The other day I found myself melting down about what was happening in our country and our world. I had woken up from a series of nightmares that left me feeling afraid, powerless, and out of control—not my usual cocktail of emotions. I realized then, that the terrifying and increasing danger I was hearing about each night on the news, the fear I was being injected with and indeed injecting myself with, had sunk in deeper and was now showing up in my dreams. Even my unconscious had been infused with fear and anxiety. I was not happy with this state of being, and not okay with feeling afraid all the time, with anxiety as my baseline state.
At that moment, I was reminded of something a friend said many years ago, “Nothing changes if nothing changes.” Her words came rushing back to me the morning after those terrible nightmares. It was then that I realized that I had become addicted to fear, and, that for me to feel differently, to not be afraid all the time, I needed to stop taking in the substance that was making me afraid, which in my case, was the news cycle. I knew I needed to change, or more accurately, I needed to make a change. While I might or might not be able to create change in the world at this moment in time, I absolutely could create change in my inner world, and I could do this by changing my own behavior and mindset. I needed to stop pumping myself up every night (and sometimes even during the day) with despair and terror, to stop injecting and subjecting myself to every terrible and incomprehensible thing that was happening, every potentially catastrophe, and every ominous prediction that someone was desperately trying to tell me.
I was outraged-out; in addiction terms, I’d hit my rock bottom. My ah ha moment had come and I made the choice to step off the treadmill of terror, turn off the news, and opt out of the tornado of despair in which I’d been caught.
I turned my attention, instead, to the present moment, the perfume of the approaching spring, with its warmer breezes and lighter mornings, the fun in playing fetch with my pup, the feel of the plush rug under my toes, the sound of my daughters laughing together, the smile on my husband’s face when he saw the Hershey kiss on his computer… simple, here and now, available joys—my actual reality. I decided to turn my attention away from what if, and towards what is—this moment as it is, right here right now—without the infusion of toxicity and fear.
What I discovered when I stopped focusing on what I knew was happening outside my experience, and started focusing on what was happening inside my actual experience, I discovered that I was fundamentally well and happy. In an unexpected and delightful discovery, I found joy and gratitude, sitting right there in the most unlikely place, just under the terror I’d been consuming and in which I’d been actively partaking.
Within a day, I felt better—far better. After one day and night clean, sober, and without the barrage of bad news, I slept well and felt well. I enjoyed the day, and, I didn’t feel afraid.
Interestingly, when I told a friend about my choice to detox from the news and focus on just my present moment, and the delight I was discovering in this choice, his response was to become angry and accusatory. He immediately set off on a diatribe about why I couldn’t and shouldn’t take a break, how that was copping out and cowardly, and would make me a part of the problem. In his words, this was “what they wanted,” for me to turn away from all the terrible things they were doing to us, and become complacent, happy in our own little worlds. When I turned off the news, “they won.”
In another conversation about my choice to detox, a second friend argued against what I was doing. According to her, focusing on just the present moment and my current reality, was exactly what happened in Nazi Germany. We turned away from the rumblings, the signals and messages, we said it couldn’t and wouldn’t happen, and then it did. Then they showed up at our doors and it was too late. Her point being that we can’t just focus on our present moment, it’s not safe or wise. We must stay steeped in our knowledge, fear, and outrage, in order to protect ourselves and inform our present moment choices.
Ever-persistent, I tried a third friend, still wishing to share my newfound equanimity and joy, the results of my choice to unplug from the news cycle and what was making me feel sick. This friend told me that taking a break from the real-life atrocities happening in the world was tantamount to saying it’s okay that they were happening, passively condoning them—agreeing to let them happen. Stepping off the toxic fear treadmill was, in his narrative, a form of denial; it was choosing to live in delusion, which was in fact the same as becoming an accomplice in those atrocities.
Clearly, there are a lot of people who believe that we have the right to do what we need to do—to be okay inside ourselves. And furthermore, that taking care of our own wellbeing is selfish, naïve, and even immoral.
I want to offer a different message, namely, that the choice to take care of yourself in whatever way you need to do that, whatever way works for you—is—the wise choice. To do the very thing that makes you feel unwell—so that they don’t win, and so that they don’t get what they want—that, in fact, is them winning.
The important question is what makes you well; knowing and acting on behalf of your own wellbeing is what allows you to reclaim your life and your power. When you take them out of the center of your consciousness, why you do what you do; when their winning or losing (regardless of what it costs you) is no longer your concern or driving force, then you’re free, and free to be well.
It’s okay to step off the treadmill of terror, here and there, when you need it, or dare I say, all the time—if that’s what you need. What’s important is that you live by your own truth; you don’t owe it to anyone to stay toxified and afraid; it’s not your responsibility to prove that you’re not a coward, part of the problem or that you deserve to wear their badge of honor. Being courageous is not about filling the role of brave hero as defined by someone else’s narrative, but rather about having the courage to honor and live by what works for you.
So too, being kind in the world starts with being kind to yourself. Self-compassion is the best place to begin countering the absence of compassion in our world. And furthermore, focusing on your present moment is not contradictory to feeling empathy for the world…quite the opposite in fact. The joy and gratitude you experience when you allow yourself to pay full attention to what’s here now in your intimate reality, indeed cultivates compassion for the larger world. The two go hand in hand and make a beautiful handshake.
At times like this, when the world feels upside down and scary, it makes sense, for some, to get out there and protest, pull out the megaphone and dive deep into the thick of it. For others, what helps is to watch rom-coms and check out from the horrors. For most of us, it’s somewhere in the middle, with periods of each at different times, diving in then pulling out. Outrage then rom coms, rinse and repeat. But what’s important is not the contents of what makes you well, not how you create your wellbeing, gratitude, and equanimity, but simply that you do it—live byyour own truth, design your own reality, and recognize that what you need to be well matters, regardless of what it means in anyone else’s narrative. Remembering too, that when you’re balanced and intact inside, and receiving what you need to be okay, you’re more equipped and inclined to behave kindly in the world, and therefore, to be of service. Self-compassion is a win for everyone.
