I woke up in a cold sweat, my heart racing.
I had just seen a vision of a dystopian world. One so horrifyingly visceral that I was convinced it was real.
As I opened my eyes and hyperventilated, I took stock of my surroundings. All was still in my darkened bedroom. Outside my window, all was quiet and calm.
Everything was normal. I had just had a bad dream.
Our minds are powerful things. They can help us solve some of life’s most profound problems. They can help us visualize new possibilities. And they can help us to get mundane tasks done.
Yet, that power can be compromised. Our minds can lure us into traps.
These traps are particularly effective when the protocols we follow are rewired. When our minds are put on the witness stand for cross-examination.
This is why we freeze when faced with tricks and illusions. This is why these mind games work.
Whether we’re observing a magic trick or falling for a joke, our minds can make us look silly at times.
We welcome this silliness because it keeps us honest. It allows us to find levity, build emotional connections and ward off burnout.
But some tricks and illusions can be more sinister. Confidence schemes can wipe out our life’s savings, leaving us destitute. And nightmares can spike our stress levels, weakening our immune systems.
It’s critical for us to avoid these outcomes. Otherwise, our survival is in grave danger.
So, we compartmentalize.
We prepare ourselves to see magic tricks by attending a magic show. We set up jokes on the first day of April, punctuating them with a warning of April Fools! We keep our guard up when we meet new people. And we do our best to be in a good mental state before we doze off.
These are not perfect solutions. But they provide us with enough control to stay afloat.
Or at least they do until a tidal wave of change hits.
Our lives are driven by emotion.
And one of the most powerful emotions out there is fear.
Fear can stop us in our tracks. It can help us avert a certain action. Or it can goad us into taking an alternative one.
Because fear has such a gravitational pull, it’s used as a tool in many societal settings. We find it in parenting techniques, in storytelling and in governance.
These applications are often for our benefit. Often, but not always.
For it turns out that fear is an illusion. It’s nothing more than a construct in our minds.
Indeed, as a common refrain goes, fear stands for False Evidence Appearing Real.
With circumspection, we can tackle these fears. We can self-triage — determining whether the outcomes that so terrify us are as likely or detrimental as we imagine them to be.
Often times, the answer to this question is No.
But there are exceptions. Exceptions like global pandemics.
In events like these, the false expectations are real. And that can be hard to fathom.
On one hand, things look normal. The sun is shining. Birds are chirping. Homes, buildings and vehicles stand intact.
But look closer.
Businesses are shuttered. People are confined to their homes. And everyone is being admonished to wash their hands, to avoid touching their faces and to stay six feet apart at all times.
Yes, the signs of normalcy are a smoke screen here. They’re an illusion.
And in these times, reality is the cruelest trick of all.
What happens when the curtain gets lifted? What transpires when the illusion becomes the status quo?
We grieve.
We go through all 5 stages of the Kübler Ross Model: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance. And at the end of that process, we adjust.
Initially, we feel aggrieved. We yearn for the lifestyle we had once taken for granted. We curse the new normal.
Finding these attempts futile, we seek to bridge the gap. We try and hold on to some remnants of the past, while adjusting to the demands of the present.
This effort inevitably fails as well. A paradigm shift doesn’t allow for a soft transition. We must dive right in.
Finally, reality sets in. The loss of control yields a sense of hopelessness. We feel pangs of despair, before picking ourselves up and resolving to move forward.
This pattern is well-known for individualized shocks — such as a death in the family, a loss of a job or the breakup of a relationship. But when the entire world is turned on its head, things can get messy.
For there is no set timeline as to when all of us will make it through the gauntlet. There’s no synchronized date when we cross the threshold from one stage of grief to another.
Much like runners in a marathon, we cross the mile markers at our own pace. All as the event timer keeps ticking away.
Meanwhile, leaders wait impatiently, mired in a brutal Catch-22. They need to act quickly to properly adapt societies to the shifted landscape. But they also need consensus — which can be hard to find as individuals navigate the new normal on their own timelines.
Conundrums like these illustrate why the fascination with disruptive change in the business world is misguided. Even in the best of times, we struggle to turn on a dime.
But in crises like these — moments when our darkest illusions come to life — this tendency becomes a real liability.
So, what can we do to ease the burden?
How can we move past the paralysis of being tricked, bamboozled and floored by a world that suddenly looks much different than it once did?
We can start by letting go. By not pining for the creature comforts of the recent past, or wondering when they’ll be restored wholesale.
That ship has sailed.
We must instead focus on vigilance. On finding the right resources to follow during this period of disorientation. And on taking the appropriate actions.
This is exceedingly difficult when our world has just been rocked. For we are low on confidence, and particularly vulnerable to any tricks and illusions that persist in our new reality.
(For instance, the risk of cyberattacks is known to increase during pandemics.)
But often, what is difficult is necessary. Necessary to get us out of the quicksand of confusion. Necessary to keep us moving forward.
So, let’s recognize the circumstances. Let’s accept that illusion has become reality.
And let’s get on with finding the right light to guide the path ahead.
Our future depends on it.