(A series in which I ramble some personal perspective on ICYDAK's "30 Proven Tactics to Resist Authoritarianism in Daily Life," because most of this stuff is just default daily life to me.)
ICYDAK: 30 Proven Tactics to Resist Authoritarianism in Everyday Life
#1: know your rights
#2: secure your communications
#3: diversify your news sources
#4: develop financial independence
#5: learn to spot propaganda & psychological warfare
Psychological pressure is real. Build a strong mindset, exercise, and practice stress management techniques.
The Tao Te Ching circles back again and again to the image of complementary opposites. Shrink to grow. Twist to straighten. And so on. Which is why I think my bona fide work addiction makes me weirdly, uniquely qualified to talk about building mental and physical resilience.
My name is molly, and I'm a workaholic.
Unlike drinking, work isn't something one can abstain from entirely. So I can't tell you it's been X days since I last worked. I'm working right now. But I have managed to stop work from undermining my mental and physical health for about ten years now, after twenty years of enabling it to eat me alive. Here's how.
The ICYDAK lists "exercise" second, after "strong mindset." I think this is a mistake for two reasons. One, most people think strengthening their "resilience" is a mind-over-matter thing - something they can brute-force with the power of positive thinking or whatever.
Two, the brute force method is doomed to failure, because both "resilience" generally and a "strong mindset" are, at root, physical features. Your mental and emotional health can only ever be as good as your physical basic body care. Full stop.
Sure, Gandhi said "Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will." But the physical capacity helps. The more chronically sleep-deprived, nutrient-low, and worn out you are, the smaller your ability to summon and fortify that will. The brain relies on the body.
So here is my foundational recipe for body/brain health:
In all caps, because it's that important. Sleep is THE bedrock on which mental and emotional capacity are built. I, personally, need about nine hours of sleep a night. Your mileage may vary, but if you're regularly getting less than six or more than ten, be warned: you probably don't actually know how much sleep you actually need.
If you sleep fewer than six hours a night, you're probably also kneecapping yourself. "But I don't have time to sleep, I have too much to do!" is what people say when they're so chronically sleep-deprived they can't do normal activities in a normal amount of time. If you weren't chronically sleep-deprived, you'd get more done in less time and feel better about it, too. (Prove me wrong: get more sleep.)
"Eat Real Food" is the best single thing that has come out of the current US federal administration. I find the new nutritional guidelines a mixed bag overall (no, you probably shouldn't be eating some steak with your butter), but "eat real food" is deadass correct.
Like sleep, optimal food is highly personal. Also like sleep, there is food that is just not good for anyone. "Ultraprocessed" food falls in this category. If it contains ingredients you can't pick up at the grocery store to whip up a batch in your own kitchen, it's ultraprocessed, and it's not going to fuel your brain or body well. It feels good to eat in the moment, but not in the long run. We're going for the long run here.
"Exercise" is such a loaded word. I say this as a former competitive athlete, now retired, who is on a first name basis with every trainer at my gym. I absolutely love exercise. I feel like crap without my six day a week training regimen. And I am also very, very aware that such a regimen is not for everyone. (If it were, my gym would be crowded and I would not like it.)
So: If you're one of the people for whom the word "exercise" causes more dread than joy, don't exercise. Move your body. Moving your body can look like lots of different things, but they all tend toward the same result. Movement reduces stress and makes with the happy hormones. It also keeps your body functional, so you can do the things you want to do for longer.
Remember: ICE agent wannabes keep washing out because they can't do 12 pushups and 23 sit-ups. Can you beat an ICE agent wannabe? Give it a shot.
Solid, sustained habits for physical health are a prerequisite for mental resilience. I learned this the hard way. I let work addiction whittle my physical health down so far that I couldn't conjure up mental resilience, or even basic mental health. At my lowest point, I didn't sleep for four days/nights straight. I hallucinated. It was Not Okay.
I tell this cautionary tale because I don't want anyone else to have to learn through experience that YOUR PHYSICAL HEALTH MATTERS. Lay that foundation. Give your body the sleep, nutrients, and movement it needs. Without that, you'll have a hell of a time conjuring or sustaining any mental "willpower" - if you can do it at all.
I looked this one up. "Strong mindset" means different things to different people. I wanted an overview of what tends to fall in this category.
