How to Stay Sane in an Age of Division

by Elif Shafak

Stories bring us together, untold stories keep us apart. We are made of stories – those that have happened, those that are still happening at this moment in time and those that are shaped purely in our imagination through words, images, dreams and an endless sense of wonder about the world around us and how it works.

If all my friends and acquaintances think like me, vote like me, speak like me, if I only read the kind of books, newspapers and magazines that are in line with what I have read before, if I only follow online sites that sympathise with my preconceived verdicts, if I only watch videos or programmes that essentially validate my worldview, and if nearly all of my information comes from the same limited sources, day in, day out, it means that, deep within, I want to be surrounded with my mirror image 24/7. That is not only a suffocatingly claustrophobic setting, it is also a profoundly narcissistic existence.

In each case, ‘the individual satisfies his own narcissism by belonging to and identifying himself with the group. Not he the nobody is great, but he the member of the most wonderful group on earth.’

‘You focus on improving your daughter’s life. We inherit our circumstances, we improve them for the next generation. I had little education, I wanted you to do better. Now you need to make sure your daughter has more than you had. Isn’t this the natural way of the world?’

In a world that is ever shifting and unpredictable, I’ve come to believe it is totally fine not to feel fine. It is perfectly okay not to be okay. If truth be told, if from time to time you do not catch yourself overwhelmed with worry and indecision, demoralised and exhausted, or even incandescent, maybe you are not really following what is going on – here, there and everywhere. We have legitimate reasons to be despondent.

So if our first challenge is to allow ourselves to experience, sincerely and openly, whatever mental disturbances are there, and recognise the presence of negative sentiments in our lives, the next step is to decide what to do with this recognition, how to turn it into something more constructive and health-giving.

Acts of barbarity can happen fast and on a large scale not when more people turn immoral or evil, not necessarily, but when enough people become numb. When we are indifferent, disconnected, atomised. Too busy with our own lives to care about others. Uninterested in and unmoved by someone else’s pain. That is the most dangerous emotion – the lack of emotion.

It is a problem, the endless barrage of information – let alone, misinformation. We cannot process this much, and the truth is, we don’t. In reality, we only skim through the news, scroll up and down our screens, without contemplating, and more importantly, without feeling.

Perhaps in an era when everything is in constant flux, in order to be more sane, we need a blend of conscious optimism and creative pessimism.

– it is easy to feel like the story we are living in is not the one we would have chosen. That the narrative is distorted by the events

we are living through. That our version of truth and reality is trampled under the feet of others, who shout louder, who have more power.

Do not be afraid of complexity. Be afraid of people who promise an easy shortcut to simplicity.

Analyse, understand and reflect upon where negative emotions come from, embrace them candidly, but also notice if and when they become repetitive, restrictive, ritualistic and destructive.