Survival Mode

For most of my life, I thought the way my mind worked was normal. Recently, a close friend of mine who is a therapist told me something that initially confused me. She said that after getting to know me, she realized I seem to live in a constant “Survival Alert Mode”

At first I didn’t fully understand what she meant. But the more I reflected on it, the more it made sense. 

When someone experiences repeated trauma throughout their life, the body and mind adapt in order to survive. One of the ways they do that is by constantly scanning for danger. You read body language, you read the room for signs, you analyze words and refer to previous scenarios in your mind. Your mind starts overthinking , predicting worst-case scenarios, and mentally preparing for everything that could possibly go wrong. It feels like a form of protection as if being mentally prepared will somehow soften the blow when something bad happens.

But one of the most important lessons I’ve learned is this no matter how prepared you think you are, when something truly painful happens, it is almost always worse than anything you imagined. It’s like studying a subject for a test you are not sure you will take but finding out you were tested in a whole other subject. And usually it’s POP Quiz 🫨

All that constant vigilance, all that overthinking it doesn’t actually shield you from the pain.

So I’m trying to shift my perspective.

I’m trying to let go of the illusion that I can prepare myself for every possible outcome or control what life brings my way. Because the truth is, none of us really can.

What I can hold on to instead is something much more grounding is my faith in Allahs will. And my Faith that everything that is meant to happen will happen and now I will focus on this verse from the Quran.

“إِنَّ مَعَ الْعُسْرِ يُسْرًا” 

It means:

“Indeed, with hardship comes ease.”

Looking back at everything I’ve been through, I can see that even in my hardest moments, Allah was always there in my life in so many ways and has sent me so many amazing people to lift me up from my lowest guiding me, strengthening me, and helping me find my way through things I once thought I would never survive.

Maybe the goal isn’t to stay in survival mode forever.

Maybe the goal is to trust that whatever comes, Allah will give us the strength to get through and to have that kind of trust is far more powerful than any attempt at control. 

Living in a constant state of anxiety and hyper alertness is exhausting both mentally,emotionally, and physically. 

Trusting that Allah is guiding me allows me to release the impossible burden of trying to predict and prevent every impossible outcome, and instead, find strength and peace in the present moment and comfort knowing that Allah will always be there 💕 and to always say الحمدلله