As a high achiever, perhaps you have surprised yourself with how well you have coped with this crisis, unprecedented as it is in our lifetimes. Or perhaps you are surprised by the fact that there are days when you are truly not coping.
Coping with crisis
One of the ways humans survive crises is by using our reptilian brain – the cerebellum or brain stem – to make instantaneous fight or flight decisions in moments of extreme danger. If the house is on fire, the brain experiences a rush of adrenalin, and you flee to safety. Eventually the fire is put out, the brain feels safe again, and relaxes to a normal state. Crisis over.
But what happens if the crisis is prolonged, like a pandemic? What happens if the brain feels constantly under threat for many months?
Burnout
We’ve all felt it at some time in our careers. Those familiar symptoms of exhaustion, anxiety, stress, indifference, depression, irritability, anger, sleeplessness, headaches, withdrawal, or feelings of fragility. Burnout makes you feel overwhelmed and depleted.
But the pandemic is more than just burnout. There’s feelings of grief. Maybe not the immediate, stabbing, shocking grief that comes if you learn somebody has passed away unexpectedly, but more the creeping, corrosive grief that gradually encroaches as you see someone face a terminal illness. They are both forms of grief – one hits you suddenly, the other over time.
As well as the burnout, then, is grief in all its stages. Denial, anger, bargaining.
Of course, mixed with this is a sense of guilt – if others are suffering with COVID, but you and those you love are healthy, then what right do you have to feel grief?
Grief and coping go together
Grief is a natural human reaction to loss – whether that is loss of a loved one, a relationship, a job, our happy routines, or our sense of control over life. It’s normal to grieve unexpected change.
Perhaps beyond grief you are also pondering some of these thoughts:
- I should have used the time in lockdown productively, and learned a new skill
- I should have used my lockdown time to exercise more and get fitter
- I should be used to the pandemic by now and be thriving again
Guilt and regret! A natural combination in a high achievers’ self-assessment.
The reality is, as high achievers, it is natural to feel a sense of obligation and compulsion to do more. Ambition and inner drive propel you to conquer, deliver and solve. Of course you wanted to get more out of what was otherwise unproductive time being locked up at home.
But perhaps you’re burnt out and that’s OK. And whilst it’s not shocking that a prolonged crisis would lead us to feel burnt out, the fact that it’s hitting high achievers more acutely was a surprise.
Dr Pauline Boss from the University of Minnesota has been quoted expressing it this way:
“It’s harder for high achievers. The more accustomed you are to solving problems, to getting things done, to having a routine, the harder it will be on you because none of that is possible right now.”
So how do high achievers cope? Perhaps you are accepting that things are not perfect or normal and that’s OK. Maybe you’ve lowered your expectations about what level of achievement is possible in challenging times. Or possibly you’ve connected even more strongly to your personal support network, and have been feeling fulfilled by helping others.
We don’t have a personal manual or reference point for coping with a pandemic, because we’ve never had to before. That means there is no one right way for high achievers to adjust their coping mechanisms.
High achievers can’t control the pandemic. But they can control their perspective on it.
If you want to improve your ability to handle crises, consider our Crisis Management Training for your team, or consider our leadership coaching services.
Sources
AusIMM, Understanding Your Brain In A Crisis, June 2018.
Helle, T., 'Your ‘Surge Capacity’ Is Depleted — It’s Why You Feel Awful', Elemental, August 2020.
UNSW School of Psychiatry and Black Dog Institute
Commentaires