This is generally what I do, or at least what I try to do, when I’m in a stressful situation. When I can manage to follow a strategy close to this, it always makes me feel better and allows me to better handle whatever situation I’m in. I realized afterward that the first letters of each step spell out “SAM”, so I’ll call this the SAM Strategy. If you ever feel overwhelmed and need help getting through a tough situation, just think of our good friend SAM.
- Stop: Stop whatever you’re doing so you can focus on grounding yourself. You have many options available for this. Focusing on your breath, breathing more slowly on the exhale than you did on the inhale, mentally describing or counting things you see around you, thinking about one of your favorite memories, and even leaving the situation for a few minutes if possible are some ways you can use to center yourself and let your body know that everything is ok. If you’re talking to another person, you can ask them an open-ended question that’s relevant to the situation. That takes their focus off of you for a bit and gives you some time to listen, which may very well solve whatever issue is occurring. Your goal here is to get out of the story that your mind is telling you so that you can calm down, see the situation more clearly, and then move onto the next step.
- Act: Once you’ve calmed yourself, take some positive action. Anything that puts you in a better position than you’re currently in (eating, drinking water, taking a nap, working on an important task, etc) is fair game here. Taking positive action gives you something to focus on and prevents you from being paralyzed by anxiety, which can easily cause you to become overwhelmed once again. Once you’ve done that, you’re ready for the final step.
- Move on: Do your best to move past that situation after it’s over. It’s tempting to go over it repeatedly in your head, think about what you did versus what you could have done, etc. Rather than dwelling on the situation or trying to force it out of your mind, move on to something else that requires a lot of attention. Just like in the second step, this will help you avoid becoming overwhelmed or get stuck thinking about what just happened. If you do this right, you’ll soon become engrossed in whatever you’re doing and forget all about that previous situation. Then, if you happen to think about it later once you’ve physically and mentally moved on from it, you won’t be nearly as upset by it as you were earlier.