After spending a few days in mandatory self-isolation, some information has become increasingly clear to me. They are rich material about existing and moving on in times of crisis. Like me, many colleagues have shared their knowledge about the psychological mechanisms involved in the confinement experience.

It is possible to analyze this from different angles and subsequent intervention. There is a range of possibilities and paths. However, they all converge towards the goal of minimizing the impact of the current situation on our physical and mental health. In my case, as a doctoral researcher in Psychology and expert in Stress Control, I choose the latter angle. Stress, which was initially called General Adaptation Syndrome by the physician Hans Selye in 1956, is one of our organism’s resources to adapt to situations that threaten our internal balance, our homeostasis.

According to this definition, we perceive the positive role of Stress in maintaining our survival. But why then do most of the publications on the topic propose to control, reduce and even end stress? The answer lies in how long it takes to activate this resource. When it becomes prolonged and intense, it can cause excessive wear in the body, an exhaustion, which culminates in the depletion of energy reserves, which are used to preserve our immune system. Stress management requires the use of a wide range of resources.

The challenge is to build our own Survival Manual in Times of Crisis!

We can start the process by becoming aware of the most disturbing emotions at this moment, which can be worry, distress, anguish, anxiety, irritation, anger, fear, despair, sadness, discouragement, hopelessness, among others. It is also important to realize at what time of the day they increase and in what situations they are usually present. With these two pieces of information very clear in your mind, emotion and situation, ask yourself how you are interpreting that situation that makes you experience such emotion.

For example, I feel worried when I read news about the increase in the number of the disease cases worldwide, because I think I am about to get sick too. By identifying all parts of this process, we can get some information about our internal turmoil in the face of external instabilities. The first one is related to time, the distinction between past, present and future. Try the exercise of identifying the time of your emotion and you will notice that in most of the day it is related the past or future. In the example mentioned previously, it was in the future. But I could also be sad because of the losses caused by days of confinement, by everything I am putting aside. Wherever your mind is right now, this is not an issue; it will make this move automatically.

We are always building stories about what's going on. And watching this movement gives a sense of freedom. I feel free when I notice that the present moment is a space where many things happen, but that my mind is engaged in only one of these things, trying to fix what it considers wrong, or imperfect, or absurd. From there I can expand my visual field to everything that belongs to here and now, allowing for reality to be as it is; knowing that nothing needs to be excluded so that I can exist, so that I can breathe and so that I can live. True freedom lies in understanding that circumstances are as they are, and so we connect with nature as it is. Decreasing the flow of judgments and criticisms results in emotional regulation. When we let our mind run indiscriminately on autopilot, we will see that just the opposite occurs, we feel emotionally overwhelmed. Do you want to know how to practice balancing your emotions? Imagine that they are like the sound of a melody, and that you can adjust their volume; whenever you notice that the sound is too loud and unbearable, you should know that you can gradually turn it down until it is bearable and acceptable.

We are not looking for absolute silence, but for a noise that does not prevent us from moving on.

About the author: Juliana Caversan is a psychologist and cognitive behavioral consultant. PhD in Psychology from the Graduate Program in Psychology at UFRJ (2015).  She holds a master's degree (2007) and a degree in Psychology from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (2002).