The year that began with promise
This year started as usual with great promise. My goals were in place, my vision board ready, my word of the year chosen. I had done my end-of-year meetings with my business mentor and my daughter, both of who help me stay accountable. I was feeling really optimistic about being “productive” and working towards “abundance.”
And then everything changed.
When the world became too loud
The issue of stray dogs in India exploded, and with it came a wave of cruelty that was impossible to ignore. Dogs were being killed in their hundreds, cheered on by people drunk on power and indifference. For someone like me, this was not just news—it was a constant assault on my nervous system.
My anxiety spiked. I began reaching more and more often for my SOS anti-anxiety pills.
Choosing a safer alternative
At some point, I realised I was standing on a dangerous slippery slope. And just in time, I switched addictions.
I returned to an old, familiar way of coping with emotional pain. I buried myself in romantic novels, binge-reading four or five in a single day. It was my way of making the world disappear and hiding in a world where the biggest problem was how to stop yourself from falling in love with a rogue or a rake.
On the surface, this seemed like a safe, harmless trade.
But was it?
When comfort turns into hiding
For me, reading means not getting out of bed, and so all my best intentions for 2026 got tossed out of the window, or should I say, under the quilts.
Since I barely left my bed, I missed my walks. I skipped physiotherapy. I stopped working on my business plans and my writing. I was moving in the exact opposite direction of my word of the year—abundance.
The only thing in abundance were the novels I escaped into.
Making changes
This wouldn’t do.Something had to change.
So I did the only thing I could manage at that point. I set up my Instagram and Facebook to block news and posts about the killing of dogs—and anything else that lingered long enough to trigger my anxiety.
Maybe it was selfish not to want to know what was happening in the world. Maybe it was self-preservation.
Whatever it was, it helped. It has me tiptoeing back into the world of the living—the world I want to build for myself—one where life, creativity, health, and hope are allowed to flow in abundance.
Sometimes it feels like social media knows exactly what kind of news affects us most and keeps throwing it at us, spiking our anxiety. I often wish I could step away from smartphones or even the apps entirely. Dealing with anxiety in the moment is tough, and I too tend to turn to unhealthy coping mechanisms at first until awareness, thankfully, kicks in.
I am glad to know the not-so-happy-times have passed now that your Feb makes the year look good for you.
This is not merely a “feeling.” Platforms have spent millions – maybe BILLIONS – of dollars on making social media more and more addictive, generating negative feelings – dare I say in the hopes that a little “retail therapy” in the guise of buying crap we don’t need from ads we don’t want will kick in and make the expenditure worth it to their bottom line?
They also know that most of us would leave if it weren’t for family and friends who ALSO refuse to leave because…family and friends. We are all stuck together at the bottom of the quarry, so to speak, and it’s our fault – we’ve trapped each other there.
This is one reason I keep saying that I want to spend more time on my own site and less on Facebook, but the vicious truth now is that no one will read a thing we write here – it gets swiftly buried in the noise – unless we promote it like a streetcorner vendor on……FACEBOOK. (And/or X, Bluesky, Substack… they KNOW how to keep us hamsters on their wheels, building THEIR content, turning them into billion dollar properties to be traded on the stock exchange or sold.)
True that.
Oh yes, social media knows exactly how to hit you. I really hope I can keep my exposure to it to a minimum this year.
I think all of us have various ways of dealing with anxiety and stress. Learning to become conscious of it and take the right steps to preserve your emotional and mental well-being, is the best thing we can do. Hugs.
True. Awareness is the first step. Only then can we decide in which direction we want to move.
It’s not selfishness, Sunita, blocking that news was an essential self-preservation tactic for you. Don’t forget that you are still an animal lover at heart. If any injustice happened right in front of you, I know you would stand up for it.
I completely understand the need to block the dreadful news crowding your feed. I used to feel responsible for everything going wrong in the world, until one day I realized that feeling sorry wasn’t helping anyone, including myself. I am so glad to hear that you have found your way back to a place of abundance once again.
Remember, don’t feel guilty for prioritizing your mental health, ever.
Thanks Vinitha. Yes, this year (as usual) the idea is to prioritise my health, both physical and mental as they seem to be feeding on each other.