How to stay productive as the world burns

Barely 10 days into the new year, it already feels like you can’t look away from the news. In the last week alone, the U.S. military captured Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro and took over operations of the country; President Trump withdrew the U.S. from dozens of international organizations, including a major climate treaty; and an ICE agent fatally shot a Minneapolis resident, sparking outrage and widespread protests.

If it seems impossible to focus on work—or anything else, for that matter—amid all this troubling news, you’re not alone. Plenty of research in recent years has shown that Americans are overwhelmed by the state of politics and feel a heightened sense of anxiety over the news cycle. There’s also clear evidence that doomscrolling and constantly absorbing negative media can interfere with our physical and mental health.

It might feel like there’s no reprieve from the endless onslaught of news, and the idea of staying productive seems almost quaint when each day has something new in store. But there are, in fact, some things you can do to help ground yourself—and get through the workday without being consumed by the news cycle. 

Create some guardrails

Our media consumption habits are unhealthy, and not only because of the obvious effects on our productivity. Engaging with the news cycle takes a toll on our well-being—and from an evolutionary perspective, our brains are wired to pay closer attention to negative news.

“When we see something in the news that triggers our perception of danger, we have a physiological response in our bodies,” says Emma McAdam, a marriage and family therapist who also shares mental health resources on YouTube. “So in order to not be reactive, we have to be really intentional consumers of the news. And we have to ask ourselves: ‘Am I consuming news for entertainment, or am I consuming news to inform action?’” If the news you’re taking in is not actionable, McAdam says, it can just increase your stress levels or serve as a distraction. 

“It’s easy to pretend that we’re doing some important job by reading the news—that we’re being informed,” she says. “But realistically, we’re probably more emotionally driven to read the news.” At the same time, it’s also not realistic for many people to entirely block out the news—especially when it directly impacts their lives. 

McAdam argues you can, however, be more intentional about how you consume news to avoid simply consuming information that is not actually actionable. This can be as simple as turning off push notifications and carving out specific times of day to catch up on the news. Or you might remove certain apps from your phone so you’re less inclined to check the news unless you’re on your laptop.

“Our bodies respond very differently to acute stress than chronic stress,” McAdam says. “We’re actually very good at managing little bits of stress. A big stressor in a short dose gives your nervous system a chance to get activated and then to relax and restore your internal sense of safety. But when we consume the news throughout our entire day, then we have this low level of chronic stress.”

Step away from the devices

There are, of course, jobs where you simply can’t avoid the news, or maybe a push notification pops up when you pick up your phone for something work-related. In those moments, you may have an emotional response that makes it difficult to stay on task. 

“We’re not able to focus and concentrate as well because our nervous system is activated,” says psychologist Maggie Stoutenburg, who works with the telehealth provider NY Mental Health Center. “We feel this distress, but then we also feel hopeless—and people can feel kind of paralyzed by that.”

If you find yourself in that situation, it can be helpful to just step away from your desk. When you’re activated and on edge, doing something that lights up your parasympathetic nervous system can help calm you down, Stoutenburg says. Deep breathing can be “quite powerful,” she says, or you might try going on a brief walk or listening to soothing music. Even a funny video can do the trick. 

When you need to get back on track after a distressing news alert, Stoutenburg recommends trying to work for just 10–15 minute increments without letting your mind wander. “Give yourself some compassion,” she says. “Validate your own feelings, and try to acknowledge it and then redirect it. ‘Okay, there’s this stress here. Maybe there’s not a lot I can do about that in this moment, but what I can do is accomplish something in the next 10 or 15 minutes that will give me more of a sense of productivity and control’.”

Focus on what you can control

Embracing the things that are within your control can be a crucial tool for managing news-related anxiety. McAdam recommends an activity that can help you gain agency, by articulating exactly what is within your control and what is out of your hands. 

“You take a piece of paper, you divide it in half, and on one side, you write ‘things I can’t control,’ and on the other side you write, ‘what I can control,’” she says. “‘I can’t control what the President said today. But I can control whether I’m going to show up at a protest. I can control whether I love my kids’.”

In other words, you do have a say in how you respond to depressing news—and McAdam points out that even anxiety can be a useful response at times, by nudging you to take action and relieve that feeling. “Anxiety isn’t just something bad that happens to us,” she says. “Anxiety is actually supposed to ask the question: Am I in danger? Is there something I should do about it? When we ask that question, we can get more clarity and be like, well, I can’t change this. I’ll let it go . . . And if there is something actionable, that little spurt of anxiety can help us take that action.”

When there’s so much happening in the world, it can be difficult to stay motivated. You may have a harder time finding purpose or meaning in your work, especially in the face of more serious concerns. It can be helpful, then, to reframe how you think about your job or other elements of your life and understand where you can actually have an impact. 

“Most of the news we read is very far from us, and most of the good we can do is very close to us,” McAdam says. “Parenting matters. Being connected to our neighbors and being kind to our neighbors matters. Doing good in my sphere, doing good in my job, being kind to my coworkers, being really productive and solving [problems] at work—these are things that actually do make a difference and hopefully make the world a better, kinder, happier, safer place.”