How to Calm the Chaos and Find Your Peace
How do you stay calm when everything around you feels out of control? Shari has been hearing this question from women constantly, capable, responsible women who are quietly unraveling on the inside, not because of anything catastrophic, but because of the sheer noise of the world.
In this episode, she explains what's actually happening in your nervous system, why the pause between what happens and how you respond is where your real power lives, and four practical ways to come back to yourself when it all feels like too much.
Key Takeaways
- When the world feels chaotic, your nervous system picks it up, whether the threat is immediate or something you read on your phone at 11 p.m. Your body responds the same way either way: stress hormones rise, breathing gets shallow, and you start scanning for danger.
- This isn't weakness. It's your nervous system doing exactly what it's designed to do. The problem is most of us were never taught how to help it settle again.
- Between what happens and how you respond, there is always a pause, and that pause is where your power actually lives.
- You can't control what's happening in the world, but you can control what you consume, who you talk to, and when you step away to take care of yourself. These are real choices.
- Four practical ways back to yourself: pause before you consume, regulate your nervous system before you try to think anything through (try the 4-7-8 breathing pattern), set a boundary around your information diet, and anchor to what you can actually influence.
- The C.A.L.M. Method applies here too: Clarity on where you're actually overwhelmed right now, Awareness of what's driving your reaction, Learning what your body needs, and Mindset to remember you have more agency than you think.
Resources
π¬οΈ Free 5-Minute Stress Release and Reset (audio): https://www.sharibiery.com/5-minute-stress-release-&-reset
π― Take the free Midlife Spark Type Quiz: https://www.sharibiery.com/quiz
π Read or Listen to It’s Your Turn: https://www.sharibiery.com/its-your-turn-book
π Website: https://www.sharibiery.com
π Follow Shari on Substack: https://sharibiery.substack.com/
Transcript
How Do I Stay Calm?
[00:00:01] Shari Biery: How do I stay calm when everything around me feels out of control?
You can't control what's happening outside of you, but you can come back to yourself. And that's where peace actually lives.
Welcome and Intro
[00:00:19] Shari Biery: You're listening to It's Your Turn with Shari Biery. I'm Shari, a National Board Certified health and wellness coach, best-selling author, speaker, and creator of the C.A.L.M. Method. Each week, this show is about taking your turn in midlife, embracing new purpose, new passions, and new possibilities. New episodes drop weekly, so be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts. Now, let's get into it.
If the World Feels Noisy
[00:00:49] Shari Biery: If the world feels very noisy to you lately, this episode is for you.
Today, we're talking about what to do when the world feels like too much, and you're not sure how to find your footing again.
I'm recording this just a few weeks before the midterm elections in the United States, and things are tense. I wanted to record this because here's what I keep seeing: women who are responsible, capable, holding everything together, are quietly unraveling on the inside. And not because anything catastrophic happened to them personally, but one of the reasons is because the constant noise of the world is wearing many people down.
And the question I hear over and over again is, how do I stay calm when everything around me feels out of control? The short answer is, you can't control what's happening outside of you. Yes, we have influence over it, we can take part in certain things. But the biggest thing is, you can come back to yourself. And that's where peace actually lives.
What's Actually Happening in Your Body
[00:02:28] Shari Biery: So first, we need to talk about what's actually happening in your body. When the world feels chaotic, your nervous system picks it up. It doesn't matter if the threat is immediate, or something you read on your phone at 11 o'clock at night, your body responds. Your stress hormones rise. Your breathing gets shallow. You start scanning for danger. And if you stay in that state long enough, you get exhausted in a way that sleep doesn't fix.
Now, this isn't weakness. This is your nervous system doing exactly what it was designed to do. It's responding.
The problem is that most of us were never taught how to help our nervous system settle again. We just stay activated. We scroll more. We talk about it more. We think about it more. And then we wonder why we can't relax, or why we feel so exhausted.
So we have to remember, our body isn't broken when this happens. It's responding. And what it needs is a way back.
The Pause Where Your Power Lives
[00:03:50] Shari Biery: Remembering you always have a choice about how you respond. One of the most grounding things I've ever learned is this: between what happens and how I respond, there is always, always a pause. It might be a tiny pause, but it's there, and it's my choice how long that pause is. And inside that pause is where your power lives.
You cannot control the world. We cannot control what's happening to us, but we can control how we respond to it. And that's not about being passive. It's not about ignoring what's hard. It's about knowing where your influence actually lives.
You get to choose what you consume, and how often. You get to choose who you talk to and what conversations you stay in. You get to choose how much you scroll, and what you scroll and start reading, because you're going to get more of that information in your feed. And let's just be honest, there's a lot of information out there on social media that is clickbait, that's rage bait. We just have to be aware of it, and step away from it. You get to choose when you step away to really take care of yourself.
These are all real choices, and they matter more than most of us realize.
Four Ways Back to Yourself
[00:05:38] Shari Biery: So today, I want to share 4 ways that you can come back to yourself when things feel overwhelming. These are practical, they're not complicated, but they will require you to actually stop and do them. So I invite you to listen to them and see which one stands out for you the most. Either do one, or all of them.
