10 Things to Remember When Life Feels Completely Overwhelming

Some days, life doesn’t just knock you down—it buries you under an avalanche of responsibilities, losses, worries, and uncertainties.

You’re staring at your phone at 2 a.m., scrolling through existential dread, wondering how everything got so hard so fast. The bills are piling up. The diagnosis was worse than you feared. Your relationship imploded. Someone you love is suffering. The job you hated is gone, and the future feels terrifyingly uncertain.

Maybe it’s one big thing, or maybe it’s a hundred small ones that have accumulated until they feel like one giant, suffocating weight. Either way, when tough times hit—and they hit all of us eventually—it’s easy to feel like you’ve been singled out for suffering, that you’re uniquely broken, that this darkness is permanent.

I know this feeling intimately. I’ve been there curled up on my bedroom floor, convinced I was failing everyone and that I’d never feel normal again. I’ve had clients sobbing in my office, certain their world was ending. I’ve read the research, and I’ve lived the reality.

But here’s what I’ve learned, both from science and from surviving my own dark seasons: tough times are universal, survivable, and temporary. What separates people who make it through from those who get stuck is what they choose to remember when everything screams that it’s hopeless.

These aren’t empty platitudes or social media quotes. They’re battle-tested truths grounded in psychology, neuroscience, and human resilience research. They’re the mental anchors that can keep you from drowning when the waves feel too high.

1. This feeling is temporary. Nothing lasts forever.

Your brain makes the current pain feel eternal because that’s what it evolved to do. The same negativity bias that helped our ancestors survive saber-toothed tigers now makes a bad week feel like your entire life.

But here’s the biological reality: nothing is permanent. Not joy. Not pain. Not relationships. Not health. Not even you as you are right now. Emotions have lifecycles. Stress hormones dissipate. Neural pathways that feel like concrete highways today will fade with time and new experiences.

Neuroscientist Lisa Feldman Barrett explains in her work on constructed emotion that our feelings aren’t direct reactions to reality—they’re predictions based on past patterns. When you feel “this will never end,” your brain is actually saying “this feels like past pains that lasted forever.” Reminding yourself that feelings are temporary rewires that prediction.

The pandemic taught us this brutally. People who felt they’d never be happy again are now looking back thinking “I survived that?” You’ll say the same about today, one day.

2. You’re stronger than you think (probably much stronger).

When you’re suffering, it’s easy to see only your weaknesses—your anxiety, your mistakes, your failures, your inability to “just get over it.

But think about everything you’ve already survived. That heartbreak in college you thought would kill you. The job loss that forced you to reinvent yourself. The illness or injury that you recovered from. The friendship or relationship that ended painfully but made space for something better. Every single time you got out of bed when you didn’t want to, every time you kept going when you wanted to quit—that was strength.

Psychologist Angela Duckworth’s research on grit shows that our ability to persevere through difficulty predicts success more reliably than talent or intelligence. You’ve already demonstrated that grit countless times, even if you don’t remember it right now.

Make a list. Not of your problems, but of the specific hardships you’ve overcome. Every single one is evidence that you’re tougher than this moment.

3. Suffering is universal. You’re not alone.

One of the most isolating lies your brain tells you when you’re suffering is “no one understands” or “no one else feels this way.”

Wrong. The specifics differ, but the experience of suffering is the most universal human experience there is. Every single person you see on the street— the person behind the cash register, the executive in the suit, the influencer with the perfect Instagram life—is carrying invisible pain, loss, fear, or struggle.

Harvard’s longest study on happiness, the Grant Study, which followed people for 85 years, concluded that the quality of our relationships is the single biggest predictor of health and happiness. But it also showed that every participant went through devastating losses, failures, and periods of despair. Not some. Not most. Every single one.

When you feel alone in your suffering, you’re actually experiencing one of the most human things possible. The people around you get it more than you realize. You’re not defective. You’re human.

4. Small actions compound. You don’t have to fix everything today.

When you’re overwhelmed, your brain demands a complete solution. “Fix your entire career! Heal your entire trauma! Solve your entire financial situation! Right now!”

This is magical thinking. Complex problems require iterative, incremental progress. The most successful people aren’t smarter or more disciplined. They understand that small, consistent actions compound over time.

James Clear’s Atomic Habits is built on this principle. A 1% improvement every day compounds to 37 times better in a year. The opposite—a 1% decline—leaves you at 0. That means small actions matter enormously over time.

When everything feels broken, ask yourself: “What is the smallest possible step I can take right now that moves me in a better direction?” Not the perfect step. Not the big heroic step. The smallest possible step. Make your bed. Drink a glass of water. Take a 5-minute walk. Send one job application. Write one paragraph. That step breaks the paralysis and creates momentum.

5. Your perspective is limited (and that’s okay).

When you’re in the middle of tough times, you have very little visibility. It’s like being in a valley surrounded by mountains—you can’t see the path out, you can’t see how long it’ll take, you can’t see what’s waiting on the other side.

This is normal. Your brain is optimized for immediate survival, not long-term perspective. The higher wisdom—the ability to zoom out and see meaning, patterns, and opportunities—comes later, after you’ve survived the immediate crisis.

Viktor Frankl, who survived Nazi concentration camps, wrote in Man’s Search for Meaning that “in some way, suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning.” But crucially, he notes that meaning often emerges retrospectively, not in the midst of acute suffering.

