I took a lovely mindfulness class this summer from The Institute for Organizational Mindfulness. It was such a nice class, with each session starting and ending with a short meditation and some helpful learning and conversation in between. In one of the sessions, our instructor told us about the acronym VUCA. It was the first time I’d ever heard of it. Once it was explained to us it made perfect sense.
VUCA stands for volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous. The United States Army War College used the acronym following the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001. A deeper look at each of the words shows that volatile means unpredictable and rapid change, uncertain is being unclear about the future, complex is related to many different and interconnected factors with the possibility of chaos and confusion and ambiguous is a lack of clarity about certain situations. Does any of this sound familiar?
Clearly, we are living in VUCA times. We see so many people struggling with anxiety, a lack of motivation, discontent at work, poor or limited decision making, overwhelm, etc. With a global pandemic, chaotic political situations, constantly changing work environments, personal struggles, and the challenge of daily lives amongst all of that, no wonder so many of us are having a hard time. VUCA times are extremely trying and difficult and almost always completely out of our control.
After, a coaching friend and I talked about how much pain we are seeing with our clients, friends, and family members. We both also admitted that we’ve had some rough times as well. The chaos and constant change seem overwhelming. The polarized news sources lead us to feel that we never know what is the truth and what is politicized information. Our medical community seems completely overwhelmed and burnt out, and who can blame them! These are challenging times and VUCA put a name and an explanation to why they are so challenging.
Mindfully Navigating Our VUCA World
Here’s the thing about VUCA…most of it is out of our immediate control, which means we only have a couple of options; change the way we look at things or change how we respond to them. Which leads me back to my beautiful mindfulness class. As our instructor taught us about VUCA, she also talked to us about being mindful, being in the moment and clearing our heads to being fully present and mindful of what we are thinking and feeling. Her recommendation was to notice the VUCA effect, not judge it or ourselves and then allow ourselves to get mindful. The mindfulness allows us to release the stress and anxiety that comes from living in a VUCA world.
Mindfulness allows us to release the stress and anxiety that comes from living in a volatile world. #stress #mindfulness #anxiety #uncertainty Click To TweetWhat most of us do in these trying times is try to escape. We go to our electronic devices or food, alcohol, cheating, drugs, gambling, etc. Although those would be understandable escape mechanisms, in the long run they only make us feel worse and more disconnected. Getting fully present with ourselves, allowing ourselves to experience all of the feelings that come our way and then releasing those feelings leads to a more conscious choosing of how we respond to our VUCA world. Meditation, centering, being in nature, movement, and unplugging all allow us to manage the chaos that comes with VUCA.
Sometimes just knowing why we feel a certain way allows us to normalize instead of judge our experience and thus allows us to choose what we want to do about it. I’m on a mission to do this for myself and to help my clients and loved ones do the same. Let me know how you do as you navigate your way through a VUCA time.
Love,
Lisa Kaplin Psy. D. PCC