Way 1: Pause Before You Consume
[00:06:07] Shari Biery: The first one is to pause before you consume. Before you open your phone, before you turn on the news, ask yourself, is my nervous system in a regulated state right now?
For many of us, it is not. If you're already feeling anxious, or overwhelmed, or full of worry, adding more information that you know is not going to help, is not being helpful to you. So give yourself a few minutes first. Take a pause with that.
Way 2: Regulate Before You Think
[00:06:52] Shari Biery: The second is to regulate your nervous system before you try to think anything through. That means breathing. Slow, deliberate breaths, where the exhale is longer than the inhale.
I teach this in our coaching, and you may have heard it called box breathing. It's really taking an effort to slow down and breathe. It's an inhale for 4 seconds, a hold for 4 seconds, and then an exhale for 7 seconds. So 4-4-7 is the pattern I follow and coach my clients through.
That's not a wellness trend. Being a respiratory therapist, I know this, that's physiology. A longer exhale activates your parasympathetic nervous system. That's the part of your nervous system that is your rest and digest. It tells your body it's safe to settle.
Way 3: Set a Boundary Around Your Information Diet
[00:08:10] Shari Biery: The third way is to create a boundary around your information diet. This doesn't mean you stick your head in the sand. It doesn't mean you disengage and don't take part in things. It means you decide when you engage with hard things, and when you don't.
Maybe it's 30 minutes after you've been up for some time in the morning, and that's it. Maybe it's certain sources. There's a lot of misinformation and a lot of clickbait out there, so notice where the source is coming from. There's a lot of AI-generated bots and posts out there that are really sharing false information. So being aware of it, and not participating with it, you get to decide.
Way 4: Anchor to What You Can Influence
[00:09:09] Shari Biery: And the fourth is to anchor yourself to what you can actually influence. Your home. Your relationships. Your choices today. Your commitments to yourself. The things right in front of you are real, and they're yours.
And when the world feels big and out of control, those anchors are what keep you steady.
The C.A.L.M. Method Applied
[00:09:40] Shari Biery: Now, you know I have the C.A.L.M. Method. If you've been listening to this, or read my book, I talk about it. This is the framework I teach, and it works perfectly here.
Because Clarity is about getting honest with yourself. Where are you actually overwhelmed right now? Not in theory, but right now.
Awareness is about noticing what's driving your reaction. Are you consuming more than your nervous system can handle? Are you in conversations that keep spinning without resolution?
Learning is about listening to your body and what it needs. It might need rest. It might need movement. It might need a good walk outside without your phone. Listening to nature.
And Mindset is about reminding yourself that you have more agency than you think. Not to control everything, but to choose how you show up. To come back to yourself, even when the world feels like a lot.
What I Hope You'll Take Away
[00:11:01] Shari Biery: So, here's what I hope you'll take away from today. The world is loud. It has always been loud in its own way, and maybe more so now than ever. And it will keep being loud.
What you can build is a steadier relationship with yourself inside of that. A way of coming back when you've drifted. A practice of tending to your nervous system instead of feeding it more chaos.
Midlife does not respond well to force. It responds to rhythm. And one of the most powerful rhythms you can build right now is the practice of returning to yourself, of being true to yourself.
Peace isn't something the world is going to hand you. It's something you create from the inside out. That's what this work is all about. Not ignoring the world, but coming back to yourself.
Where to Go From Here
[00:11:50] Shari Biery: If you want a simple starting point, I have a free resource I call the 5-Minute Stress Release and Reset. It's practical, it's short, it's a practice, it gives you something concrete to use when your nervous system needs to settle. I'm going to drop it in the show notes here.
And if this episode really spoke to you, and you're talking about it with other people in your life, especially the women in your life, share this episode with whoever you feel might need to hear it.
Where in your life right now are you feeding the chaos instead of coming back to yourself? And what's one small thing you can do today to create a little more peace, from the inside out
Keep Taking Your Turn
[00:13:04] Shari Biery: So thanks for spending time with me today. If something in this episode really resonated with you, I'd love to hear about it. That's such a big part of what comes out of this show, hearing from you.
You can find me on Substack as well, and if you haven't taken the free Midlife Spark Type Quiz, that link is always in the show notes as well. So, until next time, take care of yourself. Keep that inner peace. And keep taking your turn.
Take the Next Step
Why the 5-Minute Stress Release and Reset, with the quiz as secondary: This episode is built around real-time nervous system regulation, so the free audio practice Shari names directly in the episode is the most immediately useful next step. The quiz remains a good secondary option for anyone who wants a broader picture of where they are right now.
If you want a simple starting point, try the free 5-Minute Stress Release and Reset. It's short, practical, and gives you something concrete to use the next time your nervous system needs to settle. Listen here.
If you haven't yet, take the free Midlife Spark Type Quiz to see where you are right now. Take the quiz here.
This content is for informational purposes only and is not intended as medical or mental health advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare provider or mental health professional with any questions about your health.
AI Disclosure: I'm a mom, wife, veteran military spouse, healthcare worker, and National Board Certified Health and Wellness Coach. My writing connects back to my book, It's Your Turn, and my own lived experience. I use AI to help draft and edit, but every idea, story, and word comes from me.