The Internets say that when people write about "strong mindset," they write about stuff like:
Here's what I know about a few of these, in no order.
Contrary to popular media's belief, courage is not a stat. Courage is a skill. It gets stronger and easier the more you exercise it.
Specifically, courage is the skill required to be present with your own fear. To feel it, acknowledge it, and say "yes, I'm afraid, but this thing I'm about to do is more important than my fear. So my fear will be coming along for the ride, because here we go."
Like any skill, it builds better with small, consistent practice than in giant leaps. Just like you wouldn't expect a first-time ice skater to nail a triple Axel, don't expect yourself to do The Scariest Thing all at once. Instead, do one Mildly Concerning thing a day. Over time, your brain and body learn that fear can be present *and* you can do the thing.
FYI: Courage is not the absence of fear. Fearlessness is the absence of fear. Courage is action in the *presence* of fear. It takes a lot more moral fiber to be afraid yet act than it does to act when you feel no fear at all.
Confidence is closely related to courage. If courage is bringing your fear along for the ride, confidence is trusting that the you who Does the Thing is equal to the task - fear and all.
I also recommend the small-steps approach to building courage. To paraphrase the Tao Te Ching at you again: by treating the easy as hard, wise people don't find anything hard.
That is: don't limit the small steps approach to daunting tasks only. When you break *every* task into small steps and do the steps one at a time, every task becomes easy, because you're only ever doing one thing at a time. (This is also great for cultivating mindfulness, which is fantastic for stress management.)
Fun fact: I have been told all my life I have *fantastic* self-discipline. I don't know where this comes from. It's even on several of my childhood report cards: "molly has fantastic self-discipline." ("when she wants to but she needs to apply herself" is also on there...a lot.)
As near as I can tell, what other people call my "self-discipline" is what I call "knowing who I am, why I'm here, and what I want." There's really no substitute for that kind of personal clarity, which is why I spend a LOT of time on it.
Things that have helped me get that kind of clarity at various points in my life:
When you know who you are - flaws and all - and what you're after, self-discipline becomes much easier. Suddenly, a LOT of things are just "not what I'm going to do," instead of things you feel pressured to consider. "No" becomes a complete sentence you feel secure in saying, because you know that's the answer. You don't need to feel particularly angry or upset or overworked about anything. This is just how you do be.
For me, "strong-mindedness" and "stress management" are closely related. More than I realized when I started writing this thing.
For example, I mentioned mindfulness above, under "confidence." Single-tasking, and being actually present with the task, is GREAT stress management. There's only one thing you are doing at any given moment, and it is the only thing you have to do.
Also, humans can't actually multitask - and it's crap for our productivity. I know we all think we can and must and it's the answer, but we're wrong. There are studies.
The "Myth" of Media Multitasking: Reciprocal Dynamics of Media Multitasking, Personal Needs, and Gratifications
Multitasking is actually counterproductive
The myths of the digital native and the multitasker
(I found that first study particularly interesting because it implies we "multitask" to soothe our emotional needs at the expense of our cognitive needs. I've caught myself doing this before, and I've always found it counterproductive in the long run. If I'm multitasking to avoid feeling my feelings, that's going to backfire. More efficient to be with the feelings - but definitely not more pleasant!)
I am also a huge fan of progressive muscle relaxation:
Progressive Muscle Relaxation (how to)
After years of practicing, I can now trigger my relaxation response on command in nearly any situation. This is HUGELY helpful in dealing with the chronic pain from the motorcycle accident that turned me into a part-titanium cyborg. It's also just plain useful. When everyone else is freaking out, I'm tuning in.
Finally, I've found a lot of stress management comes down to self-awareness. The self-discipline stuff helps a lot here. When you know what you're about, you know what's going to be Too Much, and you say no to it. Big help.
To be clear: I'm not magically stress-free. I don't think it's possible to be aware of the state of the world right now and be stress-free. I definitely don't think it's possible to exist in any society run on the extraction imperative and be stress-free, unless you're some kind of extractive monster. Maybe not even then. Elon Musk seems to be doing an awful lot of ketamine these days.
But it is possible to take each day as it comes. To do the thing in front of you and do it well, and to let that be enough. And that kind of life is resilient as hell.
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