Our minds are perfectly designed to keep us safe during this crisis, we just need to know how to use them

Our minds are designed to look for risk for one simple reason, to keep us safe. For our ancestors, who were under constant threat from wild animals, opposing tribes, life threatening diseases and a lack of food, this was incredibly helpful.

In the modern day, certainly for those of us in the developed world, we have 24 our supermarkets, relatively safe cities and an excellent health service to take care of these things. This is why our minds can have a tendency to imagine dangers where there aren't any, to worry about missing our flight when we have lots of time to get to the airport, to panic about starting a new job when we are perfectly competent, to imagining we have a life threatening disease when we have a couple of minor symptoms.

For once we have a real survival scenario to deal with. Certainly running out of toilet paper is not life threatening but catching a dangerous and potentially fatal virus definitely is. The good news is that we are ready for this, we are actually built to deal with a crisis. Under pressure we are incredibly resilient and our bodies have a remarkable immune system that will do its best to fight off any invisible attackers. The thousands of incredible human stories we have through the ages of ordinary people overcoming adversity from imprisonment to debilitating illnesses testify to this.

The danger is that, instead of realising this and harnessing our special survival powers, we panic. We get caught up in the 24 hour negative news cycle and freeze like rabbits in the headlight instead of taking action. Our minds are designed to identify the risks and then do something about it. Sitting at home in our pyjamas and comfort eating Doritos does not count.

So what should we do?

I was delighted this week to be invited by fellow coach Laurence Knott to take part in his Conscious Living Community, and share my insights on how we handle this situation along with lots of practical tips on how to deal with the day to day challenges we are facing. You can click here to watch our conversation in full. For those of you short on time here are the four key steps to get you quickly from feeling anxious to feeling calm and in control:

Step 1, let the risk part of your mind do its work. Write down the disaster you are worrying about, ideally write down a few scenarios - the current scenario, a slightly worse scenario and then whatever disaster scenario your mind has conjured up.

Step 2, make plans. This is how we keep calm. If we've identified the risks and stop there we will just feel anxious until we see how everything pans out. You need to take action and the key action when the future is uncertain is to make plans. Make plans for the survival basics, where and when you will buy your food, how you will pay the essential bills to keep a roof over your head and how to keep yourself and your loved ones safe and well. As a self-employed consultant the first thing I wrote was a plan based on all my non-committed clients cancelling their planned work with me over the next 3-6 months. Actually that hasn't come to pass, so far I'm working much more than I expected, but still I needed to satisfy the risk management part of my mind in order to stay calm. Write out your plan and put it in a drawer, you now know what to do if things get really bad.

Step 3, setup a new routine. We love a routine, human beings have had routines since we could get up and walk about and our minds can adopt them pretty quickly. Originally we based our routines around nature. With the invention of electricity and the light bulb that changed, but still we have had regular patterns of behaviour across populations, through history. A routine is comforting which is why we use it to get our children to sleep, it also lowers our stress levels. Actions that are routine can be done on auto-pilot so you don't have to expend energy deciding what to do next. So if you weren't working from home full time before we went into lockdown now is the time to establish a new routine. Write one down and set alarms in your phone to stick to it. I highly recommend the first thing you do in the morning after you've showered and dressed is get out into daylight. This sets your circadian rhythm for the day governing energy levels and boosting your immunity, which is key right now. Even sticking your head out the window for 5 minutes works. Set alarms for when to exercise, start work, take breaks, get outdoors and most importantly when to stop work and wind down for the day. Having a good sleep routine isn't just for babies, it's essential to help you manage your stress levels and stay resilient.

Step 4, set some positive goals. Right now you are probably focussed on what you can't do. Just stop. Start focussing on what you can do and set some positive goals. Can you use the time you used to commute to do more exercise (HIIT training is highly effective and can be done anywhere), does moving to video socialising mean you can spend more time connecting with friends and family overseas than you did before? Is there a personal project you want to complete? A language you want to learn? A community of people you can help? Just think to 3 months from now, what would you like to have achieved, how would you like to have contributed?

Our minds are highly motivated by goals and reward, so use this knowledge to create a positive focus to your day and use treats to motivate yourself. Want to eat some chocolate? Use it as a reward that you can have once you've cleared your emails or done your exercise for the day. Fancy watching some tv or having an afternoon nap? First give the kitchen a clean, do 50 push ups or read 10 pages of a book. It's that simple, this is how we get things done.

Working through these four steps can rapidly take you from paralysed panic to feeling positive and productive, able to do your work, take care of your family and achieve some positive goals in this new normal. This doesn't just work on grown ups, find out what your children are worried about, create a plan that makes them feel safe, get them into a new routine as soon as possible and set them positive goals and challenges each day to keep them focussed.

Our minds are perfectly designed to deal with a crisis, we just need to know how to use them.