Dealing with Fear while in a Pandemic

The challenges we are facing right now are large. As I have spent time with my clients the consistent theme that has come up is how isolated people feel. There is a typical pattern that shows up with this isolated feeling. It goes... I feel alone, I am not safe, I am afraid, I protect myself and then I feel even more alone. We will continue to walk through it each day, in the same way. Unless we interrupt the cycle. Here's what is helping me right now with grounding, quieting fear, and accepting change. 

1. Practice physical distancing, while still connecting. One way to navigate your fear is to know you are doing all you can on behalf of others. We've all seen the guidance on cleaning, distancing from others, and staying home when we are sick. This is also an opportunity for us to connect, creatively (SKYPE, ZOOM (personally), and Facetime). Who is someone that could use encouragement during this time? Reach out and connect.  

2. Social media diet: make a clear plan for news and social media consumption – and follow it (even if imperfectly). Simply asking myself, "When will I be looking at news/social media today?" The answer for me has generally been 1 or 2 short periods during the day, not more. We all need to stay informed, and there is a lot of good information spreading in a grassroots way that is not yet coming in a centralized, succinct way. In this sense reading online is very useful. And, we also need to be discerning about what level of news consumption will best allow us to keep our connection to our center and to give our nervous system much needed breaks. Remember that sending yourself into fear puts us in the oldest part of our brains, downloads cortisol, and heightens our senses.

 3. Serve others: make your daily plan to be of service. Service is an antidote to fear. We have got to get away from thinking about ourselves (and away from thinking period) and into loving action – multiple times a day. So every day – and especially when you are getting caught up in fear and worry – ask yourself what you can do to be of service. For example, you can call those in your community who might be feeling particularly afraid or lonely. You can find a way to support a small business that is being hard hit. You can do a video call with someone who could use a pick-me-up and put your adorable dog in the camera frame for them to see, giving them something to smile about for a few moments. And you can think about – or pray on – how your knowledge, skills, personal strengths or other resources can be of service during this crisis, and then act on your ideas.

 4. Do your self-care top three. Identify three practices that are your foundation for staying well-sourced during this time. Maybe that's keeping to a calming bedtime routine. Maybe it's singing or listening to music or having a living room dance party. For me right now, the core three are exercise (via online videos or playing tag with my kids in the house!), meditation, and connecting with others (via video) each day. Identify and do your self-care top three, schedule them in your calendar each day, and shift what they are when needed.

 5. Channel your Sage energy. This one is the hardest to explain, but let me try. The sage is the wise, elder. The one who knows what they knows from the heart and from lived experience. The one who has been shaped by the lessons of a lifetime of community tending and care giving. The sages who came before us put up with a lot. Sages of our own time already put up with a lot – violence, war, injustice, pain turned into pain turned into harm. 

The sage sees the folly of the world for what it is: deep unknowing, deep "I have not learned that yet," coming from young, still immature souls. The sage knows how pain and unhealed wounds turn into more pain, which turns into harm done – through greed, deceit, heart-hardening, and denial. They grieves this, but also look at it with total clarity and compassion. When confronted with that folly, he/she does not feel like a child being attacked by something bigger than him/her. They know they are bigger than it, that they can call in parts of that folly for healing, for a teaching, for an embrace, like a grandparent would with an unruly adolescent. They stand in this place even if that folly takes them out, in their physical incarnation, this time around. He/She is present to heal what needs to be healed and can ache in their hearts, with tenderness, with wisdom, for what is not yet healed. This is the time to channel the sage energy, to stand in that place, as we encounter what is now unfolding.