to choose one that applies to what I’m extolling in this essay, it would be: “It’s OK to not be OK.” (Ugh.)
Greg Mania
Now, America may run on Dunkin’, but I run on delusion. However, in order for me to function at this capacity, I do have to counterbalance it by being realistic once in a while. So I ask myself: How does the paper straw I’m drinking my latte out of directly combat the handful of giant corporations belching carbon dioxide into the atmosphere? Is that singular paper straw drafting regulatory laws to present to Congress that would help mitigate the disastrous global repercussions of corporate greed? Is that paper bag I paid 75 cents for at the grocery store going to spearhead one of the countless paradigm shifts that need to happen if we’re going to salvage any semblance of a future?
Second: if I’m being realistic, what can I actually do? Sure, I can flail my arms and repeatedly scream about the importance of down-ballot voting. I can research reputable resources to send and share. I can grab a friend and suggest we get involved in civic engagement through volunteer work. Or find other ways to contribute to my community in a meaningful and impactful way. I make an effort to connect with organizers and heed their calls to action, among other things of the ilk. These are all tangible things, and remembering there are things that I can do as both an individual and part of a collective brings me some solace.
And third: edibles.
What more can I do without burning out at a significant rate? Why waste precious energy trying to perpetually exude positive vibes when I can lay out the extra large heating pad I bought directly from an Instagram ad at 2 in the morning while exceedingly high on the ground of the trenches I find myself in? Why not light a wildly overpriced scented candle, and spend hours on my phone sending depression memes to my equally depressed friends while some CW show of yore casts a soft glow on my face not unlike the way Morticia Addams is always lit by one beam of light across her eyes in Addams Family Values?
It’s not so much a “wave the white flag” mentality as it is an “I will continue to resist, but will be supine in the meantime” one. I’m not throwing my hands up in defeat and exclaiming, “What’s the point?!” I am wiping my fingers that are coated in a thin layer of Smartfood white cheddar popcorn dust on my duvet and sticking my nose in some bitch-in-Ohio’s business on TikTok and muttering, “I’m not fine, but this is, and that’s enough for now,” before having a coughing fit after hitting my weed pen a little too hard.
First of all, how exhausting would it be if you could make the most out of every day? Think of how much energy we’re saving by wasting away!
Greg Mania
I am the last person to deploy any kind of adage or affirmation you would see on some text-based graphic on Instagram, but if I were forced to choose one that applies to what I’m extolling in this essay, it would be: “It’s OK to not be OK.” (Ugh.) Unfortunately, the shoe fits.
On the bright (OK, dimly lit) side, this aphorism grants us carte blanche. What qualifies as “not OK”? Your answer is probably different than mine, which, if I’m being honest, would probably warrant a wellness check. Again, it depends on whom you ask, but that’s the beauty of it! We contain multitudes. Acknowledge and accept them, you unwell bitch!!!!!!!!!
Some days we don’t have the energy to even get out of bed. Take it a step further. Commit! Embrace your inner sickly Victorian woman. Drape a thick wool blanket over your lap and ask a friend to carry you into the garden, where you can wistfully stare off into the distance for an indeterminate amount of time. You’ve got the morbs, use ‘em! If your walls could talk, make them want to say, “Damn, Julie, how many episodes of Charmed can you watch in a row?”
You can’t carpe every diem. Instead of being discouraged by that fact, I flip the script and receive it as a blessing. First of all, how exhausting would it be if you could make the most out of every day? Think of how much energy we’re saving by wasting away! These are trying, difficult times; seize what’s under your nose instead, unless the Roku remote has slipped between the cushions—in which case seize your phone instead and go down a rabbit hole on YouTube of exceptionally talented retirees performing emotional renditions of some of the greatest hits of all time on America’s Got Talent. We might not have the solutions to all the world’s ills (yet), but we have options (look at how many delivery apps there are to choose from!).
Huh. Who knew? I guess I’m more of a positive thinker than I thought.
