Last week, in my role as Teaching Assistant, I wrote what we call a Social Story to try and help a 9 year old boy who is having some difficulty with strong emotions.  The following paragraph is an extract from this which somehow seems appropriate in a wider context at the moment.

Calm is a nice feeling.  When someone is calm their body feels relaxed and they find it easier to think clearly and make sensible choices.  If someone feels angry or sad then they might find it difficult to be calm.  This means that they might find it harder to think clearly and make sensible choices.  If they are not calm then there are things that they can do that can help them to be calm again.  One thing that they could do is to take a deep breath in, count to 5 and then breath out again really slowly.  Another thing that they could do is to think about something nice.

The enforced pause in triggering Article 50 is giving us the time in which to take a deep breath in , count to 5 and then breath out again really slowly and in which to think about something nice.  Then we might find it easier to think clearly and make sensible choices.