Maintenance and Emergency Toolkit
Build one routine to stay well and a separate plan for your worst days
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 78%
This framework splits self-care into two kits. The maintenance toolkit is the set of daily habits, sleep, exercise, connection, routine, that keep your mental fitness topped up. The emergency toolkit is a separate, pre-decided plan for the days when everything goes wrong: a loss, a breakup, a job gone, a bereavement. The key move is deciding your bad-day response in advance, because in the moment most people default to harmful coping like alcohol, which raises baseline cortisol and makes almost everything worse. Alex stresses the kits are personal: your routine and tools will differ from anyone else's, so you copy the method not the contents. Because difficult events are certain to arrive for everyone, having both kits ready is what lets you get through the worst days without spiralling.
Origin
Extracted from Deep Dive with Ali Abdaal. Alex George developed the toolkit idea through his own recovery from anxiety and grief and teaches it in The Mind Manual and Live Well Every Day.
Core principles
- 01Everyone's toolkit is personal; copy the method, not the routine
- 02Maintenance habits build fitness; the emergency kit prevents collapse
- 03Decide your bad-day plan before the bad day arrives
- 04Default coping mechanisms like alcohol usually make things worse
- 05Difficult events are certain, so preparation is not optional
How to run it
- 1
Map your maintenance habits
List the everyday practices that keep you well, such as sleep, exercise, good food and connection.
Pro tip These are your equivalent of going to the gym for mental fitness.
- 2
Name what builds you up
Separate the habits that actively grow your mental fitness from those that merely maintain it.
- 3
Write an explicit emergency kit
Decide in advance exactly what you will do on a day when something really bad happens.
Pro tip Make it concrete: who you call, where you go, what you avoid.
Watch out It sounds silly until the day you actually need it.
- 4
Swap out harmful defaults
Identify unhelpful coping like drinking and pre-plan a healthier response for bad days.
Pro tip Even a few glasses of wine a week raises baseline cortisol, so alcohol is a poor stress tool.
Watch out The default of 'let's go to the pub' usually makes things worse.
- 5
Prepare before the crisis
Have the plan in place before you need it, since bad events are certain for everyone at some point.
Pro tip Alex credits having this preparation in place with getting him through his brother's death.
In the wild
When Alex got the call that his brother had died, he was already in the middle of writing his first book and using the tools he had learned. Having an awareness that things can get better, and a kit of practices in place, was, he says, part of what carried him through.
→ A pre-built toolkit helped him survive a sudden bereavement.
Common mistakes
Defaulting to alcohol
The common bad-day reflex is drinking, but alcohol raises baseline cortisol and worsens stress, health and productivity.
Copying someone else's routine
Toolkits are personal; lifting another person's exact habits ignores your own needs and rhythms.
Is it for you?
Best for
Anyone building resilience who wants a personal system for both ordinary days and crises.
Not ideal for
Acute clinical emergencies that need professional intervention rather than self-managed tools.
From the transcript
“have an emergency toolkit so on a day where everything goes wrong what you're gonna do”
“learning what your good coping mechanisms are going to be on bad days is as important as your maintenance day to day”
From the episode
Dr Alex George: How To Strengthen Your Mind & Build Mental Fitness
Dr Alex George