How to Manage Fear and Uncertainty: Featuring Video by Steven Washington
We can all agree that fear exists. Depending on our previous exposure to fear and uncertainty or to the beliefs, attitudes, and depth of the self-care practices we have embraced, the idea of managing fear and uncertainty may be a relatively new concept for us.
We can all agree that fear exists. Depending on our previous exposure to fear and uncertainty or to the beliefs, attitudes, and depth of the self-care practices we have embraced, the idea of managing fear and uncertainty may be a relatively new concept for us. We may meet fear with awe and trepidation or perhaps it may impact us harder and drain us of our life force and personal energy.
The energy behind fear and uncertainty is the idea of loss of control:
“I don’t know why,”
“I don’t know how,”
“I don’t know who I can trust to help me,”
“I don’t know what to do.”
Whether it is a relationship we are in that feels out of control, a hurricane whose course is constantly changing, or now the face of this pandemic that is impacting each and every one of our lives, where in all of this do we find our breath, our center? While I intend to write more on this subject, I felt strongly to first focus on a practice. We need a variety of tools in our self-care toolbox to choose from in order to help us ground into ourselves with more peace, and thereby access these answers for ourselves.
I called up my dear friend, Steven Washington, to get us started. In this short video, Steven will guide us through a breathing practice, two acupressure holds and two QiGong movement sequences. Try them all and know that they are now part of your self-care toolbox.
Grief Happens
Grief happens.
You have been dealing with Grief since the day you were born.
What do I mean by that? That sounds negative and pessimistic.
While there are different circumstances to every pregnancy and birth, on the day you were born, you left a temperature controlled safe environment where all your needs were met and you entered into a world of extreme contrast.
Grief happens.
You have been dealing with Grief since the day you were born.
What do I mean by that? That sounds negative and pessimistic.
While there are different circumstances to every pregnancy and birth, on the day you were born, you left a temperature controlled safe environment where all your needs were met and you entered into a world of extreme contrast.
The world you entered often felt very polarizing. You were fed and happy or your hunger motivated cries of need. A toy you loved and happily played with might be taken away or broken by a sibling and never returned.
If you could look at your life from a distance without too much emotional attachment, you would see that loss and Grief have been there all along.
It is a powerful realization to say: I have been navigating loss and Grief all my life.
We all have. We share this story as much as we share this planet. This is a discussion that deserves our time.
So when did it become so hard for us to address grief as adults?
Are we so burnt out from Grief by the time we leave high school that we make a pact with ourselves not to look griefs way ever again unless absolutely forced to? I believe I made some version of that pact. But for me, it did not work for very long. Well, truthfully, it did not work at all.
I have to say my efforts were noble. I ran from grief by overly focusing on caring for others. Being highly empathic, or a “psychic sponge” as I was labeled, was not helping the matter at all. By my early 20s I finally got myself to a doctor and shared all my symptoms that I was sure were leading me to my early demise, the worst symptom being the tightness in my chest that kept my breathing an ongoing frightening struggle.
After the examination, the doctor announced that I had “air hunger.” The blood drained from my face and I braced myself for the number of months or weeks he would then tell me I had left to live.
It sounds funny now to read those words but at the time I was in deep fear.
The doctor continued, “Have you ever seen a therapist?”
With disbelief yet to become relief I said, “I am sorry, what did you say?”
He repeated, “Have you ever seen a therapist?”
I thought he meant some type of breathing specialist.
“You have extreme Anxiety and I think it would be great if you could talk to a therapist.”
Given this was the early 1980s, I was not that informed about where one even found a therapist, let alone exactly what they did, but this doctor opened a door that gave me hope and insight. If Anxiety — and what I learned later — that enormous amounts of unconscious Grief could literally take my breath away, then I needed a therapist. I needed to talk to someone who was not afraid to hear my story.
How I found the therapist and the journey into my Grief is another writing but until then here is short synopsis of what I learned.
Grief happens.
You don’t fix Grief.
You listen to Grief.
You give it space.
Grief can inspire your life to move forward in amazing ways.
Sometimes it is acute and overwhelming and other times the Grief has been on a slow simmer in the background of someone’s life.
You need to make the Grief conscious.
Trying to ignore or outrun Grief never works. It can be tireless in its pursuit of your attention.
Grief will always be there as part of your life. It brings contrast and opportunity. It is a part of how the energies work here on this Earth and we need to make friends with the messages it brings.
One of the places I like to work with my Grief is by water: lakes, rivers, streams and beaches. In the next petal of the lotus called “When Wisdom Washes Ashore” I describe how water brings wisdom and healing for me.
Years ago, I wandered a beach lost in my Grief and missing the healing gifts this oasis was trying to share with me. The waves had been calm and gentle all day but when I turned my back to the ocean and started to head back to my car, a big wave hit me from behind, drenching me from the waist down. Stunned, I turned quickly to catch the watery culprit that had forged the sneak attack. But the waves were again calm. I stood staring out at the ocean for quite a while as if to challenge the trickster of the sea to try again. At least this time I would see it coming. But the reality is we rarely see it coming.
As I watched the stillness of the sea, I felt a connection to the oneness and rhythm of the waves. The magic happened for me as I realized I was letting go and letting nature replace the Grief. Old repetitive, looping thoughts and worries began to drop from my mind. And with that I heard the wisdom that was the sand, the shells, the birds begin to speak. I suspect they had been speaking all along.
