Create a Power Narrative in Trying Times

I thought I was about to burst out crying, but then I sneezed. Yep, I just confused the need to sneeze with feelings of overwhelming grief. This quarantine thing is weird. “Unprecedented” (award for best overused word of the pandemic!) Intense, bizarre, just… weird.

It’s a jumble of polar opposites, and this is certainly true for working parents. Whereas before we did two full-time jobs (parenting plus our paid career) in two separate shifts, we now do them simultaneously. Despite this intense double job, the pace of daily life has slowed down considerable for most. Now we sleep in (at least more than before), we wear stretchy pants all day if we choose, and we literally do not need to BE anywhere.

Unexpected responsibilities have come hurtling at us out of the blue – caring for our own kids 24/7 (with zero outside help); homeschooling (congratulations, you’re now a teacher!); working remotely; dealing with the emotional turmoil of an upended existence. At the same time, so many crushing pressures of the 21st century rat race have dissolved into thin air – fighting traffic, the mad morning rush to get out the door, endless errands and activities… that feeling of running so fast and so hard towards an ever-distant desert mirage.

Life in quarantine is simpler, yet more challenging. Slower, but at times intense. Less demanding, but filled with new levels of multitasking. We feel grief, and gratitude. Worry, and relief.

In short, life within the pandemic is just a more intense version of… well, life. With its polar opposites and its rainbow of emotions. It is confusing.

The content people are putting out reflects this myriad of reactions as well. Some articles motivate people to grab this season of life by the horns, while others dig into the need to slow down and nurture our emotional health.

Whether you choose to kick into high gear to tackle a great new endeavor or hunker down during the quarantine is a personal choice. Only you can know when to push and when to slow. The tool that I would like to offer today is geared toward our mental, not physical, reactions to what is going on. It is called creating a “power narrative.” It has to do with the way you view what is happening to you (for you) as a result of the pandemic. This mindset can help everyone, regardless of whether you are pursuing writing the next great American novel or just trying to get by day by day.

Our mind shapes a large part of our reality. Regardless of events happening in our lives, the meaning we take from them is just as important as the events themselves. To put it another way, the quality of our lives is made up of the quality of our emotions. How we react emotionally to events within our day, our week and our year steers our overall existence.

We can control our emotional reactions by manipulating the way our brain interprets the events in our lives. Manipulation is a word with a negative connotation, but I love this concept so much and was blown away when I first heard it explained. Manipulating your brain’s understanding of reality has nothing to do with denying the truth, burying real emotions or pretending everything is fine when it isn’t. It is also much deeper than “positive thinking.” 

On the contrary, the strategy of manipulating your brain is deeply rooted in self-reflection and connecting to reality.

To a greater or lesser extent, our lives have all been disturbed by the global pandemic. Some have experienced tragedy, such as the loss of a loved one, or are in a true state of financial desperation or mental health crisis. I do not pretend that one mindset strategy will magically lift someone out of their current trauma. This strategy is geared towards those of us who are being inconvenienced, more than anything, by the pandemic.

Creating a Power Narrative:

1) Get aware of your emotions. Life looks different now, and with change come strong emotions. There was a thread on social media in which everyone was talking about how hard the pandemic has been, and someone posted that it’s not hard; it’s inconvenient. Many of us keep having to check our privilege throughout this ordeal, reminding ourselves of the comfortable home, modern conveniences and full access to nutrition we continue to enjoy. Nonetheless, we are human, and negative feeling such as stress and anxiety will come up.

The first step in writing a positive narrative for yourself during the COVID-19 crisis is getting in touch with your feelings. You do not need to suppress them or shame yourself for feeling whatever it is you feel. Eventually, though, we want to move through negative feelings towards healthier and happier ones.

2) Catch the negative narrative. Once you identify the feelings that bubble up for you throughout your day, the next step is to “catch” yourself inventing a tragic narrative of your current situation. Narratives of doom and gloom, tragedy and victimization happen when a negative event or situation triggers your emotions, you allow yourself to stay in that place of negativity, and your brain takes off on a rant about how awful everything about your life is.

We create these wretched narratives all the time, and we must be especially vigilant during such unusual circumstances. There are many triggers firing from all directions. You are now with your children 24/7, with absolutely no relief in the form of daycare, nanny, grandparents, baby-sitters or opportunities for interaction with other kids. Stress, irritation, exhaustion. You might actually be attempting to get work done at the same time as you care for your minions. Extreme multitasking, constant interruption, frustration. Every fun thing you had planned for the next 6 months, from taking your toddler to the bouncy place to your family vacation overseas, is likely out the window. Disappointment, boredom, isolation.

