While ultimately this depends on the kind of inner work we do, there are also some very practical, everyday kind of things we can do that will help a lot, and make that inner work more effective.

1.) Avoid watching or reading any mainstream media, or even ‘alternative’ media. I understand that there is a deeply seated need in many people to be ‘informed’, but the media at this point (and for a long time, but it’s gotten much more intense in the past two years) is a fear-generating machine.

There are billions and billions of human interactions and events every day, and the majority of them are neutral or positive. The media only presents you with the most scary stuff, a lot of which is misinformed if not outright manufactured, or presented in the worst possible light; but even if it weren’t, the narrative presented by the media is a tiny slice of the sum total of human experience, and it seems to have an agenda to keep people afraid. So that’s one of the biggest things – stop taking in that poison.

Or, if you feel that it IS important to still take in various forms of media, you may benefit from watching this conversation between Irene and Joe Martino on Media sensemaking from a trauma-informed lens … https://youtu.be/VHjC0eOkjB8?si=40ss0uUP-ZXa80GH.

Denzel Washington once said, ‘if you don’t watch the news you’re uninformed, but if you watch the news you are misinformed’. I agree completely, but I’ll add that actually, there are many ways to be informed that come from the shamanic traditions of relating to the natural world as our primary source of information.

2.) We did not evolve to be able to process an entire world’s worth of events. We aren’t meant to know about everything that’s happening everywhere. Turn your attention to ‘The Earth’ not ‘The World’. Pay attention to the natural world as much as possible. She tells a very different story than the doom and gloom narrative.

Try to keep your attention local as much as possible – your room, your house, your yard, your street, your neighbourhood. What flowers are blooming? What do they smell like? What’s it like to feel the shade of trees, and to touch their bark? How does the wind feel on your skin? What birds are in the area? Spend time with your bare feet on the grass or dirt, which facilitates beneficial electron exchange.

These are very positive sources of information and are the kinds of things we evolved perceiving and relating to for hundreds of thousands of years, and so they inherently support well-being.

3.) Connect to other people that feel safe, people you can be authentic with. Avoid as much as possible any and all people who are toxic, especially if they are family members who have a powerful energetic and biological influence.

4.) Finally, continue to do the inner work that you are learning about in this curriculum so that you can increase your capacity and resiliency in the face of any threat.