Right now, you can’t see the gift in this pain, the lesson you’ll learn, the person you’ll become, or the opportunity waiting on the other side. That’s okay. Your job isn’t to find premature meaning. Your job is to survive until life reveals it to you naturally.

6. Emotions are data, not dictators.

When you’re suffering, emotions feel like absolute truths. Fear feels like prophecy. Shame feels like reality. Despair feels like wisdom.

But emotions are not facts. They’re biological signals designed to help you respond to the environment. Sometimes they point you toward real dangers. Sometimes they’re outdated reactions triggered by current stress. Sometimes they’re simply exhaustion talking.

Emotional intelligence pioneer Daniel Goleman distinguishes between feelings and actions. You can feel afraid and still take courageous action. You can feel ashamed and still behave with dignity. You can feel hopeless and still do one small thing that moves you forward.

Label your emotions. “I’m noticing feelings of anxiety/shame/anger.” This simple act of naming creates psychological distance between you and the feeling, according to research from UCLA. It reminds you “this is information, not my identity.”

7. Your body matters more than you think.

When you’re overwhelmed, your physical body becomes enemy number one. You stop sleeping. You stop eating well. You stop moving. You numb out with distractions. This is the worst possible strategy.

Your brain is part of your body, and it’s profoundly affected by what you put in it, how much you move it, and how well you rest it. Sleep deprivation alone reduces emotional regulation by 60%, according to sleep researcher Matthew Walker. Poor nutrition impairs decision-making. Sedentary behavior increases depression risk.

Simple physical basics create massive psychological leverage. When you can’t do anything else, do these three things: sleep (or at least rest in bed), hydrate, and walk outside. These aren’t luxuries. They’re medicine.

Dr. Andrew Huberman’s neuroscience research shows that morning sunlight exposure, deliberate cold exposure, and nasal breathing dramatically improve stress resilience. You don’t need to meditate like a monk. You just need to treat your body like it matters, because it does.

8. Asking for help is strength, not weakness.

Somewhere along the way, many of us internalized the lie that we should be able to handle everything alone. That needing help makes us weak or burdensome or somehow less human.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Interdependence is the human default. The species survived and thrived because we helped each other hunt, gather, raise children, defend against threats, and care for the sick and elderly.

Brené Brown’s research on vulnerability demonstrates that the courage to be imperfect and to reach out for support is what creates connection, healing, and strength. The people we admire most—the ones who inspire us—aren’t self-sufficient lone wolves. They’re people who built supportive tribes.

Reach out. Text a friend. Call a family member. Join an online support group. Talk to a therapist. Hire a coach. Ask your neighbor if they need anything (it works both ways). Say “I’m struggling and I need support.” The specific words matter less than the act of reaching out.

9. Comparison is a thief (but you can stop stealing from yourself).

Social media makes this brutally obvious but no less painful. When you’re suffering, every Facebook post about someone’s promotion, wedding, vacation, or newborn feels like a personal indictment. “Why them and not me? What’s wrong with me?”

Remember that social media is a highlight reel, not reality. The person posting about their “perfect life” might have just taken a Valium to get through their day. According to a University of Pennsylvania study, limiting social media to 30 minutes per day significantly reduces depression and loneliness.

More importantly, your life path is yours. Someone else’s win doesn’t diminish yours. Someone else’s suffering doesn’t make yours less valid. The universe doesn’t grade on a curve.

When comparison steals your peace, redirect your attention to your own small wins. What went right today? What are you grateful for? What would you tell your best friend if they were in your shoes?

10. Tough times aren’t punishment. They’re part of being alive.

Perhaps the most insidious lie suffering tells us is that we’ve done something wrong, that we deserve this pain, that life is punishing us or testing us or singling us out.

This worldview is both inaccurate and disempowering. Bad things happen to good people. Life is stochastic, chaotic, unpredictable. Genetics, chance events, economic forces, human decisions beyond our control—these create most of our hardships.

Stoic philosopher Epictetus, who was born a slave, had his leg intentionally crippled by his master, and still became one of history’s wisest teachers, said: “It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.”

Modern psychology echoes this ancient wisdom. What researchers call “post-traumatic growth” occurs when people who’ve been through hell emerge with deeper wisdom, stronger relationships, greater appreciation for life, and clarified values. A study from the University of North Carolina found that 70-80% of trauma survivors report some form of positive psychological change.

Your suffering isn’t pointless, even if you can’t see the meaning yet. It’s making you wiser, more compassionate, more resilient. It’s preparing you to help others going through similar pain. It’s clarifying what truly matters.

The One Thing to Do Right Now

If you’re reading this while feeling crushed by tough times, you don’t need to remember all ten points perfectly. You don’t need a five-year plan. You don’t need to be strong 24/7.

You just need to do one thing: breathe.

Literally. Take a slow inhale through your nose for 4 seconds, hold for 4, exhale through your mouth for 6. Repeat three times. This activates your parasympathetic nervous system and creates a brief window of calm amid the storm.

Then pick the smallest possible action from this list. Drink water. Text one friend. Go for a walk. Make your bed. That’s it for today.

Tomorrow, you can pick another small action. And another. Small actions compound. Tough times pass. You’ve survived 100% of your worst days so far.

And the people who love you? They’re cheering you on. Even if they don’t know the details. Even if they’re struggling too. Even if it doesn’t feel like it right now.

You’re doing the hard thing. You’re showing up. You’re still here. That’s strength. That’s enough.

Keep going.

FAQs | Things to Remember During Tough Times in Life