By Dahlia Garofalo, B.A. and Cindy Nichols Anderson, Ph.D. ABPP
Be yourself? That seems like such a tall order. Yet, identity helps us feel grounded and capable. It increases our agency, purpose, and confidence. It also helps us connect with society, loved ones, and people working towards common goals.
After COVID-19 (and many of its accompanying impacts), many of us have struggled to define our purposes. Our jobs, work environments, friends, and family members have all experienced significant change. There has been a lot of political unrest in the United States and the world abroad. Violence and community shootings continue to increase. We have been through a lot, individually and collectively, as a world.
You aren’t alone if struggling to find yourself. A lot has changed and continues to change. Below are some coping methods for finding yourself, especially when the world feels so messed up.
Practice Self-Compassion
Self-compassion involves treating yourself the way you would a good friend. Identify how you judge yourself. Do you criticize how you interact with your family or friends? Do you feel worthless, purposeless, or lazy? Do you judge your reactions to the pandemic, the news, your family, society, masks, or in-person interactions?
Forgive yourself for any past mistakes regarding your reactions, emotions, and health. When a new judgment arises, question its helpfulness. Even if true, it’s unproductive to internalize fears.
Talk back to your judgments with your “compassionate voice.” I may have social anxiety. But just because I’m awkward at times doesn’t mean I’m any less valuable, smart, or capable. I am courageous for interacting with others despite my fears. I have the power to let go of judgments concerning my social anxiety.
Put Things into Perspective
Think of the many things you survived before the pandemic. Focus on the strength you used to survive these past challenges. You may still carry some regrets and fears, but you’ve survived every past obstacle. These difficulties in part formed you into the wonderful, capable, and strong person you are today.
Focus on the moment. Don’t worry about your social anxiety when you eventually return to the office. Don’t worry about your child’s readjustment to school. Don’t worry about your mental and social health when the demands of post-pandemic life return. Focus on your current health and needs.
Likewise, be aware of how social media manipulates your sense of reality. Putting things into perspective means letting go of such comparisons between yourself and others’ presentations. Clink here for more tips on how to gain social media perspective.
Identify Emotions Without Judgment
Learn to identify your emotions in the moment. How is your breathing? Where do you feel pain or discomfort? Work on identifying how your body and mind react to different intense emotions.
Treat yourself with the same patience and love you would a struggling friend or child. Emotions can feel overwhelming and painful, but you will not die from them. You are safe in your body even if you don’t feel it.
For more information about emotional regulation, click here.
Soothe Difficult Feelings
Grounding is a powerful technique for soothing overwhelming emotions. Lay down in a comfortable position and focus on each part of your body, moving from your toes to your crown. Walk outside barefoot and focus on the sensations of your feet. Listen to a guided mediation or savor five minutes of silence.
Practice self-soothing by incorporating the five senses into your experiences. Look at pleasing art and colors on Pinterest. Open your window and listen to the wind. Clean your room, focusing on the textures of your clothing, decorations, and surfaces. Eat a piece of fruit, focusing on the flavors and consistencies of each bite.
Even if you can’t step away from a situation, remember to self-soothe. If working from home, light a candle. Put on calming music in the background. Hold a stress ball or stone. Chew on some gum or sip tea.
Practice separating your emotions from your identity. Just because you feel lazy, useless, or unwanted doesn’t mean you are. Just because you worry about getting ill or failing to readjust to post-pandemic life doesn’t mean those events will happen. Your fears and judgments are not reflective of reality.
Practice Gratitude
Gratitude can be hard to grasp in the midst of a pandemic. But it’s not about being boastful or ignorant of the problems in the world. Gratitude is merely recognizing the parts of your life that you cherish. It’s what makes your life worth living despite the heartache. It helps you learn the positive things that help you be yourself.
Keep a notebook beside your nightstand. Create a document on your desktop and write your gratitude before checking your emails in the morning. Create a wall or jar of sticky notes and invite the household to join in.
Get into the routine of writing down at least one thing you are grateful for every day. When we consciously notice the beauty in our lives, we shift our focus.
Follow Your Values
Another way to be yourself is to serve others. Helping others is an important component of mental, physical, and social health. Opportunities to work with like-minded people towards a common goal may seem limited. But there are still many nontraditional ways to follow your values.
Explore what gives you joy. Do you find joy volunteering at the humane society or food bank? Do you enjoy making food for potlucks and family get-togethers? Do you find pleasure in making a stranger smile? What about these responsibilities and connections give you purpose? Find tasks, organizations, and people to help refill that void.
Write letters to your representatives and congressmen about issues that matter to you. Register to vote. Donate to your favorite organizations. Make eye contact with strangers in the grocery store. Place picked flowers on your loved one’s work desk to brighten their day. Put away the dishes even when it’s not your turn. Thank essential workers for their service.
The world always needs volunteers. Warm Up America needs knitters and crocheters year-round. Translators Without Borders currently need help translating medical and crisis response texts. DoSomething.org fights for racial equality and human rights. Humane societies still need help fostering animals, cleaning kennels, and donating supplies. Whatever your passions and skills, you are needed.
Redefining our identity remains essential. Life changes will still occur, and we must form methods of coping with our current lives. We need to hold onto self-compassion, perspective, self-soothing, gratitude, and values in order to find ourselves, even when the world feels so messed up.
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