There’s plenty in the news that can anger or scare you:
wars, politics, the economy.
Not to mention the stressors in your own life.
Several reactions can happen—often at once.
Maybe you feel scared or unsafe.
Angry or outraged.
Hopeless and powerless.
You want to fight or flight.
Or you freeze and want to distract or soothe yourself.
Withdraw from the world.
And maybe, the injustice and suffering ignites you:
What can I do?
How can I fix this?
However you react, it’s often accompanied by tension, pressure, and stress. You can feel it in your body. Something clenches, tightens, closes or shuts down.
It doesn’t feel good. And you want this feeling to go away. And whatever you think will help you get rid of that feeling, is what you turn to. Eating chocolate. Opening another bottle of wine. Argue with strangers online. (Being angry beats feeling helpless.)
You’re bombarded with news every day.
Even when you stop following the news.
Others talk about it. You see billboards.
Screens with news flashes in the dentist’s waiting room or the airport waiting lounge.
And it takes its toll.
It creates a steady stream of tension coursing through your veins.
What can you do?
Should you double down on your difference-making work?
Withdraw completely?
You just don’t know.
You can’t control world events.
Now what?
There’s another way.
A way few walk, because it seems too scary or uncomfortable:
Turn towards the stress, the discomfort, the anger, the fear.
Not the stories about world events, the suffering, the injustice.
But to your physical response to it.
To your shoulders, tensing.
Your stomach, cramping.
Your jaw, tightening.
Your breathing getting shallower.
Your heart beating faster.
And you don’t try to fix it.
You don’t try to relax or breathe into it.
And you don’t look away.
No.
You let it be.
You let the body, these sensations, do its thing.
Don’t try to unclench your jaw.
See what happens when you simply notice how it clenches.
What the actual experience of that clenching feels like.
Can you let that clench be there just a moment longer?
Can you zoom in on that clench a little bit more?
If you’re willing to stay with the sensations, a few things tend to happen:
– The sense of urgency dissolves;
– The nervous system realizes there’s no immediate danger, and it relaxes on its own;
– Thoughts—the same ones—can still be there. But they’re no longer in charge.
The system settles.
The urgency to escape these unwanted feelings quiets.
Tension and stress soften.
You may still shout from the barricades, double down on your work, join a movement, sign a petition, or bitch and moan about the assholes seemingly in charge.
But with a little less tension.
A little less stress.
A little more openness.
Love,
P.S. Dropping out of the mind’s stories and into what’s actually here is easier with support.
That’s what happens in my private coaching:
Less tension and pressure. More lightness and relief.
P.P.S. Liked this blog?
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