Feeling Blue After Trump’s Win? The UK Offers Lessons from Brexit

Were you shocked by Trump’s win? Are you finding the news hard to handle? Then check out the BBC’s  survivor’s guide to unexpected voting results.

The BBC knows a thing or two about surprise votes. After all, it was just five months ago that the UK voted to withdraw from the European Union. And many in the UK found it hard to cope with that outcome. But they did. And they want to help you now.

Here are the survival tips offered:

• Read around and try to understand why other people voted differently
• Focus on how much you love your friends and family
• Work hard and travel
• Break out of the “echo chamber” and engage in dialogue with people whose opinions differ
• Question your own views – and accept that you may not actually know best
• Acknowledge that the problem is beyond your control
• Do whatever relaxes you

This is pretty solid advice.

Psychologist James Oliver had this to say to the BBC about the election:

For all we know, it will be far better having Trump as president…. Obviously he is a bit of a fruitcake, a volatile, personality-distorted man but many great leaders have been many many sandwiches short of a picnic. It’s more of a case of the other way round – find me a leader who wasn’t a few sandwiches short of a picnic. The fact that he’s a fruitcake doesn’t mean anything. That’s about the one thing we could know for sure. Beyond that, we really don’t know anything. We don’t know who his advisers will be. We don’t know what his policies are going to be. We don’t know how history is going to pan out.

That’s oddly reassuring. For now.

-KitJ