So many people in modern life are finding their lives filled with chronic stress and a general sense of being overwhelmed. We are constantly overstimulated, and this often leads to anxiety, nervous system dysregulation, and even full burnout—of all kinds, it seems: physical, mental, emotional, relational, and even spiritual.
Many people are living in a state of near-constant stress, which keeps the nervous system from ever fully settling. This has enormous ramifications.
You don’t need me to tell you that, but it does need to be acknowledged—and acknowledged often, as we all, despite our best intentions, fall back into the habits that are constricting us in these painful ways.
The solutions to our problems are simple and we hear them often: turn off your phone, breathe deeply, go for nature walks, take time to meditate or pray.
But as we know, simple doesn’t mean easy.
We have to be intentional in a radical way in order to combat the effects we are experiencing.
We have to be heroic.
Cultivating Virtue as the Answer to the Stress of Modern Life
The reducing of the effects of stress require more than repeated advice about going to bed at a reasonable hour, not living on caffeine, and learning to regulate your nervous system.
Of course, the practical advice is needed, but it misses a key component: without virtue—the increased capacity to live in a state of agency and habitually choose what is good for us—these behaviors are very unlikely to stick.
I once heard this phrase: “A good society is a society in which it’s easy to be good.” It has always stayed with me, because it acknowledges many critical things about human nature.
We are social animals.
We are creatures of habit.
We are likely to behave in a way heavily influenced by reward, punishment, social perception, expectations, and an overarching sense of (or lack of) our purpose.
The way I have sometimes put it, drawing from a faith background that looks at the uniqueness of the saints as extraordinary, as well as many ancient myths, is that most people aren’t heroes.
By definition, this is obvious: to be heroic is to be exceptional. It is not common. That’s what makes them so compelling.
So, the way we develop our society and culture matters tremendously because the heroes are defined by their exceptional response to it, and the many—most of us—who will not choose a heroic path will fall into whatever is normative as a rule.
Both our heroes and the general population will become less of who we are capable of being, and this is a tragedy.
I am not capable of changing society at large, and most of us aren’t. We should recognize the meaningful impact we have within our sphere of influence, but it is practical and wise to accept the reality that our society is not currently making it easy to be good so we can square with reality.
Despite the realization of the difficult, our only option to overcome the deleterious effects of modern life and its peculiar stressors is to become heroes.
This is sobering, but ultimately helpful, because it takes us out of a lot of the habits of self-hatred, frustration, and exhaustion we find ourselves in.
The reality is that we really weren’t made to live like this, but the shared way of being normal in our society, focused overly much on both productivity and distraction, is like a sucking vortex, pulling us constantly into habits that leave us depleted, anxious, and sad.
This happens not primarily because of our personal dysfunction, but because we are communal creatures that need to live in relation to one another.
It’s not so different from swimming in a river with a dangerous current: at a certain point, it really isn’t about personal strength, but rather the inevitable overpowering of forces immensely stronger than we are. In this discussion of overstimulation and stress, the main forces overpowering us are an abuse of our human nature.
Most dramatically, we all know by now that social media has been designed to maximize use of our attention, but this phenomenon is just the final form of so much of technological modern life. All of this causes us to have a nervous system that never settles.
I know this may sound hopeless so far, but stay with me:
Because the truth is that, in seeing this reality starkly, we finally have real hope.
It is precisely in realizing an accurate picture of our own strength and nature that we better evaluate our decisions.
Essentially, we have to figure out how to not jump in the river.
This requires us both to have the humility to recognize the limits of ourselves, as well as to become heroically virtuous.
In a society like ours, there is no in between. We must look at this without flinching. We need a firm will that we want a different kind of life as a fundamental starting point.
Importantly, all of human behavior—rooted in classic philosophy and centuries of religious tradition, and proven out now by the scientific reality of neurobiology—whether helpful or harmful, has the pattern of becoming habitual, so although the necessary changes can be incredible uphill at first, it doesn’t mean it will always be that way.
We become what we repeatedly do.
To get to that virtuous spiral up, however, does take time and heroism.
But I do also think there are some cheat codes that use our human nature or our advantage, and I want to share those with you now.
