Lane County residents call on historical perspective, self-care to ease election anxieties

Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 3.

Does reading those words give you anxiety?

You’re not alone. 

On a recent Thursday night in a west Eugene church, a dozen or so souls gathered to talk about their election anxieties. The meeting, convened by the nonprofit group Braver Angels, offered an opportunity to share and to listen — and to learn about ways to deal with their anxiety.

As the church’s choir rehearsed elsewhere in the building, the meeting’s participants listed their election worries.

Some of those apprehensions come with any election: Which candidate will win? Which ballot measures will pass — and which ones will fail?

For other participants, the anxieties were personal.

“My strategy for how to discuss politics with family members has been not to do it,” said one man. “I’m open to another approach.”

Others worried about whether the election would be free and fair. That particular worry is a concern across the political spectrum, said Barry Nobel, who helped facilitate the session. And it “seems more intense than it has been in the past.”

Nobel added another factor: “What we have seen with (the) lowering trust in our institutions really just adds to that anxiety.”

It all comes together in today’s political stew, and it’s been simmering for years, seasoned by claims about elections rife with fraud and efforts to intimidate voters and election officials.

Experts say a barrage of news reports and campaign ads and social-media posts — messages beamed around the clock to our electronic devices — isn’t doing anything to lower anyone’s anxiety.

But they also say a bit of historical perspective — and some relatively simple self-care techniques — can help navigate the next few days.

Triggering strong emotions

There’s nothing new about political campaigns working to trigger emotional reactions among voters. And there’s a reason for that, said Chandler James, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Oregon. 

“I think what campaigns have realized is that inducing strong emotions can activate people and mobilize people to participate,” James said in an interview. “And so if you can make people more fearful and more anxious, that can be a good way to get them to the polls and get them excited.”

James pointed to a famous example, Lyndon Johnson’s notorious 1964 “Daisy” ad, in which a 3-year-old girl is vaporized in a nuclear explosion. (The devastatingly effective ad played off fears that Johnson’s opponent, Barry Goldwater, would launch a nuclear war.) The last words you hear in the ad: “The stakes are too high for you to stay home.”

The ad aired only once. But imagine, James said, if it had been produced today, when campaigns, now have “lots of different mediums — social media, TV, internet advertisements, etc., to be able to get that message to people quickly.”

In fact, as James was talking to a reporter, a text message from a campaign buzzed through on his phone. The news was grim: An opposing campaign had just dumped $4 million into the race. The stakes of the election were high, the text said.

One difference about today’s political landscape, James said, was that “you had to be watching TV or reading the paper or whatever to be able to get exposed to the message. But this popped up on my phone, which is always on me.”

The message on James’ phone also emphasized the high stakes of the election — and it’s not unusual for candidates to make a case that the future of the nation hinges on the election results. 

James emphasized that he did not want to downplay the importance of this year’s election. But he noted that U.S. history is filled with other consequential elections, such as the 1860 election that put Abraham Lincoln in the White House with the nation on the brink of civil war. 

He also noted that, even with election anxieties running high in this midterm election, that doesn’t apparently persuade every registered voter to cast a ballot: Based on previous midterm elections, roughly a third of the electorate won’t vote.

‘Make America boring again’

In an email to Lookout, Jenny Root of Eugene wrote about a long-running quip she likes to use: “For 10 years now, I’ve been saying ‘Make America Boring Again’ — because I follow politics obsessively and there’s no let-up!” 

In a follow-up interview, Root said she believes “this midterm is off the charts.”

She added: “We don’t know what’s going to happen on Election Day. We don’t know how this is going to roll out. We no longer have the reliance or trust in the system because of ongoing misinformation and disinformation.”

Root said she follows the news closely and sees “countless stories of either the federal government accusing states and locales of potential fraud, and then countless stories around voter intimidations. I mean, this is a new one. … It’s really a lot every single day, nearly every few hours.”

Social media and 24-hour news channels have increased the volume. She said she doesn’t use social media much, but she has news apps on her phone and subscribes to newsletters. 

She tries to find time to step away from the steady flow, but “I can’t tell you that I have this hard-and-fast rule that I set it all aside for a chunk of time and take a hike. You know, that would be super healthy, but I’m not necessarily doing that because the demands of life don’t (always) allow for that.” 

Jerry Ritter, who lives outside Springfield, said he has a group of acquaintances that includes, like Braver Angels, both liberals and conservatives. “We’re able to talk about most things,” he said. “But what most of us have in common is that we’re pretty well-informed and have our ears close to the ground. So we try to base our opinions on what’s really going on in the political world, not just on name recognition, not just on party.”

