Why resourcing ourselves is key for a sustainable future.
By Rachel Musson
I went to a talk last week by Eva Henje – a clinical psychologist from Sweden who was exploring the impact of our crazy world on the body’s central nervous system and our physical capacity to cope. Resilience, resourcing, wellness and thriving are constantly on my mind - recognising how our modern world is actively making us and our planet sick – and so much of Eva’s sharing was familiar.
But there was a little squiggly graph she drew that I’ve not been able to stop thinking about ever since…
The uncomfortable story of our nervous system...
The horizontal axis (x) is time and the vertical (y) is stress. Eva explored how, in our current climate, the average human is actually functioning at a fairly high-stressed state - point (a) on the chart - as our nervous system is being continuously triggered by the stresses of 21st century living.
Somehow, most of us are managing to function for now and are surviving in a high-level state of stress due to a continual undercurrent of threat.
This is not a healthy long-term state to be in, but it is possible to survive…for a while.
As stresses increase over time (b) the body’s autonomic nervous system literally maxes out, as our physiologies are literally not designed to cope with that much stress. This means that our nervous system goes into overdrive and start to shut down some of our functions –mental, physical, emotional – in order to keep us safe. This shows up as states of high agitation, overwhelm, depression etc. and is a place that increasing numbers of people are living within (c).
Further or continued levels of stress then continue to deplete our capacities to function and simply push us towards even deeper levels of retreat and shut down as a form of self-preservation (d). This shows up in people as emotional numbness, apathy, disillusionment and/ or even disassociation from reality.
Over the years, many folks have asked me why as a climate-activist whose life is dedicated to “saving the planet” I’m spending so much time talking about wellbeing. The harsh reality is that unless we address what’s happening to us all on a very basic nervous-system level, we won’t have any capacity left to be resourced enough to do much else other than crawl under the duvet and retreat.
Surviving, rather than thriving, is a state that so many of us find ourselves in. The dominant cultures of many of our societies are forcing us to live in ways which we are not designed for, with a culture of ‘more, more, more’ combined with a climate of high-pressure and endless drama pushing us ever more into overdrive. What is happening is we are literally depleting ourselves from the inside out in order to keep up with a world that is actively destroying ourselves and the planet.
And breathe...
Self-care is something of a taboo in a lot of people’s minds because we’ve been made to feel guilt or shame about the idea of spending time looking after ourselves - especially when there’s so many other people, other beings, other problems needing our attention. But resourcing ourselves, strengthening our resilience and focusing on wellbeing are not ‘nice things to do’ - they are essential qualities of activism to support anything else we may wish to do now and in the future (I wrote something recently on this and the rebelliousness of rest).
I’ve been thinking a lot about the word resource and how its meaning has been diluted over the years. When most people hear the word ‘resource’ stuff comes to mind: pens and paper, printed materials, magical stationary cupboards at work filled with endless supplies of things. However, the roots of the word resource actually emerged from the old French word ressource meaning ‘relief’ which came from the Latin word resurgere meaning to ‘recover and rise again’.
When we fill up our own cup, we have capacity to fill up others. We can also look at the word with a prefix -re (meaning to repeat) and source, appreciating that to resource ourselves is to return to source over and over again - to (re)source.
So what does it mean to resource ourselves and how can we do this?
We can recognise that unless start to resource ourselves constantly and consistently, we’re on a slow (or rapid) path to burnout.
We can really understand that resourcing ourselves allows us to resource others. (There's so much cutting-edge neuroscience to show how co-regulation and interpersonal neurobiology are powerful agents of social change - reach out if you'd like reading on this.)
We can start shifting habits and bringing practices into our daily lives to be filling our own cups
Taking a long breath is a natural way to soothe the nervous system and resource ourselves.
There's a lot here. I don't share this lightly, it's painful, inconvenient, scary even. And yet it's where we are - and the ever-increasing mental health pandemic sweeping the world is showing us the graph playing out in real life.
But this does not need to be our story, we have the capacity to shift from just surviving to actively thriving - and can start right here, right now...
Here's a few quick nervous-system hacks that bring us back to a state of equilibrium and calm – things we can do constantly to resource and recalibrate ourselves and support a healthier nervous system (all free and readily available to us all):
Time in nature
Talking & connecting with others
Singing & Humming
Hugging
Cold water exposure
Mindful breathing
One of the reasons we created the Triple WellBeing cards at ThoughtBox is to offer folks simple ways to be resourcing ourselves each day, to be connecting with others each day and to be connecting more deeply with nature each day – regular habits to shift ourselves into a state of thriving, not surviving.
NB: Holly runs a live-stream 10 minute session every Tuesday in the Hub (free for anyone to join) to share one of these Triple WellBeing practices each week.
It’s also why – as an organisation – we put our own self-care as top of the list of priorities, spending long stretches of time each day in nature, in conversation, and doing things which resource us, to enable us to be able to show up fully in the world, ready to act. Our ebook shares so much of the 'why' and 'how' of this, do download a free copy if it feels supportive.
Finally, if you’re feeling depleted today, here’s a little activity to bring you back into yourself and offer a little bit of resourcing for your day.
NB: We’re running regular courses to learn more about the why, what and how-to of Triple WellBeing practices, resourcing ourselves, our communities and our planet. Find out more and register your place (up to 100% bursaries available) here.