fear? or love?

Feeling anxious?  This is for you.

A couple months ago, I was enjoying a book before the world tilted and scrambled my brain with what I can only describe as "vicarious traumatic brain injury."  My best guess of the source is "The Surrender Experiment" by Michael A. Singer.  

While all the details have since scattered around the hidden recesses of my mind like glitter fallen from my daughter's artwork, what resonated most was this question...What is guiding my choices?  Fear?  Or love?

The general thesis stuck to me like gorilla glue:

Decisions and actions based in love will guide you toward purpose, meaning, ease, and authenticity whereas those based in fear will move you away from your true calling.

When I look at my own life history, it resonates deeply.  

How does it land with you?  

Yet, holding this belief does not protect against the very real experience of fear.  

Our higher selves may be drawn toward love, connection, and meaning.

Our nervous systems, however, are hardwired to perceive and then protect against danger...essentially to navigate by fear.  

And while this navigational system can indeed save your life, in the most common everyday moments (and in these historical moments, too), it's more apt to cause you to hide, flee, fight, or freeze, than follow the whispers of love that light up your life and make the world around you more compassionate and just.  

(And can I just say how very much we need that right now?!?) 💞

When those difficult emotions show up - whether fear, sadness, anger, disgust, or grief - you may well understand what they mean and where they're coming from, and...

Your intellectual understanding of your emotions doesn't keep you from experiencing them.

I feel like that bears repeating.  

Even if you hold awareness and understand the what and the why of your feelings, it does not exempt you from experiencing them.

About a month ago, a fellow therapist and I shared a good chuckle about this as she exclaimed, "I should be above all this!"  

She was referring to the emotions...the sadness, the tears, the anger, the emotional fatigue...and her frustration with them showing up inconveniently in her recent life.  

She jokingly made the case that since she understood the emotions...what they were about...why her mind and body was reacting the way it was...that she didn't want to have to go through them.  

If you're anything like me, you can relate. 😊

And, of course, our laughter was because we both knew that no matter how much awareness we hold to identify or understand our situation and the natural reactions, thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations that come with them, we still have no exit ramp from the experience.  

We have to go through them to get to the other side.

Of course, this makes sense.  

• Understanding why we're tired doesn't keep us from needing sleep.

• Understanding why we're hungry doesn't keep us from needing food.

• Understanding why we're crying doesn't keep us from feeling sad.

• Understanding why something is funny doesn't keep us from laughing.

• Understanding that love is a better compass than fear doesn't keep us from feeling afraid.

In my recent conversations, and in light of current events...There are a lot of people feeling heartbroken and afraid.  

Maybe you are one of them.  (I am right there with you!)

If so, please consider this...while understanding and reasoning with your emotions can help, it does not immunize you to the experience.

When it comes to your feelings, the trick is not to eliminate your experience of them, it's to find ways to "play nicely" (as my coach Lex would say) with the sensations that come with them.

Then you can navigate through them...preferably with love as your guide.

And channel your concern, empathy, and passion into effective choices that match your values.  Your callings.  Your desired impact.

I'll leave you for now with my daughter's "remix" advice, which she danced and sang around our living room a week ago...

"We don't just sit around and wait, we DO SOMETHING!"

(Thank you to Michelle Obama for her emotional and memorable inspiration not to allow ourselves to become trapped in fear and frozen in paralysis, but to instead channel our emotions into constructive action about what really matters.  I trust my daughter will remember this for years to come.  As will I!)

And on the subject of what really matters...even with my less frequent musings, I hope you are continuing to remember and hold close the certainty that...

You matter.  You make a difference.  I'm so thankful you're here.

May you remain hopeful, empowered, and impactful in all the ways uniquely you as you persist in bringing love, light, compassion, and justice to the world around you.