(Un)ravelings, or the alchemy of trust
Heather asked about my mention of fear in the last post, about how the undoing of it is one of the things I’m giving my life to. So I’ll try and explain more of what I mean by that.
I think fear is at the heart of our world’s problems. How’s that for a bold statement?? I think it’s at the heart of our individual problems, and at the heart of our collective problems, and the reason why it’s such an uphill thing, at least much of the time, to work well (or at all) together toward good.
Pushed far enough, maybe the core of our fear is fear of death, but I don’t think that’s what most of us are conscious of. I think most of us are conscious of fears like that of loneliness, joblessness, lack of clear or appealing identity, debt, getting dumped, getting raped, getting robbed, being ugly, being fat or thin in all the wrong places, losing health, losing respect, losing popularity, losing our minds.
I think there’s another whole layer of fear, though, that we’re not so conscious of, and that may be far more toxic than the rest. I think it has to do with who we are in a very deep and vulnerable place, and the kinds of questions we ask from there. Are we loveable?, is a big one. Are we okay? Is the world an inherently hostile place? Will the people I love abandon me? Will they get taken away? Will I have to suffer more than I can bear? Does God exist? Is God as critical as it seems sometimes? Are you going to hurt me? You? How ’bout you? Are you going to make me feel small? Will you take advantage of my weakness if I show it…or can’t hide it like I’d wish?
At heart, and of course to varying levels, I think we’re all afraid, and that every one of the “stupid” things we do collectively or individually can be traced to this. I think they can be traced to trying to protect ourselves, or keep from gaining or losing the things we’re afraid we’ll gain or lose. Traced to making sure that whatever hurt us before won’t ever hurt us again.
Surely many of our fears are well-founded. They make sense, and they’re there for good reason. But I think far more often than not, they’re bigger than they need to be, and when acted upon, only perpetuate the need that we and those around us have to be afraid. If I get defensive, for example, because I’m afraid you’ll trump my view, then my defensiveness will cause your voice to raise, and your defensiveness along with it. The two (three?) will escalate until we’re saying and doing things we never thought we would, given how we felt only five minutes ago. We will be fanning the flames of distrust for future interactions. We will be fanning flames of shame for having overreacted, if indeed we see that’s what we’ve done. We will be shrinking the bold, expansive, playful, curious, eager, trusting parts of ourselves that can’t come out when fear is at the helm, and nurturing an inner tightness, a vigilence, self-consciousness, clenched fists. We won’t be able to think about the common good, but be consumed with shoring up what we personally (as individuals, groups, nations) haven’t yet lost. At the farthest, most gruesome extreme, we will start wars.
I think versions of this process happen constantly, at every level, around us. It’s a web of fear and subsequent violence…and subsequent woundings, and the needs that follow our wounds to be afraid and protect ourselves…that we all get born into.
So. I want to be about the undoing of fear. I want to be about the shrinking of it, where it’s grown too big. I think the opposite of fear is trust, so I want to be on expeditions everywhere to unveil reasons for fear to actually turn into trust: trust that life can be good, that we’re okay–all the way to our core, that healing can happen, that no critical God exists apart from the ones we’ve grown inside ourselves, that our vulnerable selves can actually find safe places to be seen, and loved, and nurtured on toward Life, in the very best sense of that word.
I’m a writer, so written words are what I use most toward this end. But I think the shrinking of fear and the growth of trust can happen by many other means. I’m experiencing it through Qigong. I’ve felt it in Tai Chi, and the belly dance classes I’ve taken. In therapy. In laughter at no one’s expense. In sex and hugs and friends’ and mentors’ presence. Through music and visual arts. Through the work of raising my son. I see it happening as people love their pets, and as the motley crew of us gathers daily at the neighborhood park to talk and watch our kids play.
As far as I can tell, fear feeds on judgment and criticism and threats and looks of disapproval, so none of these, despite our best efforts at using them on ourselves or others well (said partly in jest, but partly with all seriousness), can lead to the alchemy I’m talking about, I don’t think. Trust is allergic to them. I think trust is allergic to many of the concepts of God that we work hard to feel loved by.
So this–this work of undoing fear and cultivating trust–is what I’m giving my life to. It’s the wind that fills up my sails and urges me on to write.
October 26th, 2006 at 6:44 pm
nice to come back after a long while with no internet and find a new site. it looks great.
loved catching up on the Birds of a Feather threads; coming back as i just have from a non-English speaking country, the idea of speaking the same language occurs. a lot of times i think that when people think they are having a dialogue about spiritual/philosophical/political/etc. differences and it devolves into shreikings and howlings, it’s because there’s an assumption the languages are the same, and they aren’t. so many times i have found myself translating Conservative-Evangelical-Christianese into Postmodern-Searching-Nonreligiousese and wondering: if not for translation, how much of this conversation would be rejected?
i think this applies to fear as well: we all fear being misunderstood, especially if we’re being vulnerable or transparent. the work of cultivating trust, i think, is to listen carefully, to hear between the lines, so to speak, so that i can alleviate fear in myself that i’m not understanding or being understood. and taking the time to understand myself too.
