In this moment of cultural, political, and economic uncertainty, when we have no idea what horrors the next news cycle will bring, or how we and our loved ones and our communities might be impacted, many of us are variously experiencing our nervous systems under pressure.

I have to confess I still haven’t seen the movie, but I’ve been thinking a lot about this time we’re in, where “everything everywhere all at once” feels particularly acute.

Even in our own lives, aside from the political chaos of the current moment, it can feel like everything is breaking.

Or that if it’s not one thing, it’s another.

As I write this, it’s Saturday morning and Malaika and LaVoya from the CCI team are convening just a few blocks from my house to host our first ever DEI brunch!

Me? I’m down with covid, fortunately a mild case, but in consultation with my PCP, I’m following the original rather than current guidance and quarantining for five days.

And I feel… disappointed, yes of course, but also, surprisingly, I FEEL AMAZING!!!

After an energizing and engaging week, I was all fired up to write this blog post about sexual harassment in middle school… but after an emotional weekend, I’ve found I don’t have it in me to get all fired up right now.

Rather than pushing myself through, I’ve decided to save that for another time, and instead to share some of our most popular blog posts from the past… which lead me to be curious to look at our website stats (which honestly we don’t look at in the way we probably should) to see if traffic has dropped off this year, what with the DEI pushbacks and all.

As we step further into the new year and are all somewhere in the depths of grief, trauma recovery, and adjustment, I’ve been thinking a lot about capacity—the limits of what we can give, create, and sustain—both personally and professionally.

Our work with clients often comes back to this—as folks move through the process of workplace cultural change they are able to more clearly see how systems of oppression function in their day-to-day work, in this case in the urgency of our workflows.

While the cultural pressure to push ahead can feel overwhelming, especially in the current political context, a trauma-informed lens reminds us to consider capacity differently: not as a fixed boundary to ignore or overcome, but as a dynamic, evolving reflection of our human experience.

At a time when the dominant narrative is grossly mischaracterizing DEI to justify its dismantling in favor of what amounts to re-segregation, we believe now is the time to lean into your values and beliefs.

While there’s so much you can’t control, you can ensure that equity, inclusion, and belonging remain priorities in your workplace - so your staff and the communities you serve feel just a little more protected and reassured.

You can make a difference to the people around you who are feeling scared and demoralized.

And you don’t have to do it alone.

We know there's a lot going on right now and something that has been coming up in our coaching sessions with executives, leaders and staff is stress and burnout. We’ve written about burnout before, deep into the worst of the pandemic, and revisited over a year later, the strategies (and science) are just as relevant today, even if our stressors have shifted.