One of those (dippy) weeks...

You know those weeks where you just dip?

They come by every so often, emptying your energy and draining you mentally. It'll start with a challenge, say a large sum of money that you suddenly need to spend on fixing the house (and you need to figure out where to get the money from), continue with another so called "challenge", then another, till every little thing causes a melt down... The burnt-out lightbulb? Aaaaaargh!

-Static-
"Ladies and gentlemen, we are now reaching coping capacity, please fold the tray tables in front of you, return your seats to their upright position, and make sure your seat belts are tightly fastened. It's going to be a bumpy ride..."

When you arrive at coping capacity, the world — and your perception — are completely warped and out of whack. It's not the captain speaking anymore... Instead you'll hear the voices of judgment and anger swirling in your head. Judgement for how you performed (or really, how you mis-performed and got us here in the first place); and raging retaliation against said judgement.

The best thing to do when the (metaphoric) captain disappears, is turn on auto-pilot. Auto-pilot forces you to continue flying forward, to your destination. Turbulence does not affect auto-pilot, it doesn't spend time revisiting the past, considering different options or making major decisions. Its sole purpose is to keep the plane up in the air and on course. And most importantly, it allows the captain to get some much needed shut-eye.

If you are having a dippy week, take a step back to regain perspective. Ask yourself fundamental questions about each separate challenge you are faced with, and work your way through them using lots of reason. The first thing you will find is that a lot of the challenges can be postponed to a later date, and that not all of them have a complete-by-yesterday date.

Disconnecting from the situation, allows you (the captain) to regain balance, perspective and eventually control, avoiding more unneeded turbulence.