Regardless of how your “suffering” compares with the suffering of your neighbor or someone in a developing country, what you experience day by day is going to cause real emotions. The trick is to maintain enough self-awareness that you can catch yourself going down the “my life sucks” rabbit hole and stop it before you disappear into the abyss of self-pity.

3) Connect to reality. Find a different slant. You might think that manipulating your mind to interpret reality differently sounds a little “coo-coo.” It has nothing to do with denying what is going on or denying emotions. Every second of every day is made up of many realities, and it would be impossible to focus equally on everything that happens to us at all times. Our brain takes in information, and we process it in our mind, which sends signals to us in the form of emotions.

I have been at home for the past six weeks with a four-year-old and now ten-month-old, while attempting to teach Spanish remotely to 160 8^th graders. My own children require constant care, attention and especially feeding. My only time to get actual work done is after 9pm. The house is wrecked. I have not gone anywhere outside my own neighborhood in six weeks. I trip over the same godforsaken black stuffed dog with a Christmas scarf 27 times a day, every day, because my son insists it’s “a lava with hands and feet,” and four-year-old logic dictates that a lava with hands and feet must be in that exact spot in the hallway at all times.

These are the facts. This is my reality. But there is another parallel reality that is just as real and true. The other narrative is that, since COVID-19, my children and I sleep 2-3 hours later each morning. Our daily three hour commute? Gone. Instead of seeing my kiddos (awake) for a couple hours a day, I get to spend the entire day with them. I’m able to push that extra bit of water, fruits and veggies that were lacking in my son’s diet. Despite not being able to sit and work a full eight-hour shift, I continue to receive a full paycheck. I am not nearly as exhausted as I was working outside the home, and I am now able to write at night more often.

There are two completely different narratives. And of course, my life is a combination of both of them. But the point is, I want to train my brain to register the blessings more than it picks up on the hardships. Believe it or not, recognizing blessings is a habit. Complaining is a habit.

When you start to go down the victim rabbit hole, you can re-connect to a different reality by asking yourself, “What am I grateful about in my life right now?” This question will help you find a different, more uplifting slant on the situation.

4) Re-tell the story. Once you are able to connect to the positive parts of your current circumstance, you can create your power narrative. I recommend literally telling your story to yourself mentally, or writing it down in a journal. Tell yourself all about what you are gaining from this challenging season of life, whether that’s improved fitness, quality time with your children, more sleep, a slower pace. Some will have to dig a bit deeper to find the positives. Remind yourself of this powerful sentiment: “Life isn’t happening to you. It’s happening for you.”

Recognize how more positive emotions emerge as you learn to take new meaning from your circumstances. It is precisely these emotions – gratitude, power, joy, abundance, growth, pride, fulfillment, etc. – that make up the quality of our days. That should be a massive motivator to keep re-focusing our brain on what is good.

6) Rinse and repeat. Keep doing this, over and over. You will not get perfect at it. You probably will not even get good at it. Do not expect it to ever come easily. Understand you need to go through all the steps, each time. And that means starting, every time, with the negative emotions and the negative narrative. It is called being a human being. We experience something difficult, and we feel emotions. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. What holds us back is when we choose to stay in that space. Some days you might need to. It is not a reason to shame yourself or to give up on working towards healthier mindsets. The key, whenever and however you are able, is to get back up and try it again.

This is simply a tool. Used in good faith, it can help you, in small or significant ways. The more you use it, the better it will work.

I was washing dishes late last night, my mind wandering, when it suddenly occurred to me that it will be at least four months until I have to do the hateful, dreaded morning hell of getting two children off to daycare and two adults to work on time. I already knew this, but the realization hit me like I had been body slammed by a rainbow. I had this thought that has always bubbled up in my mind in certain moments throughout my life: “I’m so lucky. Things always work out perfectly for me.” Then I felt a moment of guilt – guilt that I was deriving joy from a situation bringing pain to so many around the world. Followed by a flash of reflection, in which I realized that things are not “working out perfectly.” Given the choice between pre-pandemic or post-pandemic life, the former is the clear option. After this quick succession of split second emotions and thoughts, it finally dawned on me that I was feeling the joy of my power narrative.