None of us are feeling particularly calm right now. The world is unpredictable, the news is relentless, and social media keeps serving up more of whatever you were already anxious about. So what can you actually do?

This question was answered by Emma Keen, mental health expert, whose work focuses on helping people build healthier relationships with their own minds and habits, and Wez Hawes, industry leader, who brings practical, grounded perspective to the human challenges of working in creative industries. Andy Wright, host of Asking For A Friend on Never Not Creative, brought the question to the table on behalf of the community.

Be intentional about your input

Emma's starting point is deceptively simple: choose what you let in. Rather than passively absorbing whatever appears on a screen, she encourages people to get deliberate about what they're exposed to, how long they spend with it, and where it's actually coming from. As she puts it, what you pay attention to grows, so paying attention to sources that activate your nervous system will leave you feeling worse, not better informed. The goal isn't to disengage from the world entirely, it's to engage on your own terms.

Know when you have the capacity for hard news

Emma makes an important distinction between reacting and responding. She is intentional about when she consumes news, choosing moments when she genuinely has the mental capacity to process it, rather than letting a constant feed of information hit her at any and all hours. That shift from reactive to intentional can make a meaningful difference to how regulated you feel across the day.

Train your algorithm for recovery, not dread

Wez adds a brilliantly practical layer to this. Several evenings a week, he sits down and deliberately watches light, funny content, videos of cats, cooking disasters, people doing silly things. The payoff isn't just a laugh. It's that the algorithm starts to learn what you want more of. Feed it calm and funny, and it gives you calm and funny. Feed it outrage and chaos, and you know what happens next.

Neither Emma nor Wez is suggesting you switch off entirely or pretend the world isn't complicated. But small, consistent choices about what you let into your head, and when, can quietly change how steady you feel inside it.