Downshifting in Dystopian Times

Spoiler: It’s not fine.

I’ve never played parkour, but I think we are all emotional parkourists now. Let me explain.

Parkour is a sport characterized by moving efficiently through complex environments using tactics like running, jumping, climbing, and rolling. Rooted in military training, its philosophy is as much psychological as it is physical: parkour is about adapting—again and again—to rapidly changing demands.

My original inspiration for this blog, called Downshifting, came from a mix of personal and professional experiences that taught me something essential: quality of life matters more than quantity of output. It is precisely because we are parkouring through dystopian times that we must chose where to place our attention, money, and very precious, finite time on this planet.

Our nervous systems are not built to witness the brutal murder of a mother at point-blank range at the hands of an ICE agent, then immediately switch gears to making spreadsheets in the Spreadsheet Factory, then pivot again to summer camp sign-ups, Hollywood awards season, and influencers hawking protein shakes. For those of us with the privilege of being observers rather than direct participants, the parkour is largely mental. But for countless others, it is a full-body extreme sport with real and immediate consequences.

We often think of “multitasking” as doing multiple physical tasks at once—texting while driving, or the more benign sending an email while half-listening on Zoom. What we don’t tend to think about is the cost of constantly parkouring between emotional and cognitive states. Yet research has long identified something called switch cost: the time and energy the brain needs to disengage from one demand and shift to another.

Closely related is switch readiness, which describes the conditions that make switching easier and reduce that cost. Switch readiness increases in emergencies and truly essential situations—but it declines sharply when tasks are intense, demanding, or emotionally charged.

Are you seeing where I’m going with this?

Emotional parkouring isn’t just “being busy.” It’s a specific kind of relentless, high-dissonance shifting between emotionally intense states. Even for those who actively avoid the news, the effort required to disengage and protect oneself is its own form of parkour.

We are parkouring with high switch cost and it’s draining our already low batteries. This may be worse for those who are already anxious, but it isn’t really good for any of us. We often begin our days already in switch debt, in sleep debt, already low on bandwidth. Then we continue to spend what little we have responding to the demands of the day.

If we want to survive—and live well—we have to downshift demands in order to allocate bandwidth.

The antidote to macro-overwhelm is micro joy. The Big Joy project , a large-scale multinational citizen science initiative, is producing early and promising data: just seven minutes a day of micro-joyful acts can lift mood and increase feelings of connection. Micro-joys are small, attainable moments of peace, meaning, connection, or fun. They remind us that positive emotions are still possible and keep those neural pathways open and responsive.

Ideally, micro-joys are simple and accessible—which means they carry low switch costs. More importantly, they offer a high return. They help replenish the energy required for emotional parkour.

So, with all that in mind, here’s your 3 minute reflection prompt:

Close your eyes and picture the last time you experienced real joy. Don’t overthink it—trust your memory to take you someplace meaningful. Take a mental picture of this moment, open your eyes, and describe it in a few sentences in your journal. What are the sights, sounds, smells, and textures of this memory? What made it joyful?

Let’s close out with some micro-joys. What are you reading/watching/listening to right now?

Reading: I’ve recently discovered Gillian MacAllister’s twisty, page turning thrillers and Famous Last Words is hitting the sweet spot.

Watching: I will finish Stranger Things. I will.

Listening: The internet knows I’m a Xennial and keeps feeding me Television Dreams and I’m eating it up. Sorry not sorry.

Thanks for downshifting with me, and see you next time. ~S