The message of the wave was a reminder that life’s challenges and gifts can come with a wake-up call out of what feels like nowhere. Don’t be afraid of what they have to say. There are people who can help you navigate these times. In turn, you can take this knowledge and experience and grow it into wisdom to be shared with others.
It is called life. And it happens.
When Wisdom Washes Ashore
When walking on a beach, you are in nature’s stillness. You can choose to make it your stillness.
Picture yourself on a beach, or if you can — go to one.
On this beach, breathe in the sounds. Breathe in the sensations on your skin and let the taste of the salty air rest on your lips.
What a lovely, lovely beach. How wonderful it is to be here.
The author has recorded this writing if you would prefer to listen instead of read. Click below for audio —
When Wisdom Washes Ashore
By Dianna Edwards
When walking on a beach, you are in nature’s stillness.
You can choose to make it your stillness.
Picture yourself on a beach, or if you can — go to one.
On this beach, breathe in the sounds. Breathe in the sensations on your skin and let the taste of the salty air rest on your lips.
What a lovely, lovely beach. How wonderful it is to be here.
Let yourself be mesmerized, not by the blue lights, flashing texts and emoji’s that have become your life, but instead drop into the seductive silence of the sand. It offers you support and molds to your presence and yet wants nothing from you.
If your attention is to be diverted, let it be by the vibratory force of the waves that wash across your feet, not the vibration of alerts on your phone.
Let it be the squawk of a seagull that makes you turn your head. And as you do, look up and see the Sky in its stillness.
Watch as the Sky lets the clouds move through at their own pace. Notice that the Sky does not say,
“You are a very heavy dark cloud, please float elsewhere.” nor does it say,
“You strange behaving cloud, you are moving too slow, hurry along, you are in my way!”
The Sky feels no need to judge the clouds. The Sky does not want to fix the clouds. Take your wisdom from the Sky. Let your thoughts pass by without questioning or responding to them, your thoughts are your clouds. Slowly and deeply breathe out the distraction.
Now, return to your gaze, letting it drop back down and be entranced by the endless spray of trillions upon trillions of tiny bits of broken Seashells that are under your feet. You notice that these seashell bits travel on the sand farther than your eyes can see. Why are they all here? Where did they come from? Where do they go next? Stare into them as you stand or walk.
Breathe in their colors, their fragility and their strength.
What do you see? As you do this, be aware that a smile will start to fill your heart and want to move to your face to be shared with the world.
Just then one of your thought clouds comes by and you stop to think…
“Share my smile with the world? What world? I am on this beach alone. If I smile, it is just for me. And that seems rather unnecessary.”
Oh dear, there you go slipping into the comfortable old pattern of analyzing and thinking. Just as easily as you slipped you are again interrupted, but this time by the Waves that are crashing even harder on your legs. They are there to wake you up. Can you feel the gift of that interruption?
The Waves that now drenched you more than expected want to remind you they are here, the sand is here, clumps of seaweed and scurrying baby crabs and squawking birds are here.
The next Wave asks,
“What do you mean alone? You are here, now, a part of all this life called a beach. Are we not worth your smile?”
A few more Waves crash against your legs. You did not mean to offend the beach. A little bit of shame creeps in and you start wondering if you ever knew it was even possible to offend a beach. Surely it is not your fault if no one ever taught you that.
Another Wave hits your leg, and another.
As if someone is whispering in your ear, you suddenly hear,
“please stop thinking so hard, the sun is setting soon and there is still much here, now, for you to see.”
You look around, you want to see who said that. But does it really matter? What matters is that you heard it.
Not sure what to do next, you choose to breathe. You have learned, conscious breath is always your best choice when lost for words or action and when you are off your center.
On the 5th or maybe it is the 6th breath, you let your gaze return to those minuscule bits of Seashells. They truly are awfully tiny and delicate. As you consider what journey they must have been on to be here now on this beach, for you to witness them today in this moment, that smile returns. Something inside you has a deep sense of recognition of the journey of these shells.
You feel how they were once part of a beautiful whole, filled with life and purpose. Perhaps once they were a large clam shell, home to a delicate mollusk or as protectors of a luminescent pearl. You think: what a grand life that would have been for a shell. But now, sadly to you, they are mere fragments of themselves broken apart by their life in the ocean. As you think that thought, you realize they heard you.
The Seashell bits speak out,
“Broken apart did you say? We are not broken. We are enjoying our new life here now on this beach. As our edges are softened and we may appear to shrink in size and purpose, we are actually becoming a part of a far more tremendous whole. We love that we are part of the sand that now makes this boundless and majestic beach. We feel at home.”
Who knew Seashell bits had so much to say?
As you stand there feeling beholden to their message,
let yourself take in the wisdom of the Seashells and sand.
Breathe it in.
Yes, you are talking to sand and to Waves, if not talking you are at least listening. This realization makes you want to laugh. It occurs to you that their loving grace and presence is now becoming your loving presence. It feels good. It feels easy. When was the last time something felt so easy?
You may ask,
“What is this space where I am engaged in conversation with ocean, sand, shell bits and sky? Am I losing my mind?”
If that is so, then I say “Bravo, it is about time.”
If walking on a beach lets you lose your mind, then I say, “walk it more often.”
There is much wisdom that washes ashore on a beach. Whether you go there in the physical or in your meditation, you will be surrounded by it. Seek it out. Befriend it. Find it in the awareness and the gentle focus you can bring to all its movement and beauty. There is stillness in that movement. To be both in all that movement and yet feel the power of its stillness, then you are in wisdom.
Make it a gift to yourself to remember how that feels.
Yes, it can be that easy.