What to Do When the World is Ending (But You Still Have to Go to Work)
In the haunting queer dystopian novel Private Rites by Julia Armfield, everyone knows the world is ending—not via meteors or anything grand, but with endless rain that turns city streets into impassable rivers, swallowing building after building. On the train rides to my office in Center City Philadelphia, I sometimes think of its characters, still commuting to work because the rent must be paid, even as they know the end is near. Lately, many of my clients and I have been wrestling with a similar question: what do we do with ourselves in the face of so much uncertainty, despair, and fear? The novel’s imagery doesn’t feel so distant—it echoes in our own lives, where the rain may look different but the weight is just as heavy.
Right now, people are not okay. Between clients and loved ones, I’ve been noticing that this particular tipping point in humanity is manifesting as profound shifts in our personal lives, marked by despair, hopelessness, and fear. We are frozen, with no clear path through the collective trauma. Many of us have not had breathing room to heal and process the past few years, let alone the current horrors in this country and abroad. And so our attention turns to the job that has been causing so much stress, the relationship that isn’t properly meeting our needs. Changing those things might help—or it might not. What I do know is that grief and trauma offer a unique perspective. If you are willing to move through and truly feel the weight of that crushing grief, you may be able to alchemize it into something gem-like and miraculous.
I was struck by these words: “Hope is the power of being cheerful in circumstances that we know to be desperate.” ― G.K. Chesterton
I’m not suggesting we put on some forced mask of cheerfulness. Rather, our task is to find the small, everyday bits of hope. This is the way forward. Without it, hopelessness drives us into numbing distractions, like clicking that “buy now” button on Amazon. Despair alone never births revolutions. Instead, create tethers to life, to the parts of the world that are still good, still here. Now is the time to listen closely to the dark, tender parts of your heart—and to gather your resources. There will be much stamina required to weather these storms.
I won’t pretend to have the blueprint for larger social change. But I do know that we need to tend to our own psyches in order to care for the collective.
Here are some simple ways to move out of freeze and despair:
Touch grass. Time outside, noticing the natural world with your senses, can bring you back to yourself. There is something soothing about the way a bee still happily collects pollen from a flower on the bleakest of news days.
Low-energy option: Gaze out an open window for three minutes and notice what you see, hear, smell, or feel. Perhaps you notice the feel of the sunshine on your face, see a squirrel running up a tree, hear joyous sounds of children playing.
High-energy option: Go for a stroll somewhere with trees, birds, or open sky. Can you spot signs of the current or coming season? Is there anything that stirs curiosity or awe?
Highest-energy option: Find a forest and engage in the Japanese art of Forest Bathing. Slow down, touch tree bark, notice the wind, listen to birds, and jot down observations or sketch what catches your eye.
Engage with art or music. These forms of expression connect you to others across time and space, tapping into a shared human experience. They have long served as tools of resistance and protest. In creating or experiencing them, you engage a different part of your brain than the one caught in worry or rumination, allowing your mind and body to process emotions in ways words alone cannot.
Low-energy option: Grab a pen and an old magazine and start to doodle with music in the background. Draw devil horns on the models. Create a “found poem” by crossing out words and leaving only a few impactful ones that tell a different story. No judgment—just play as if you are a child again and see what emerges.
High-energy option: Attend a local concert, improv show, or dance performance. Feel the energy in the room and on stage. Notice how it feels to be experiencing shared emotions with others.
Try a random act of kindness. If we are all just a little kinder to each other, we can create an energetic shift. It fosters connection instead of furthering the divide. It can also change your mood when you take action towards the opposite of what you are feeling.
Low-energy option: Text a friend who is struggling and tell them you’re thinking of them.
High-energy option: Invite your elderly neighbor to lunch—they may have wisdom about how to withstand impossible historical moments.
Speak gently with your inner child. Bring an image of a younger version of yourself to mind. What do you want them to know? What do they need you to hear? Speak with the gentleness and compassion you needed but may not have received. For example, when coaxing myself out of bed, I ask my younger self what she would like to do today—and notice what images come. I may offer options for breakfast and see what she responds to most strongly. More often than not, she will gladly get out of bed for waffles and a walk in the woods.
In the end, the world may still feel overwhelming, and the storms—both literal and metaphorical—are not letting up. But even in the smallest acts—feeling the sun on your face, listening to a song that moves you, offering kindness to another, speaking gently to your own heart—you are building the stamina to keep going. These are not trivial gestures. They are the threads that anchor us, the quiet rebellions against despair. We cannot control everything around us, but we can tend to the world inside ourselves. And in doing so, we create the foundation from which hope, resilience, and even transformation can grow—one mindful, tender, gem-like moment at a time.