Creating Safety

Can we all please just take a collective breath?

I'm not sure if it's just me, but the more I learn about being an informed service provider and the more work I do on myself, the more I realize that for the vast majority of my adult life (and before it), I've been functioning in a state of mild panic at any given time.

Think back to when you were in high school, especially your junior and senior year. College applications! I felt the pressure to do ABCDEFG for the sole purpose of making myself a more competitive applicant. And some of those things, I didn't even like! But it seemed like if I didn't do it, everybody else would, and that would be the one little thing that threw off my journey.

Then yay, you're in college! But now what? Decide on your major. Decide what you want to do. Prepare for something. Do ABCDEFG extracurriculars, volunteer here, tutor there. Prep for grad school, because psychology majors are a dime a dozen and you can't do what you want without a grad school degree (according to the people advising you). Oh, and there's the GRE to study for too.

Then yay, you got into a master's program! Now do ABCDEFG to make yourself a competitive PhD program applicant.

Or maybe you got your master's and you're job hunting. You must do ABCDEFG to make yourself a competitive applicant.

Now you have a job. You must do ABCDEFG to pass your probationary period. You must do ABCDEFG to maybe earn a raise.

You're focusing on money? Okay. You must have this much in your emergency fund, this much saved for retirement, this card over that one but actually not if you have this and this situation, and diversify your portfolio because you should know what that means.

Oh, you're working on yourself? Set ABCDEFG goals. Read this number of pages in a book every day. Drink this amount of water. Eat this and not that. Give yourself grace if you screw up, but actually, don't screw up at all because you must do this!

ENOUGH ALREADY!

The world is not going to end because you didn't read today. Or didn't meditate. Or didn't get everything done on your seemingly endless to-do list.

But it sure does feel like it, huh?

I'm not sure when exactly I started living my everyday life with my foot flooring the gas pedal, but it's time to let up.

No, there aren't any guarantees in life. Statistically speaking, anything is possible. It may be improbable, but it's not impossible.

I watched a talk recently on working with individuals who have a trauma history. The gentleman giving the talk asked the audience, "Are you safe right now?"

To a person who's lived their life in a state of mild panic, the answer is: "Well, no! There's people I don't know all around me, I don't know how structurally sound this roof is, there's a weird noise, I'm sweating---"

"Yes," the presenter said, "but in this very moment, is anything actively harming you?"

"No, but they could!"

"But are they?"

"They could!"

"But in this very moment, are you being harmed? Is anything going horribly, terribly wrong? A lot of things could. But in this moment, are any of those things happening?"

"Well . . . no."

"So are you safe? Right now, in this moment? Is anyone or anything hurting you? Not what could happen. What is happening?"

"Um . . . I guess, nothing."

"So are you safe?"

"Well . . . I guess . . . I mean . . ."

It's hard to accept, isn't it?

Some of us have had "You must do this NOW!!" ingrained into us for a very long time.

This week, I invite you to think about what safety means to you. It doesn't have to be a long and complicated answer. Think about the very basics of physiological safety. Not what could happen or worst-case scenarios.

An example could be: I am sitting in my favorite chair.

Notice those thoughts of but I have to do this and this, and I need to have the roof looked at and the dog is whining and---

No. You are sitting in your favorite chair. That's what is actually happening.

Sit in your chair and take a breath.

In this moment, you are safe.