So his election anxiety, he said, “has its roots in uninformed voters.” He recounted an example when a relative asked him for election recommendations, and a disagreement emerged over a candidate for federal office. Ritter said he had followed this candidate closely for a decade, and disagreed with the candidate’s positions on the issues.

He explained this to the relative, and she shrugged off the advice: “I know his name,” she told him, “and I think he’s popular in Oregon.”

“I’m guessing there are many voters in our fair state who vote on name familiarity or simply because of party without fully understanding the issues at stake. I find this very concerning,” Ritter wrote in an email to Lookout. “And how many people are going to vote one way simply because ‘We hate Trump!’ without considering the very real statewide problems with which Donald Trump had nothing to do?”

Preaching mindfulness

At the Braver Angels meeting at the church, Lisa Dayton, the event’s other facilitator, offered a definition of anxiety as emotion characterized by apprehension about things that might happen.

“So it’s very much focused on the future, the unknowns, the what-ifs,” she said. 

Anxiety, she said, “can have quite a profound effect on us, not only mentally and emotionally, but physically as well.” 

It can also prompt people to stop socializing. For Better Angels, an organization that believes that Americans, regardless of their political differences, can practice “courageous citizenship” through “skill-building, convening and collaborative action,” that’s a particularly troubling symptom. 

So among the tools Dayton and Nobel offered participants at the session was mindfulness — trying to be aware of how your body is reacting to a conversation or a bit of news. “Have intention before you have the conversation,” Dayton said. “And do so with compassion and curiosity.”

Michelle Fenesy thinks that’s good advice. Fenesy, a clinical assistant professor of psychology at the University of Oregon, supervises doctoral students training to be clinicians and increasingly hears about patients expressing election-related worries.

Her advice to her students is to, first, validate those concerns. 

“Elections do have real impacts on our lives, and in the lead-up to elections, we’re also having to sit with a lot of uncertainty,” she said. “We don’t really know what the outcome is yet, so it’s really easy for our minds to go in 500 different directions about all possible outcomes.”

But then, she said, the key is deciding what’s under your control right now. Maybe that means trying to limit time spent reading news or social media posts, “so I can be informed, but then I’m not letting it overwhelm me or take control of my entire day.”

Maybe it’s having conversations about certain topics and why they’re important to you in the election — and listening to what someone else says.

Mindfulness matters, she said, but it doesn’t necessarily require you to focus on your breathing — although that can help.

Fenesy often recommends what she calls a “mindful color walk. … Go on a walk and pick one color that you’re going to pay really close attention to.” As you go on a walk, “you’re moving your body, which is great for anxiety.” But you’re also engaged in a mindfulness practice.

Mindfulness might also help in dealing with anxiety caused by social media, she said. And people need to remember that social media algorithms are designed to keep people engaged and elevate emotional responses. 

“So if I’m scrolling on TikTok or whatever and my goal is to just take a five-minute break but all of a sudden I find myself feeling really stressed or overwhelmed, that might actually be a sign to myself that, hey, I need to pause and set this down for now, because this isn’t actually helpful for me.”

But she’s not advocating that people cut out social media entirely, because it does have positive attributes, such as allowing people to stay in touch with family and friends.

‘Outrage fatigue’

Election anxiety isn’t going to disappear on Wednesday. Not every race will be settled, and it seems certain that some of them will be headed for courtrooms, for weeks if not months. That’s part of the reason why Nobel and Dayton are planning another session on election anxiety on Thursday, Nov. 12. 

But Dayton, thinking about how the landscape has changed between 2024 and 2026, sees hopeful signs.

“I think people are finally getting outrage fatigue,” she said. “You’re not necessarily seeing less dialogue, but you’re seeing calmer voices actually finally starting to rise to the top.”

Braver Angels offers one safe place for those calmer voices, and Dayton sees another hope emerging as people gather in a room for civil conversation: “Understanding that there are so many more similarities that, no matter how an election turns out, we have to be able to trust each other.”

If you go

The Braver Angels Southern Willamette Valley Alliance is hosting a post-election anxiety workshop Thursday, Nov. 12, from 6 to 8 p.m. at Bethesda Lutheran Church, 4445 Royal Ave. in Eugene. Nobel and Dayton will lead the free workshop. View more information and RSVP through the Braver Angels: Southern Willamette Valley Alliance Meetup page or check updates directly on the Southern Willamette Valley Alliance Website. For questions, email swva@braverangels.com.