The Crisis Minimum Protocol

When you can’t do normal, maintain these four things. Only these four things.

Crisis Minimum: The Four Requirements

1. EAT SOMETHING

Not perfectly. Not according to any system. Just eat something every day.

In crisis, appetite often disappears. Food seems pointless or impossible. Days can pass without eating, which depletes you further and deepens the crisis.

The minimum: Put food in your body daily. It doesn’t have to be healthy. It doesn’t have to be a proper meal. A peanut butter sandwich counts. Crackers count. Something.

Why this matters: Your body needs fuel. Without food, everything gets worse - mood, energy, cognitive function, resilience. Eating isn’t about nutrition optimization here. It’s about keeping the system running.

2. ATTENTION PROCESS WHEN FOGGY

2 minutes of spotting corners when you notice you’re checked out.

In extended crisis, you can spend days in a fog. Checked out. Not present. Living in the crisis rather than in the present moment.

The minimum: When you notice the fog, do 2 minutes of Attention Process. Spot precise points in your environment. That’s it.

Why this matters: This maintains some connection to present reality. It prevents complete retreat into the fog. It uses a skill you’ve built to create brief moments of groundedness. These brief moments accumulate.

3. SLEEP TIMING

Go to bed by a fixed time. Not necessarily early, but fixed.

In crisis, sleep schedules often collapse. You stay up ruminating or numbing. You sleep at random hours. This destroys circadian rhythm, which worsens everything.

The minimum: Pick a time - say, midnight. Be in bed by that time, every night, whatever else is happening. Not necessarily asleep, but in bed.

Why this matters: One anchor point. One consistent thing in a sea of chaos. It also prevents the slide into completely destructive sleep patterns that make crisis harder to exit.

4. THREE GRATITUDES

Three specific gratitudes per day, on paper. That’s it.

In extended crisis, the world collapses into a tunnel. Everything is the crisis. You stop noticing anything else. Without some structured return to what’s still real outside the crisis, the tunnel gets narrower and harder to exit.

The minimum: Three specific, concrete, small gratitudes every day. “The sun came up.” “My hand works.” “The tea is warm.” They don’t have to be profound. They can’t be abstract. Paper, not phone.

This is different from the Emergency Gratitude Protocol (previous lesson), which is one long session to shift a stuck state. Crisis Minimum is three a day as a floor — you’re not trying to dissolve the crisis, just maintaining a thin thread of contact with what’s real outside it.

Why this matters: Each specific gratitude is a small completion — one point of contact with something real. When the crisis has eaten everything else, three daily points of contact keep the tunnel from closing all the way.

That’s It

Four things:

1. Eat something
2. Attention Process when foggy
3. Fixed sleep time
4. Three gratitudes

Everything else can wait.

What This Means

In crisis, you’re not maintaining your full routine. You’re not meditating for 20 minutes, eating according to plan, exercising optimally. You’re surviving.

The Crisis Minimum gives you permission to drop everything else while maintaining the floor. It defines what “not letting yourself completely collapse” looks like.

Many people in crisis try to maintain too much, fail, and then abandon everything. Better to consciously reduce to the minimum and maintain it.

Today’s Practice

Personalize your Crisis Minimum. Write down specifics:

1. Crisis sleep deadline: What time will you be in bed no matter what? (Example: 11:30pm)

2. Your gratitude paper: Where will paper and a pen live so you can find them in crisis? A notebook by the bed, pad on the kitchen counter, folded sheet in a drawer. Decide now so you don’t have to find paper when you’re depleted.

3. Easy food location: Where is food you can eat with zero preparation? Know this now so you don’t have to figure it out when depleted. (Example: Peanut butter and crackers in pantry)

4. Attention trigger: How will you remember to do the Attention Process when foggy? Tie it to something. (Example: Every time I use the bathroom, I spot 5 things after)

Write these down somewhere you can find them in crisis. Put them in your phone notes. Stick them on your fridge. They need to be findable when you’re not thinking clearly.