Photo by Kaleidico on Unsplash

I was just staring at the screen. Ten tasks in bright green before me. I looked at them once. Twice. I blinked and I am pretty sure it was ten minutes.

There is a wild misconception about what a nervous breakdown may look like. It can be different for anyone, really. I see it as a way for my brain to cope with incredibly painful and stressful events.

A nervous breakdown (also called a ‘mental breakdown’) generally refers to a sudden, acute, but ultimately time-limited crisis in mental health that means for a certain time you are unable to carry on with your everyday life.

It’s that feeling of hitting rock bottom, or not having the energy and will to do anything.

There is no exact route to having a nervous breakdown but they generally tend to have a catalyst or a series of catalysts, as life events that are both unpredictable and uncontrollable, can leave people vulnerable.

A breakdown is not a formal condition. Most people actually respond to that feeling of overwhelm, that tipping point, by just being unable to move.

I remember a friend being bed-bound for a week. Once I ended up being almost blind for a few hours.

In this case, I just stared at a blank screen, motionless. I could not get started with my day. Decision paralysis, you may call it. Anxiety was washing over my body. My brain just blanked, and I started breathing heavily, fighting a panic attack.

For a short five minutes, I felt like I lost control of myself.

When talking about mental health, there is this misconception, you see. It’s like at some point you get woke enough that you do not have to put the daily work in to protect your mind. To meditate daily.

Sure, you can cultivate self-awareness. Yet that will never stop the feelings to come up. What it does, however, is allowing me to see those feelings and catch them early enough to interrupt the pattern.

Make space.

In between the tasks, in between the meetings, and the commitments. That space, the one I daily cultivate to just be, allows me to pick myself up a bit faster.

Let’s get back to that moment, the one where you left me, dear reader, staring at a list of tasks. Still breathing heavily, still motionless.

What did I do in the end?

I slowed down my breaths. I left everything where it was, put a jumper on, and went to a walk by the river. I ignored my calendar and left the house.

I do this every morning, as my lifeline to start the day right. I consciously made sure I would let go, even if for five minutes. Sometimes I would cry, or scream, or just breath.

Release can come in different forms, after all.

Moments of fear, overwhelm, worry are part of our rich tapestry of emotions.

When those moments arise, what if we were to interrupt that pattern? What if we were to place ourselves outside of that narrative, and start watching those feelings?

If you are struggling, remember that you can tap into your very own toolkit at any time

• What can you do to make more space into your day?
• What can you use to interrupt a difficult pattern of thoughts or feelings?

I am not going to sugar-coat it to you, it is extremely hard to get out of those moments sometimes. The brain can be too tired to rationalize how to get out of that void.

Yet, making a conscious effort to create that space for ourselves is key.

Finding peace during uncertain times

As more uncertainties pile up, work, jobs, and business may need to shift and adapt again. It’s a possibility we need to account for.

As I was trying to bring a bit of solace, first I took some time for us to have an impromptu workshop and realize what made us feel overwhelmed.

I then proceeded to stand up in the middle of the room and do an improv acting representation of how, most days, our worries are either related to something that is not there yet (and a scenario that we sadly cannot control) or things we cannot do anything about — regrets of past choices.

As I was shuffling between past, present, and future in my best rendition of a charade game, I pointed out that, although valid, the outcomes linked to the 250 future scenarios that may happen at any given time is something we sadly cannot control.

As such, living too much in the future is taxing our little brains with questions we seldom have answers for.

I am making a bit of a joke of the episode, but in my own way, I was trying to use this example as a reminder that, if we focus too much on what we cannot control, anxiety and pure paralysis will kick in.

I am very much a believer in realism with a pinch of faith and hope.

We either keep looking at the same old scenario that just happened, or we have the tendency skipping forward — in both cases missing what is happening in the very present moment.

Fear, depression, despair always come up because we’re stuck in the past looking back, whilst anxiety is the fear of the future, which means we keep skipping forward and always anticipating what’s gonna happen next.

A simple exercise to keep you grounded

After my improv session, we sat down and both wrote up to 10 things we could control in that given moment.

This is a very simple way to reframe the way we look at ourselves and the world. Currently, so many people are feeling the pressure of carrying the weight of the world on their shoulders.

By using mindfulness and stillness as a way to get clarity and peace, we can simply find the compass to keep yus grounded every day. If this sounds like you, I'd recommend asking yourself this very same question every day for the coming week:

“What can I control today?”

Maybe it’s the way you talk to yourself, or how you manage your day or the way you interact and support your partner.

Write down up to 10 things you can think of. I’ll give you a little starting point: your breath. You can always come back to your breath.

Taking ownership of our minds and our thoughts is not a form of control itself, it is a way to fully appreciate and accept ourselves in the way that we feel anything.

Being able to reframe the way I look at mindfulness and the present moment really helped me feel more in control of my thoughts and my feelings.

I am holding the vision of what I want for my future, but I let it go to allow myself to be appreciative of the little things I am enjoying in the present moment.

If you are feeling overwhelmed today, remember that as human beings we are constantly learning and that listening within (or talking it out) sometimes is all you really need.

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