Addition Over Subtraction to Defeat Burnout
The last thing someone wants to hear in a state of burnout is to add more to their lives, but let me explain the principle I have in mind that I have distilled over many years with my own challenges with burnout and various related health issues. As a singer and writer, I am a very naturally sensitive person to stimuli, so I have truly earned my stripes here.
The truth is, the classic advice will help you if you can implement it, and most of it involves cutting things out to reduce the stimulation and strain:
- Turn off your phone an hour before bed.
- Lower your screen time.
- Don’t eat junk food.
- Reduce stress wherever you can.
But in many ways, I think it’s often a much better principle in life that we focus on addition instead, which has the natural behavioral overflow effect.
When you focus on filling your life with what is good, there is increasingly less room for what is harmful and causing so much of our modern overload.
Not only do I believe this is more effective—truly, almost a cheat code—but is also more enjoyable. Maybe that’s the key reason it is effective.
(We saw something like this play out with Alyssa Lieu in the Olympics this year.)
Below are the things—which taken together will compound over time—I suggest you add such that heroism and virtue in response to a normatively suffering populace emerges in your life.
These are small additions that can help counteract the constant stress we’re living in:
1) Add sleep and rest
Don’t overwhelm yourself with perfection at the start, but begin with just accepting you need more of these. Especially for parents of small children, there are limits to how much of this is in your control. But faced with possible total collapse that comes with serious burnout, it’s critical to try to do this as much as you can.
Even an extra half hour of sleep, and a few minutes of quiet away from screens and stress can work wonders.
2) Add laughter
Seriously. You need to laugh. This is best found in deep human relationships, but a lot of people are struggling to find those as well. But even just incorporating a funny movie, show, or comedian you love can do the trick as well.
You can also just make a choice to be more playful with life, with yourself, with the people around you. It’s easy to be stuck in a frozen state of stress, but even just purposely smiling counter to however you feel can help transform little moments throughout the day.
This isn’t a thoroughly researched article, but in many places you will find scientific evidence that the use of certain muscles in the face, body posture, and actions like laughter actually trigger real hormonal responses.
And going to back to the principle of addition: if you’re laughing even just a little more during the day, in those moments, you will be automatically reducing your stress, even if just temporarily.
3) Add blue light glasses
Depending on your sensitivity, this may or may not be a significant change for you. But for many people, we quickly noticed a reduction in eye strain and headaches, less perceived fatigue, and an easier ability to fall asleep.
Most people will find that they are naturally more tired in the evening if they dim the lights, put on their blue light glasses (even the cheap ones work well enough for me, and I consider myself very sensitive to blue light). The phone is less riveting when the colors are turned down via brightness down and a pair of these glasses.
4) Add nutritious, whole food
The more life has gone on and I’ve tried various things, the more I’ve realized most people don’t need to “avoid sweets and junk” so much is just get focused on getting nutrient-dense, real food.
Some people really do have food sensitivies or things their bodies just don’t process in an optimal way, but for a lot of people in more of a nervous-system survival state, junk is just short hand for an intense need for energy and immediately usable calories.
Focusing on getting plenty of protein at each meal, as well as fiber and enough fat, goes a very long way for steadying out blood sugar and energy throughout the day. When this happens, junk and sweets are just not as attractive or desperately needed.
So much of what we struggle with just falls away when our bodies get what they truly need.
5) Add friendship
Modern life can make meaningful relationships very challenging. I don’t want to dismiss this or say there is an easy answer to this.
But an important starting point is just recognizing that social needs are true needs, even if this is painful to face if you find that lacking. There is a time and a place for pills and supplements and all kinds of aids in trying to achieve stable health, but we often forget that not having a sense of community actually has a physical detriment.
Ideally, we all would live in a smaller geographical place where we have stable, happy family units and an extended community of healthy, kind, virtous people around us.
In practice, very few people have, it seems, even a couple of close friends.
The first principle, then, is just to take ownership wherever we can to maintain, build, or resurrect good friendships.
If we have this already, then we should make sure to be intentional about making some time for them. It doesn’t have to be extreme, but even just daily check-ins or sharing a meme here and there can go a long way. It doesn’t need to hours of conversation or always getting together, but a few minutes to chat can lift the spirits of both people.