October 26th, 2006 at 8:06 pm
You’re a wise woman with a noble and brave calling. Blessings to you.
I’ve done a fair bit of soul-searching about fear in my journey too, especially when it comes to fear in religion. My understanding of god has evolved alot since my evangelical upbringing.
This past weekend, Franklin Graham was in our city for one of his big festivals, and the whole thing left me with a deep sadness. I didn’t go to the festival, but everything I heard and read about it indicated that his only message was one of fear and judgement. He painted a picture of a god who will judge and condemn people to destruction if they do not repent. I’m not sure why, but the whole thing has left me feeling kind of sick inside - mostly because he drew crowds of thousands and caused quite a stir in the city. I just think how much good an influential man like him could do if he came with a message of love and peace and justice instead.
October 26th, 2006 at 9:24 pm
Hi! I want to commend to you a blog by one of my Quaker heroes, Peggy Senger Parsons. She is the pastor of an intentionally lgbt inclusive evangelical Friends church in Oregon.
These are three of her posts, Worshipping at the Idol of Safety and How I Became Invincible and My Favorite Superpowers.
Oh heck. Just read the whole thing. Fearlessness is one of her favorite topics. And she’s funny.
October 26th, 2006 at 9:43 pm
Hadashi, so nice to hear your voice again! I think you’re so right: peace and trust really do get lost in translation. I love the way you’ve described a deeper kind of listening, and the safeguard this can be against misunderstanding and being misunderstood.
Heather, thanks so much for the blessing. Yes, it is a deep grief that people with so much influence paint such scary pictures of God. I grieve with you. I hope the sickness you feel can be a kind of counter-story in your town, doing the undoing work that it sounds like might need to happen there.
Robin, thank you for the commendation! I will happily go check out these links!
October 26th, 2006 at 10:16 pm
Brilliant, this: I think trust is allergic to many of the concepts of God that we work hard to feel loved by.
Navigating fear; cultivating trust. This is warrior’s work. Thank you for your clean blade of truth. It has pierced my heart.
October 28th, 2006 at 1:24 pm
Sounds like I was in the same city as Heather last week, and I also did not go to the big FG celebration. I would not have minded the music, but was not willing to sit through anything else in order to hear that,
Fear…my biggest one is a fear of pain
emotional pain
sometimes I think I have had enough and that is what triggers that.
Then of course it has all those ugly little tentacles that go here, there and everywhere..
I am happy that at this point in my life I can recognize it, for then that goes a long way with trying to overcome the stupid thing!!
October 28th, 2006 at 2:21 pm
Sage, hopefully a pierced heart is a good thing… Bless you in your own warrior’s work. I sense you’re at it.
Rebecca, yes–experiencing pain has been my most potent instigator of being afraid of experiencing it again. I so relate. I can say that finding healing at different points has given me hope and a certain kind of peace about the possibility that future pain might also have relief, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say I really, really, don’t want to experience deep pain again.
I think you’re so right, too, in the way that awareness of our fears can help us a lot in avoiding acting unhealthfully on them. Here’s to waking up, so that our literal sleep can be the best, most restful kind! :)
October 30th, 2006 at 9:25 am
Your sense of personal mission in the world is so beautiful, Kristin. And it seems quite insightful to me: it recognizes a deeper commonality that if we could get in touch with, would probably help to change the way conflict is handled. I’m imagining a tense situation, maybe a family counseling session, or a victim-offender reconciliation, where each person is just barely holding back their hurt and frustration. But if someone, a mediator, could stop and ask, “what are we all afraid of? Can each of us name a fear right now, get it out into the open?” I think that there would all of a sudden be this moment of unveiling (hey, maybe that was a subconscious reason for your previous blog) of the connectedness of everyone. Like if you can see that the parent that has hurt you, is afraid that you won’t like them, it somehow helps you to see them as more human, less an adversary.
So I like this work you are doing, and stand behind it with my full support!! The fact that there are people in the world who give a shit about doing this kind of thing makes me happy. Its also inspiring to see you put into words what you see yourself about in the world; having a sense of what you want to contribute seems so helpful in guiding action and work. Looking forward to seeing where this takes you!
October 30th, 2006 at 12:21 pm
Thank you Lori! I really like this image you’ve painted of mediation/reconciliation. It makes me want to think more about this, and the idea of actually initiating voicing my fears in tense situations with people in my life. Surely there are times when that isn’t appropriate, but maybe there are more times than we think that it is, and when that’s exactly what’s needed–maybe the only thing that can truly be effective–to lower tension and get people dealing gently with the real things that both parties feel are at stake. Thanks for pushing my thoughts further on this.
November 7th, 2006 at 10:24 am
I think it’s about time they did a remake of Blade Runner, or came out with a second version.