🌻 How to Turn Political Anxiety into Something GOOD
Community First
🍁 Tomorrow, October 19th, pop by Crema Shop and get Halloween nails or a spooky floral design!
🍁 Today, on October 18th, check out this noodle party at Hai Bayo! It’s also their GRAND OPENING, officially, which is a two-day event, so pop by either day this weekend.
🍁 October 21st: Join the Center on Halsted for Stretching & Thriving, a trauma-informed yoga workshop.
🎃 Happy Saturday, Friends!
This week, our city has been under direct attack from the current administration’s directives to forcibly remove immigrants (and citizens!) from American soil. We also just passed Indigenous People’s Day, a day of observation and mourning for the colonial abuses against Native people in our country.
So for today’s newsletter, I’m sharing ways you can manage stress and anxiety during periods of political unrest. Let’s get right into it.
🍂 Check in on your people!
Start conversations with others that feel affirming, productive, and enriching. Ask folx how they’re doing. Send that message that starts with “Sorry it’s been a while…” Times of political unrest are the BEST moments for connecting with others and finding ways to change the world together.
🧺 Limit how much time you spend looking at news/politics content.
Human beings are not meant to process the amount of information we have available to us today, so use your judgment and forgive yourself for looking away when you need to.
🥮 Donate your time.
Protest or volunteer with your local community. There’s nothing better than turning your anxiety and grief into something that might actually make a difference!
👻 Step away from conversations that don’t feel good in your body.
While we can’t (and shouldn’t!) put a stop to every conversation we don’t like, it can help a lot to time conversations based on how you feel in your body. If you notice your blood pressure rising, start by stepping away for a little while. You can always revisit a conversation later. Or, if it’s in the comments section, just leave it alone! Most times, you can’t “win” by fighting online.
🦉Michigan Medicine suggests self-assessing your interest.
Spend some time thinking about why you’re engaging with the news. Think about what you can actively contribute to the causes you care about – time, money, or energy – and what limits you from doing so.
🥧 Educate yourself on topics that are important to you, but go to a source more challenging than short-form content.
Learn about immigration through a memoir about immigration. Learn about Native perspectives by reading literature by Native writers. Plus, work on your focus and alleviate anxiety by staying engaged in something important to you for a long time.
Tip: if it helps, set a timer for 10 or 15 minutes before you crack open your book. It’ll help you trust that you won’t “lose track of time” while challenging yourself to stay continuously focused.
Some recommendations:
📚 Our Migrant Souls: A Meditation on Race and the Meanings and Myths of “Latino," by Héctor Tobar - audiobook included with Spotify Premium!
📚 An American Sunrise, poems by Joy Harjo
📚 An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States, by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz - audiobook included with Spotify Premium, too!
🍁 Remember that it’s healthy to have different perspectives in your life.
Social media creates echo chambers, and even though it’s uncomfortable to hear opposing viewpoints, notice the silver linings that come with exposure to something you don’t agree with: it can help you become more confident in your opinion, or it can help you understand an angle you hadn’t considered before.
☕ When you find yourself speaking to someone who doesn’t share your opinion, ask questions first.
Ask why they believe in their perspective. Find out where they’re coming from. These are the types of details that our brains were meant to process, and when you find out where someone is specifically coming from, it can reduce some of the general dread we all feel these days.
🔮 Prioritize sleep, nutrition, hydration, and positive social gatherings.
All of these will support your mental health generally, AND they can take time away from doomscrolling.
I hope something on this list resonates with you, friend. These are difficult times, and all we can do is support what we believe in. Sometimes that means going out and speaking the truth, standing with each other in protest, and donating our resources. Other times, that means taking the best possible care of ourselves in order to preserve our abilities to act.
You got this.
With you in this wonderful city of Chicago,
Dana