It Is Okay To Feel Overwhelmed By The Current State of The World
Does anyone else log into their newsfeeds and feel overwhelmed by the amount of news-worthy stuff going on in their world at the moment? Followed by a feeling of guilt because you’re sitting somewhere reading about it, while there are people out there LIVING it?
If you are anything like me, you WANT to be informed and in the know. You WANT to know what is going on in the world. You WANT to be educated on the lives of people outside your four walls. But it gets draining. It gets overwhelming. It gets suffocating to be feeling all these different feelings at the same time.
I feel guilty that these things overwhelm me when they do not affect me in such a profound way as it affects other people. I feel guilty that I am comfortable here in my home, while other people are displaced and feel locked in their own home, yet reading about it makes me feel overwhelmed. I feel suffocated by the constant bad news cycle. But that bad news cycle is reality. People are being killed, people are being displaced, they’re contracting deadly viruses, we’re living in a pandemic- the world is not a good place at the moment and that reality is reflected in the news cycle.
The thing is, I have learnt, is that we cannot take on the emotions and feelings of every single person in this world without it affecting us. There is such a thing as caring TOO much. We only have so much space within us to care for things before it starts affecting us mentally.
Given the current state of the world, it is OKAY to log into your newsfeeds and log out again just as quickly. It is okay to say “I don’t have the capacity for this at the moment”. It is okay to feel completely and utterly overwhelmed by the amount of bad news we receive on a daily basis.
Taking time away from the media will help. Tell people you are not in a position to discuss current world events. Take time for yourself. Be a little bit selfish. Prioritise self care. Have a cry if you have too, let it out, release some of those emotions you are feeling all the damn time.
Know that you are not a bad person for feeling this way. You are human. We are all humans who have emotions, who feel emotions and sometimes we need a break from feeling. It is okay to be overwhelmed by the current state of the world, even if you are not living through all of it.
