You are not powerless

What to do when it feels like there is nothing to be done

Brian Montopoli is a writer, documentary filmmaker, and Emmy-winning television news producer.

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If you’re reading this, you are almost certainly terrified at the prospect of another Donald Trump presidency. But terror isn’t the only feeling many of us are struggling with. There is also a sense that we could — we should — be doing more. The question of what we should be doing is where the trouble lies.

You can always give (more) money to the cause. And if you’re anything like me, you feel a pang of guilt every time a new text comes in asking for just a little bit more. The problem is one of scale: According to Open Secrets, at least $15.9 billion dollars will be spent in this election cycle. And for us non-billionaires, it can be hard to feel like our relatively paltry contribution isn’t just an inconsequential drop in a vast ocean.

That reality has left many of us grappling with an awful feeling of powerlessness. We doomscroll in bed for hours, hoping against hope that this latest outrage will be the one that finally does Trump in — but we’re not quite able to bring ourselves to believe it. It’s like we are standing on the deck of the Titanic, watching our boat barrel toward the iceberg, unable to do anything but wait for the potential disaster to come.

So how can we combat that feeling? One option is to give in to what one friend calls “the ecstatic release of culpability” when a problem is too large to combat. And there is, admittedly, a kind of nihilistic liberation in simply throwing up our hands and accepting fate.

But I find it far more helpful to remember that collective action can make a difference — and that collective action is made up of the actions of an army of individuals.

It's an idea perhaps best summed up in a conversation that takes place in one of my favorite novels, David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas. After a long argument, a character is told that his efforts will ultimately be meaningless — that he is, in the end, just “a single drop in a limitless ocean.” The character’s response? “What is an ocean but a multitude of drops?” 

This past weekend, a friend — an immigrant who became a U.S. citizen last year; he is voting in his first presidential election — took a bus from New York City to Pennsylvania to knock on doors for the Harris/Walz campaign. I asked him why he got on that bus.

“Look, we all have this terrible feeling of dread and terror,” he told me. “And for people who are feeling politically anxious, this is the best therapy. You’re around hundreds of people who share the same anxiety you do.”

My friend recognizes that his actions alone may not change the outcome of the election. But he did help a handful of people who had questions about casting their votes. And that, he insists, matters. “It’s the same principle as voting itself,” he says. “You have to believe in the power of collective action.”

I am a certified doomscroller myself — given far more to existential dread than earnest optimism. But I’ve grown tired of feeling powerless. So this morning I signed onto a Zoom training to help Democrats with phone banking. A facilitator named Theresa explained that we volunteers were to provide logistical information for a rally and make sure people had the info they needed to vote. I started making calls.

Bad news first: I never felt like I was actually changing the world. (For one thing, most of the people I spoke to had already voted.) But I did manage to help a few folks out. And my two hours of conversations left me feeling better than I have in weeks. “I’m just so hopeful after all those calls,” one volunteer said at the end of our Zoom. I knew exactly what she meant.

I know skeptics might say that my efforts didn’t make any real difference. I also know that it can be scary to give in to a collective sense of hope — especially after the emotional devastation many of us experienced in 2016.

But you should consider doing what you can in these final days, and not just because it will almost certainly make you feel better. It’s undeniable that none of us can sway this election on our own. But that does not mean we are powerless. (Follow this link to find high-priority volunteer opportunities.) Every drop in the ocean makes a difference. Jump in.

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Brian Montopoli is a writer, documentary filmmaker, and Emmy-winning television news producer.

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