Where do we go when we are worn?

On seeking shelter.

I was talking with one of my staff members the other day about the state of mental health right now, and they said it best, “I feel like how the doctor’s did during COVID. We have limited resources and so many people in need of help that we can’t keep up, and they just keep coming.” The state of mental health in the climate of our country is unprecedented. Perhaps it always has been, more and more just continues to be unearthed.

For today, maybe this is more of a plea, but be gentle with your friends who are in the trenches of healthcare. They are giving their energy day in and day out, to uphold the state of humanity while navigating the the loss of legal rights, deportation, families torn apart, domestic violence on the rise, trauma, and state by state barriers to health care. To have imagined we would need to create a list of hospitals willing to treat patients was never something I thought I would have to create. And yet, here we are. So be gentle, nothing is personal, our energy is being depleted faster than we can replenish ourselves to stay in the work.

It is hard to tease out some days, the pain of others, intertwined with my own. To reconcile all that I am holding each day and to realize, it is not mine. Then to dig out and befriend what is mine in the process. What is mine through my work in mental health care, motherhood, friendships, and general daily life. Paying attention daily to the rights being stripped away from members of my community. It is unprecedented for my generation to have less rights than our parents.

I have been focussed though. Determined to engage in the true rebellion: to love, live, and find bliss throughout it all. To rest. To laugh. To steep in joy. To hug. To love so damn hard. That is the act of true power. To deeply know that I do not need external validation to know that I have every right to exist on this Earth. To trust that my purpose unfolds to me every day, and I can choose where to pour my heart and soul energy. I can succumb to the void of fear, pain, and undoing OR I can choose to direct my energy towards healing, love, trust, guidance, and a force greater than those who wish to deplete me. I can choose to dance.

In order to dance, I also have to self preserve. To notice when I am drained and know where to refuel. To know that the status quo doesn’t work for me. I need deep and connected replenishment. Solitude. Making soup on a Sunday after a back breaking workout shoveling. Ouch. To know that I need more from my relationships. To be intentional with my daughters, teaching them each day that they too have the power of choice. To choose inner freedom, regardless of what the world continues to try to tell me and them. Silly world, good try. I see it more clearly now. Maybe that is age, maybe healing, maybe inner reckoning, who knows. Either way, it all lands differently now, and for that I am grateful.

I do have the power to choose. I think we all need that reminder. We get to decide to pay attention or not. To help and serve our community or not. To look at our own behavior and be complicit or not. To choose where to direct our voice, our power, our privilege, our authenticity, our stories, our healing, our energy, our time… it all counts. Because when someone or an entity tries to beat us down and convince us that we do not have power, it isn’t because we don’t have it, it’s quite the opposite, we are too powerful, and that creates fear that whatever facade they have tried to built could all go away with the power of truth. When we stop fearing our own voices and finally use them. Finally act upon them. When that happens, either in our own lives, or as the collective, watch out.

Over the years I have certainly had to dabble in the darkness to find my own voice again. It was lost years ago and I continued to let it be paved over. I was conditioned to believe that I had to sacrifice myself for others in a way that left me void of who I actually was. It took years to unlearn all of the narratives I was taught to believe about myself and therefore didn’t consider myself worthy of much. Healing didn’t come through one mode or a quick fix. Healing is choosing action, every day. It is the daily things we do for ourselves that begin to override old systems that exist within us. Do the core beliefs still pang once in a while, yes. But I am able to observe them differently now. And truthfully, laugh at them a bit. I notice when I squirm with anxiety or vulnerability and laugh at myself, because I know exactly what it is. Then I choose to proceed with the act of something different anyway. That is the beauty in the willingness to try something new. To do something differently than we have or have been conditioned to believe we should.

This is the season of trying new things. Speaking the truth even when it might not land. Asking the questions. Challenging the status quo. Doing it in a way that teaches my younger self that what she was asking for all along was more than okay. She was allowed to ask, even if it wasn’t given. She was allowed to want for more, even if she was told she couldn’t have it. She was allowed to grow. She was allowed to leave. She was allowed to choose herself.

We are all art, in the process of becoming. I don’t know where you are finding yourself on this snowy Sunday, but I do hope you are finding yourself well. If you are not well, I hope you are honoring where you are with compassion and grace. We could all use more of that these days. Be kind to your heart, beloved. She is trying.

All the love today,

ah