For Sanity’s Sake, Close Some Of Your Mind Tabs

“We’re about to crash. Something’s got to change.”

Prior starting 2020, a close friend forwarded this advice to me.

On his Netflix show ‘Patriot Act’, Hasan Minhaj shares about how we should tackle the new year.

“All these issues matter. But we can’t possibly care about all of them all the time. There’s even a word for it: compassion fatigue.”

According to Dr. Charles Figley, ‘compassion fatigue’ refers to an extreme state of tension and preoccupation with the suffering of those being helped, to the degree that it can create a secondary traumatic stress for the person helping.

There are many issues we should be caring about, many people we do care for, and many things we think of that preoccupies and distracts us.

And maybe all these issues do matter. It matters because we do eventually have to face them, it matters because they’re an important cause, it matters because our involvement is needed.

But when we care about everything, all at once, we can get overwhelmed. All of a sudden, it feels that there is too many tasks on our to-do-lists, it becomes too much to handle. There are days when I can’t progress at all because I feel so stuck by my “I should do something but I can’t seem to pull myself together” thoughts.

Another dear friend of mine joked that both of us are unfamiliar with truly unwinding when we say we are taking a rest. “For as long as we are anxious, we are not truly resting!,”Wallea said. Our minds keeps running even when we are ‘supposed’ to rest.

“It’s like how we have 50 tabs open in our mental browsers. And we’re about to crash. Something’s got to change.”

I’ve asked myself, “Why can’t I just do something? What is wrong?”.

When Hasan Minhaj compared our minds to our internet browsers, I felt that this description helped visualised the problem out for us so well.

When we open up so many tabs at once in our browser, at least one of these things will happen:

• Your browser shuts down or gets laggy from the amount of tabs opened;
• You forget which information you got from which tab.

This same concept applies to us when we have too many things going on in our minds. We might either be distracted by our plans to pick between what we should be doing first, which goal we must get through or ‘we’re screwed’, our lack of motivation to do the task, or our own physical bodies’ exhaustion due to our expectations.

When we get exhausted, it is understandable that we would crash like our browsers would.

Something has to change.

“So this is what I’m pitching for 2020: give yourself a break. Just pick a couple of things to not care about, for your sanity.”

I often get frustrated with myself whenever I am unable to meet my own expectations. I have days spent in a daze, head heavy, and my mind focused on everything else except on what I should be doing.

Hasan Minhaj advises us to “pick a couple of things to not care about” for the sake of our sanity. To be honest, this is easy to say, but hard to execute. However, it is a vital step for us to feeling better.

Instead of being overwhelmed by how much we have to do, we can break down our tasks by:

• the deadline,
• reasonable expectations,
• taking into account a work and rest ratio, and
• our own well-being.

The common denominator I realised from my off days, is when I get in the mindset of almost ‘threatening’ myself to progress: You must, you should, you could have, will you actually be able to, can you?

All these statements are hurtful, scary, anxiety-rideen, sparred on by guilt— and they all came from me. This reminds me of a quote from John Green’s ‘Turtles All The Way Down’: “But you give your thoughts too much power. Thoughts are only thoughts. They are not you. You do belong to yourself, even when your thoughts don’t.”

“I’m not saying, ‘Shut down your browser.’ Just close a couple of tabs.”

We will have days that are less productive. We will have days when our engines are not as smooth. We will have days where we need to ask for extra help to function.

And all of these — are okay.

Does that mean we have to switch off everything and throw in the towel?

Not necessarily, though there are some days when we really need to just rest physically.

But we can close a few tabs. It can be in many forms. Realising that one of our dreams can be pursued on a further date. Re-organising the system, or delegating tasks if we are working in a team. Taking a 10-minute break to reward yourself in between each half hour of work. Setting more realistic expectations, what can be done within this amount of time and what can’t.

Learning to treat yourself kindly — instead of saying “I should complete this otherwise I’m screwed”, say “I will try to finish this pending task first as the deadline is nearest. I will deal with the rest after I complete this.”

I myself am still learning. I still have anxiety-ridden thoughts that drive me up the wall or they continue to guilt me. I still struggle to complete some of my tasks, as I get so worried about the outcome that it disrupts my process. I get scared, and so do all of us.

Kyo Maclear says in ‘Birds Art Life Death’: “Strong one moment, vulnerable the next, we falter because we are alive…”

For sanity’s sake, close some of your mind tabs. Let us learn how to feel better, and in turn, do better for ourselves.

Let’s continue walking on this journey — together!