A Three-Step Approach to Surviving Unprecedented Times

By Helen H. Hsu, PsyD, author of The Healing Trauma Workbook for Asian Americans

In more than twenty years as therapist, I’ve never seen so many young clients express profound existential dread. They share anxieties about pandemics, climate dread, grief about lives and opportunities lost, the rolling back of LGBTQ+ and reproductive rights, harassment of social justice movements, gun violence, and serious economic and political fears.

There have always been social inequities and systemic factors with impact upon individual and public health. Yet we have now been living through consecutive years of globally unprecedented, painful, and frightening times. We are now in a time where multiple threats and crises exist which are inescapable, and on a scale so massive that typical coping skills can’t manage. Clients benefit from doing their cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) homework to reduce unhelpful thinking habits, but still cannot escape reality-based dangers in their community or environment.

Therapists, educators, clients, and family all report feeling overwhelmed.

Sources of stress vary from the daily struggles of rising grocery and housing costs to major “meaning of life” doubts and hopelessness about the future, as well as the overall problem of loneliness—which the US Surgeon General has identified as a public health crisis.

As numerous young adult clients have said, “I can’t stop worrying about everything, and even if I could, it feels immoral to ignore all these really big issues.”

As one Marvel movie fan exclaimed: “This timeline sucks, I want to live in another time!”

We can’t opt out of the current state of affairs, so how to proceed?

A simple framework I introduce uses a three-step format to organize survivance skills and emotional energy in fraught times. I use this to organize my own thoughts and energies, and it’s been something many clients have adapted for themselves.

Fundamentally, the three-step process asks a person to consider and plan for what is helpful:

Immediately

What are the immediate priorities?

These tend to fall into categories such as taking steps to secure safety, practicing sensory grounding skills, ensuring key supplies and resources are in place, and connecting to vital support persons. Actions here range from learning self-defense skills, planning a safe route home, making a family emergency plan, keeping fidget objects and water close by, and finding a supportive space to express overwhelming emotions.

Ongoing

What are medium-term priorities?

Goals in this category include maintaining habits of wellness for exercise, rest, hydration, as well as development of and regular practice of coping skills. Here we build up long-term control over the “boring yet important” fundamentals for maximizing health and wellness, even when many other things feel out of control.

Connecting to resilience in an ongoing manner may include things like signing up for an art or workout class, engaging in therapy, or strengthening self-compassion and your repertoire of coping skills.

Future-Oriented

What are the long-term priorities?

Goals and actions in this category take longer to implement and have a “big picture” perspective. They could include actions like steps to financial planning, consulting with career coach, and community activism or seeking work with like-minded people. They may have less structure than concrete, immediate goals yet have deep meaning—such as taking charge of personal and community narratives, becoming empowered with knowledge and connections, and creating longer-term plans in connection with community.

In my culturally grounded work with people of the global majority, I recommend folks recognize themselves as a future ancestor. Planning from this mindset connects with others and develops healthy boundaries of care for the self. Investing in our health as future ancestors is also a way to invest in the communities most dear to our values.

It is the human condition that we will all have periods of stress and strife. Setting up a framework of a three-step approach for organizing what feels like a huge chaotic blob of stressors can be a useful step in navigating unprecedented times.

Helen H. Hsu, PsyD, is a licensed clinical psychologist at Stanford University. She is past president of the Asian American Psychological Association; and the American Psychological Association, Division 45: Society for the Psychological Study of Culture, Ethnicity, and Race. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.