🌀 Polycrisis is a Thing
When the world is on fire and you forgot to buy milk
Introducing the Polycrisis Mood Ring™
New for 2026. Available at your local, tariff-strangled small business, or from a (now American-owned*) TikTok Shop run by a little merchant in Minnesota who keeps getting messages about “community guidelines.”
The Polycrisis Mood Ring™ shifts colors based on which existential crisis is currently consuming your attention:
🔴 Red = financial instability
🟢 Green = melting ice caps
🟤 Brown = your mental health (also, sewage backups)
⚫ Black = democracy
When the ring flashes rainbow, it means all of the above.
Congratulations, you’ve unlocked Bonus Crisis Mode. Comes with a punch card. Your tenth meltdown is free.
* “American” term loosely used here as these are simply Trump buddies like Oracle Larry.
So… what is polycrisis?
It’s that thing where we’re experiencing a midlife crisis, but for the species. Instead of buying amotorcycle, we’re launching Ponzi-scheme cryptocurrencies, and dismantling democracy one executive order and East Wing at a time.
Polycrisis is that thing where multiple disasters (environmental, economic, political, digital, spiritual) start overlapping like the worst group project in human history.
And nobody knows who’s presenting.
And the slides are on fire.
And the Zoom link is broken.
And the professor is a chatbot.
How does it feel to live in a polycrisis?
It’s like trying to meal plan while the house down the street went on the market for three times what you paid for yours, and you want nice neighbors who can afford to buy it.
It’s like being buried under 43 browser tabs, per window, per browser, when you have three browsers and use both Edge and Chrome, and you can’t figure out which one is autoplaying some obnoxious tune.
It’s realizing the algorithm knows your emotional state better than your therapist. (But applause for those who actually have a therapist!)
It’s hearing that the economic numbers are doing pretty well while your coworker sends you a screenshot from Lviv (that’s in the west of the country, people, where it’s warmest and more power stable/rich) showing his two and a half hours of power during work hours, while it’s -14°C outside.
For the Americans in the back (and the front), that means “your nose hairs freeze and then snap off.” But also, don’t go to Minnesota. And, Shel Silverstein could make a go of something good with that:
Two and a half hours of power a day
(Not the full day, no, just while I work, okay?)
So I plug in my laptop and water the fern,
Pray the frdige holds the line, and wait my turn.
I click like a maniac, Wi-Fi on thin ice,
While my neighbor’s hairdryer brings down the device.
I charge up my phone, my fan, and my face,
Then sprint to the loo cuz the lights might erase.
Slack calls connect but I’m using my phone,
And what did I hear? Hope that wasn’t a drone.
I sit in the dark with my lukewarm tea,
Thinking, “This is peak productivity.”
So if I seem terse or forget how to smile,
Just know i’ve been power-cramming my tasks all the while.
And should the grid bless me with one extra hour.
I’ll throw a small party… and might take a shower.
Everything, everywhere, all at once… and also Jira tickets
In the past so many days, we’ve witnessed:
ICE detaining a toddler and calling it “rescue.”
A guy in Salt Lake fatally shot in front of a 7-Eleven.
Trump standing in Switzerland, telling a room full of multilingual internationals that if it werent’ for America, they’d all be speaking German.
(Which they already do. Along with French. And Italian. And also English, because they’re European leaders, elites, and attendees at the World Economic Forum. Hello.)The lowest snowpack in Utah since the Three Nephites disappeared from public life. (They used to hang out more. Mostly around Provo.)
GenAI suggesting we solve inflation by starting a mushroom farm in space.
Federal officials taking down a slavery memorial in Pennsylvania… not because they’re against slavery, but because it made people uncomfortable.
Historical accuracy is upsetting the vibes. Cue the moral panic.Getting an email that my kids’ lunch money accounts are almost out.
Meanwhile, I’m trying to remember which Jira ticket to work on first, and that I need to push the button on my little heart monitor patch whenever I get the little jolt and sensation in my throat from a PVC. It’s only for three days, though. Phew.
Also, we’re out of milk.
Ethical technologist mumbo jumbo weighing in here
There’s a psychological term for this: cognitive load collapse.
Explain it like I’m 5
Cognitive load collapse (aka: why you just tried to put the milk in the pantry)…
Imagine your brain is a backpack.
You start your day with just a few things in it: a sandwich (for learning), a juice box (for problem solving), and a tiny stuffed bear named Focus.
But then…
Someone hands you a bowling ball labeled “Urgent Slack Message.”
Then comes a shoe labeled “Contact Switch: From Writing to Support Article Typo Fix.”
Then a hamster named “Open Tabs” crawls in and refuses to leave.
The school bell rings, and someone screams, “Can you jump on a quick call?”
And right as you’re about to sit down to draw a flower, a megaphone blares, NEW EMAIL WITH A JIRA TICKET ASSIGNED TO YOU.
Your backpack bursts open, and you’ll never be able to use those zippers again.
You don’t know where your sandwich is anymore. Focus is missing. The hamster is chewing your juice box. And now someone wants to know why you haven’t filled in your section for quarterly goals, and you can’t even remember if it’s Q1 or Q27.
That is cognitive load collapse.
It’s not your fault.
It’s the backpack’s fault.
It’s the hamster’s fault.
It’s the whole damn culture for expecting you to carry all this stuff without offering lockers, nap time, or enough string cheese to survive the day.
The three types of load
Intrinsic load: This is the actual stuff you’re trying to learn or do. Like long division. Or navigating Zendesk. Or understanding how your child’s middle school grading system works (spoiler: each teacher uses it differently).
Extraneous load: The clutter. The dumb formatting. The blinking notifications. It’s your boss asking for something “quick” in five different tools that don’t integrate. It’s the background noise of a thousand Slack emojis reacting in real time while you’re trying to write an email that doesn’t sound passive-aggressive.
Germane load: The good kind! This is the mental effort that actually helps you grow smarter. Like reflecting. Like connecting ideas. But let’s be honest: that part gets squeezed out by hamster juggling. (Why are there three of them now?!)
Bonus fact:
Your attention span is currently shorter than a white-footed mouse’s. (Mice can focus for 6-9 seconds. You’re averaging 3.2, and that includes the time you just spent thinking about cheese.)
Wrapping this all up
Living in a polycrisis means we’re constantly being asked to ignore what we see, doubt what we feel, and outsource our conscience to the loudest, most confident voice in the room. It seems more and more that voice is AI. Or a guy with a flag in his profile pic.
You still have power. Not absolute power. But the kind that shows up when you bring soup to a neighbor, vote in a boring local election, or say, “Hey… I don’t think that’s true,” in a room full of people nodding along.
Surviving a polycrisis isn’t about fixing everything.
It’s about not getting tricked into giving up.