Meltdowns

Surviving the onslaught of failures

What do you do when you’re in the middle of a meltdown? When you’re faced with failure after failure and all you can do is collapse into a chair and shout “this just isn’t my day!” I’ll be honest, I’m in the middle of one of those right now. As of this moment, today has gone pretty rotten. Something set me off this morning, and the rage has sent me racing down the hill of dark feelings. What do you do when those moments come? When it feels like every attempt to fix it is making things worse and worse? What do you do in those moments?

The answer isn’t easy. The answer isn’t clean-cut. Sometimes, like with me today, it starts early. By 9:00 AM I was ripe with malicious anger for everything that got in my way. I had to hack it through the day. I’m not a fan of the whole “treat yourself” mantra, so making this an excuse to drown myself in sweets isn’t an option. So, what I propose is to just say screw it. Sometimes you have to crumple up the fragile, paper-like day you are having, and try again tomorrow. It doesn’t mean you’re a failure, it doesn’t mean you’re losing time, you’re just punching that reset button for a better shot at your goals. Sometimes a little time to rest and get refocused is all you need. You have to get your head out of the game to have a better, fresher head in it. Maybe you need to give up the fight for the night and go to bed early. Maybe you just need a quick break to get some air. Maybe you need a change of routine somehow. Whatever you can take, take it. 

But I’m not saying you should just collapse and leave it there. Oh no no no! You wish you could have it that easy! What I’m saying is get a breather so you can come back and finish the fight. The project must get done, the relationship must be mended, and the moods must bounce back. Never make a decision in the heat of anger, but never put off making a decision indefinitely. Take a break, get a good night’s sleep, then come back and vanquish your foes!

While you are in the heat of failure, I have found it productive to get to know it. You can heal a symptom, but if you don’t heal the underlying cause, you can’t truly say you’ve fixed the problem. I have made my greatest breakthroughs on myself as I have put myself under intense pressure. That’s why I put myself through intense challenges: I get to know what’s in my head. When I started taking cold showers, I learned what drives me, what makes me quit, why I get back up, how to get back up. The more intense the bad day, the more you should dig, asking yourself questions like why you are feeling this way? Why are you here in the first place? What is driving you to keep going? It may go back to a life pattern you are repeating. There may be other factors at play that you weren’t realizing. It may be some old wound you never took the time to heal. Of all the things that have helped me grow this year, intense pressure has been my biggest factor.

But how do I go about studying myself? How do I get started with this process of healing whatever negative nonsense is going on in my brain? I do a lot of journaling. When journaling, I usually start with the facts. “I woke up. Wanted to go back to bed. It was all downhill from there.” As you relay the facts, ask the “why’s.” “I woke up and didn’t want to get out of bed because I had a breakup yesterday.” (Please don’t send me ‘sorry’ texts, I didn’t actually have a breakup.) See if there are any more. Breakups suck, but they can be a piece of a bigger picture. “I had a breakup, she treated me the way my mom treated me as a kid.” Ouch! Learn to get to know yourself. Take some time to learn this skill. It takes practice. You may not have much to write for a while, but the more you do this, the more it will come naturally. 

My prayer for you is that you master the art of the reset button. I pray you use every opportunity to better understand yourself, and to bring a decluttering to your mind. After all, there is nowhere we spend more time in than our own minds, so best make sure they are in the most excellent of conditions. 

Until next we meet

Cheers!