If we don’t have this, then we have to get creative. Maybe we need to join a church community, or make conversation at the gym, or join a club.
In a state of burnout, however, these kinds of steps can be overwhelming. In that case, think more in micro terms: say hi to the cashier or do a small act of kindness for someone in need. Every little bit of authentic human connection can help buoy us up into a better, less-stressed, more human state.
6) Add the outdoors
Ideally, again, we’d have hours outside, basking in the sun.
But never let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Even a few minutes a couple of times of day with the real, full sunlight in your eyes can make an enormous difference for your perception of stress. If you can add a little walking, the effect will compound even more.
This light signalling will also have a spin-up effect on your hormonal signalling which will over time help with appetite regulation and better sleep as well.
But more than anything, it’s just wise to remember we are related to nature and its queues, and being outside a little is really an obvious baseline need.
It will also give us a different sense of the all-encompassing experience of our screens, reminding us there is a beautiful world out there.
7) Add movement
I would love if everyone started lifting weights and challenging themselves physically.
But the main addition is just finding ways to move that you enjoy.
Start with walking or get a rebounder. Stretch while watching a show in the evening. Do a few body weight squats between calls. Whatever it is that is workable for you, start there.
Even small bits of movement (even 2x a week for 30 mins at the gym is still extremely minor in the context of a whole week!) add up quickly and take us out of the habit of lethargy many of us are in.
When we aren’t moving, we are queuing our bodies in a strange way—almost like telling ourselves we are unwell. When we move, we feel more alive, more connected to reality and time and our physicality, and even experience the perks of greater blood flow to the brain and the hormonal shifts that come with movement.
8) Add quiet
It would be great for everyone to advance to a point of having large chunks of quiet throughout the day, and there are many ways of incorporating more of it: walking without headphones, doing the dishes without a podcast blaring,
These are all valuable, and as much quiet as you can incorporate is likely for the best.
But start with just 5 minutes in the morning and at night, without a screen nearby. Close your eyes and allow for a moment of peace. If you pray, take a little time here to pray. If not, just allow the quiet with a bit of breathing to give you body a signal that all is well, and that you’re allowed to pause and relax.
This can do wonders, and it has a way of overflowing into the way you handle the rest of the day. By adding some intentional quiet, the habit of distraction naturally loosens over time.
9) Add beauty and peace
Start small, but try to incorporate more of what is beautiful into your life.
In a basic way, it can be trying to keep your home a little more tidy, but this can be challenging for many in a state of overwhelm. Maybe just start with the dishes and a non-negotiable making of the bed.
You can also just try to be more present to the beauty around you: the quiet of the snow, or the scent of the jasmine outside of your window, or the loveliness of someone you love, or the shape of the light at dusk. Practice noticing.
You can also intentionally bring beauty into your life. Art is incredible. Perhaps consider incorporating music more into your life in place of podcasts and screen distraction.
A lot of people find my music, I’m happy to say, deeply calming and peace-giving. It’s a huge part of why I do what I do, and you can see more about that at the end of this article.
Moving Forward Effectively into Less Stress
None of what I’ve suggested has to be perfect to be effective. But it will involve, as I said above, a sober acceptance of our need for a stronger will, real virtue, and the humility to pursue smart strategies to make better choices easier and more attractive in daily life over time.
There is always more we can do, but simple is best.
We will naturally build on good habits as we begin to experience their benefits and feel the modern strain and anxiety reduce, allowing the nervous system to settle.
Perhaps counterintuitvely, gentleness is the smartest approach to acquiring the now-heroic virtue it takes in modern life to live without the anxiety, strain, and overstimulation that is so normative.
We don’t need to change everything all at once, but we can focus on gently incorporating the valuable things we really need that will help shape the rest of our days and push out what taxes us.
Yes: turning off your phone a lot more will help.
But by starting with things that act as a help that build momentum, we can move ourselves a lot more easily in the right direction.
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As mentioned earlier, this body of work I’ve built over many years is a real part of this process for many people who are stuck in a state of stress. I am truly honored by this.
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