Dealing with the mental hot potatoes of cognitive dissonance around Trump’s election

My brain (perhaps like yours) is in a state of panic trying to resolve some serious cognitive dissonance about the world. Specifically, these two beliefs: “Trump could never be president” and “Trump will be president”. It cascades to a wider set of fairly critical beliefs in my overall mental model of the world, triggering other powerful dissonance waves around things like “I love my country” and “I hate my country” and “the world is generally trying to be good” and “the world is evil and fucked”.

In the spirit of self-reflection and knowing myself better (and, ideally, before I start lashing out and seeking revenge), I’m trying to capture a list of mental strategies that have occurred to me over the last couple days.

Cognitive dissonance at this scale is rare and extremely agonizing (both individually and as a community), and we have not been encouraged to seek guidance on how to resolve it in the best way. Consider this an attempt to do some of that because I still can’t do anything else.

This is an unedited, incomplete, still-developing list of various mental strategies that have been proposed to me by my subconscious (but definitely not the final approach that I endorse or am proud of). Each is an attempt to resolve my new dissonance in some way. My hope is that by letting them rise and fall I can eventually make a conscious choice about the strategy that is based on the values I most wish to express in the world, and adopt that one.

• Denial: No way. This isn’t happening! I will drink until I forget what is happening.
• Blame others: There is a huge list of people, demographics, and organizations that have cycled through my blame spotlight. From of course Donald Trump himself, to James Comey, to every pundit, politician, or even comedian that helped normalize him. Blaming others helps distance myself from the problem, which turns into outrage.
• Outrage: I will fucking punch the first Trump supporter I see. I will cut all ties with people who didn’t vote for Hillary. I will throw my money at organizations that are now in danger. I’ll hack Twitter accounts and create spam bots that fight back against all the reddits and gamergaters and alt-right douchbags of the world.
• Blame ourselves: I have also cycled through all kinds of self-blame: we didn’t do enough, Hillary didn’t X, white people are terrible, but we have abandoned them in many ways. Bernie did Y, his supporters didn’t do enough Z. Blaming ourselves helps distance myself from the problem by having diagnosed it, which moves me into shame.
• Shame: I can’t even look my own children in the eye without feeling shame about the world I now want to hide from them. This isn’t the world I wanted to introduce them to. I’ll create an even stronger bubble around us.
• Social withdrawal: I’ll delete my Facebook, Twitter, etc. Cancel all media subscriptions, stop watching TV, stop reading all news, hide in a hole until the next election.
• Community: Show up in my community, join movements that matter, help organize and fundraise, prepare for the next battle.
• High road: I need to be an example, smarten up on various solidarity strategies, join and/or build one of my own. Meet Trump supporters, try to better understand their stance, their pain, and try to help them. Build tools that increase community support, empathy, shared vision, and trust.
• Career shift: After smartening up, evaluate all possible careers and potential impact and drop everything to move there.
• Political withdrawal: Find a way to help California to leave the Union. Build a commune, start a new society with a new governmental system based on liquid democracy.
• Make art: Channel all of this energy into something creative that can help connect people on a deeper level.
• Dead inside: Walk around like a zombie. Let health care, immigration, human rights, international relations, etc all crumble. Let sexism, racism, nationalism, hate, etc all rise. Give up.

What other strategies have occurred to you?

I can feel my brain hop from strategy to strategy, minute by minute, like juggling a hundred hot potatoes. My heart never feels satisfied with any of the potatoes, and so the juggling continues.

So for now I’ll just focus on the juggling, and not apply any of the mental strategies until the potatoes are a bit cooler. It might take a day, a month, or 4 years (since the repurcussions of this are only getting started).

It’s important to me that I end up choosing the strategy that is the best fit for the dissonance in the world, not the strategy that makes my brain feel the most cognitive ease the quickest.