Co-written by Kimberly Reese, LCSW and Charlene Dyer, LCMHCS, NASM-CPT
It’s not uncommon for me to hear about an increase in feeling overwhelmed and dysregulated during this time of year. The calm and ease of Summer is over, the days are getting shorter, the holidays are on the horizon-for well over a decade I’ve shared space with clients as we explore and attend to the ways the shifts in the season correlate with shifts within our internal worlds.
This year though, there have been more and more echoes of exhaustion.
“Kim, I’m tired”.
And yet for many, rest feels unattainable.
In my work with clients we talk about how our brains take in information through our senses; what we can see, smell, taste, touch, and hear. Next the brain processes that information and compares it to past experiences. If there’s anything we are sensing in the present that the brain determines is a match for a past experience-and that past experience felt unsafe, how the brain stops processing and our brain stem, the part of the brain that is responsible for our survival, takes over.
There’s so much that can be activating for many of us this time of year. As Charlene and I are working together for HEART (Healing Educating and Abolishing Racial Trauma), another very powerful point of clarity became apparent to me about this time of year.
As the seasons shift into late fall, there’s also a deeper, generational weight to this time of year.
For our ancestors, late fall marked one of the hardest and most grueling periods on plantations—a time when harvesting demands intensified, and the physical toll was high. This history lives in our collective memory, and the body often holds echoes of these experiences, even generations later. It’s common to feel a sense of dysregulation or heaviness during this time, as if the season itself is reminding us of the resilience and survival of those before us.
And we haven’t even mentioned politics yet, y’all.
Acknowledging this connection can be a pathway to greater self-compassion. Understanding that seasonal dysregulation is not just personal but tied to our collective past can allow us to make room for rest, grounding practices, and a gentle surrender of what isn’t ours to control.
Preserving Your Peace Through Surrender: Releasing What We Can’t Control
In today’s world, the constant stream of political noise, social pressures, and the weight of our own expectations can make it hard to hold onto any sense of peace. For Black women especially, the impulse to “handle it all” is often deeply internalized—an urge rooted in strength, resilience, and history. But preserving peace sometimes means releasing the need to carry it all, to fix it all, and to control outcomes that are not ours to shape.
Surrender as an Act of Strength
Surrender is often misunderstood as giving up, but for us, it’s a deeply intentional choice. When we surrender, we’re not ignoring reality but consciously letting go of the weight we’ve been taught to carry. We discern what is ours to hold and release what is beyond our control. It’s about honoring the power in choosing when to engage and when to step back to preserve our well-being.
Leaning into surrender allows us to maintain peace by setting boundaries around our energy and time. This doesn’t mean we don’t care or that we’re avoiding responsibility—it’s about caring for ourselves enough to decide how and where our efforts are best placed. When we release the pressures that aren’t truly ours to carry, we make room for rest, clarity, and deeper connection to ourselves and our purpose.
Practices for Preserving Peace Through Surrender
Distinguish Responsibility from Internalized Pressure: Take a moment to identify what is truly your responsibility versus what you feel responsible for. Let go of anything that feels more like pressure than purpose.
Set Boundaries with Engagement: Decide how much you want to engage with the news, social media, or challenging conversations each day. Surrender to the idea that you can stay informed while also maintaining your mental and emotional limits.
Anchor in the Present: When you feel overwhelmed, try grounding practices to bring you back to the present moment. A simple breathing exercise or a moment of silence can help center your mind, reminding you of the peace that exists within, no matter the external noise.
Surrender allows us to claim peace as a birthright rather than something we have to earn through constant vigilance or sacrifice. In these times, our peace is sacred. By surrendering what we can’t control, we honor the parts of ourselves that yearn for rest, joy, and healing.
While surrendering helps us preserve our peace, staying informed grounds us in reality. Charlene will explore how being aware allows us to recognize manipulation, avoid misinformation, and strengthen our resilience as we navigate an ever-changing world.
Hello family, Charlene here. I don’t know about y’all but this election feels different to me and I imagine it feels different for a lot of you too. On the one hand, the anxiety I had leading up to this election was nearly washed away on July 21, 2024 however, as election day draws near I’m noticing that “hint” of anxiety is edging its way back up.
On Saturday I watched former first lady Michelle Obama give a speech in Kalamazoo, MI where she laid it out in plain English just how consequential this election is for us. I’ve been very engaged in this election, likely due to what I know (and what I know is definitely only the tip of the iceberg) is at stake. I remember how I felt when I woke up on November 9, 2016 and I asked my husband “Who won the election?” and when he told me who had won I literally felt hope drain out of my body and it was immediately replaced with fright. I had thoughts that hurriedly passed through my mind of every racist and harmful thing that he had said about virtually every person of color, non cis gender male presenting person, and differently abled people over the previous 18 months; hell over the previous 8ish years.
That “hint” of anxiety that I’m feeling now is nothing new, it's been there, relatively dormant, and this election is just stoking those feelings back to a level of awareness that I haven’t had to be concerned with since November 2020.
Nevertheless, here we are—again. The gaslighting has started up, making us wonder if we’re living in an alternate reality. Didn’t we figure all this out back in 2008? Weren’t we supposed to build and grow from there? So why does it suddenly feel like the 1960s all over again—and, depending on the outcome of this election, like we could be dragged back even further, to the 1930s?
We’re now hearing about Black men defecting to places where, as Tyler Perry put it, “there is no dream [in those places, for a person] that looks like me.” Why is this happening? I think there could be a couple things at play. Either it’s true and Black men are choosing a different political path in droves or it’s an illusion presented as a huge “problem” and in all actuality the polling of Black people has just increased from years past when their polling methods of us were not as rigorous as other groups. Either way it goes to show how insidious gaslighting can be.
The other inferno that is singeing us is coming from those with a platform who look like us but do not have any of us in mind as they slither their way to whatever place they’re wanting to take their career. Clay Cane wrote a whole book about the Black Republican grifter. Just for reference a political grifter is someone who uses the political process as a way to enrich themselves. (politicaldictionary.com) Because representation is so impactful it hurts that much more when someone who looks like you is spouting words that feel intrinsically harmful. That oftentimes can lead to internalized doubt about oneself, questions, taking stock in how you’ve been viewing the world and what your own perceptions are. That’s just how gaslighting works.
All this being said, please do not grow weary! As we move through this election season, it’s important to tap into our resilience, recognize when we’re being manipulated or gaslit, and support each other in navigating these feelings we have. If you’re feeling exhausted, or like somewhere along the line Doc Brown and Marty altered the timeline, remember that you’re not alone. We’re collectively carrying the weight of this time while also seeking to draw hope and strength from our future. Our voices, our truths, and our experiences matter. As a therapist, my hope for anyone reading this is that you find the support and strength you need to get through this next week and beyond, while keeping your sense of self well in tack and unfeigned.
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