Facing the Dark

Courage by the author

This image emerged from a personal quandary that many people, I believe, are rolling around in their mouths with their jaws clenched:

How do I look into the darkness so prevalent in the world today? How do I stay updated on global news without ending up paralyzed, disconnected, immersing myself in fantasy? Is it possible for me to stay active and involved and help make this world a better place, or is it all pointless?

As a therapist, and one who specializes in trauma, it is my job to roll up my sleeves alongside my clients and dig into traumatic stories and their effects. This gives me some skills to look at world events, but it doesn't prepare me entirely for what's going on every day on this quaking planet. But I will share what helps me so far, even if I know it's not quite enough. 

1. Mindfulness: sometimes as a Buddhist, but more often as a sensualist. 

The scope of mindfulness is very broad. For one, I'm checking in with myself to see where I'm at. Am I taking in too much fluffy fiction and Netflix? Am I eating too many sweets? These are signs that I'm disconnecting. Next, I am tracking my body sensations, noticing breath, muscle tension, digestion. Remaining present to my body grounds me and also keeps me aware when I am overstimulated or not doing enough self-care. Most importantly, I am making time in my life to appreciate and enjoy simple sensory elements. I pour my tea slowly, watching the silky brown liquid reaching into my tea cup. I smell my son's soft hair. I walk outside and listen to the crows overhead. I appreciate being alive. After all, this is what is so transitory, this is what I imagine missing after I'm dead: the rich sensations of having a body and being on this earth. I can't underline the importance of this enough for me. Real experience, as our work and personal lives become more dominated by the digital, feels at risk to our profound detriment as human animals. 

Drawing/painting is also very powerful mindfulness work for me. Drawing exactly what I see, focusing so intently on the lines and spacial relationships in front of me is very absorbing and helps me mute the constant flow of thoughts. Drawing what I feel can root me deep within my emotions and help me clarify and untangle more complex inner experiences. Check out Can You Draw Your Way to Zen?, a very interesting, non-art therapy article on the many benefits of art making. 

2. Titration: taking in hard information in manageable doses.

I get most of my news via the radio, some online. I have a habit of listening to NPR during breakfast and again at dinnertime. This can quickly get overwhelming and toxic, particularly after a string of mass shootings, gross examples of income inequality, or the escalation of wars and environmental crises. In tracking where I'm at via mindfulness, I will go through periods of time when my family shuts off the radio and just listens to music - or nothing - during meals. I gently challenge my urge to stay informed 24/7: that urge feels like a mechanism of anxiety. 

I have also decided to stop watching violent movies and tv shows. I do this rarely anyway, but I find it only makes me feel worse when I do. Why make more space in my imagination for the violent and awful during times of rest and relaxation, just because a film or show is "really well done." My work already takes me there, and I don't need further synaptic links to potential secondary-post-traumatic-stress-inducing content. I have miraculously maintained resilience for most of my nine years of working with trauma, and I have no interest in risking that for the sake of entertainment. 

3. Making time for love and beauty.

As an artist, I focus on beauty. It may be beauty in what is difficult, or it may be beauty in nature and form - or all of the above. But I allow myself to draw and paint what is beautiful because my therapy work is at least in part about the effects of ugly human behavior on other humans. I feel I deserve to make art that gives me pleasure and eases my heart a little. With that said, I challenge myself to make that same art relevant and with meaning that I find important or moving.

As a spouse, as a mother, as a daughter/sister/aunt, and as a friend, I try to remain very present to the love I feel for those in my life. I express it regularly, and I try to make time to connect with my family and friends on a regular basis. How affectionate and present I am with my partner tells me a lot about my level of calm (or my level of stress). Connecting with him and nudging myself in a loving direction when I'm out of balance can also help bring me back to equilibrium.

4. Understanding Others' Perspectives. 

I don't always have the mental/emotional/energetic capacity to work on this, but I try when I can to read varying news sources and longer articles about the root causes of some of the major issues on this planet. I'm sure this has been written about already, but I feel that the idealogical polarization in the U.S. and likely elsewhere is caused in part by the customization of information-gathering to our own leanings and interests via online media consumption. I rarely hear news that doesn't confirm my world view, and if I don't check myself I dismiss or ignore others' perspectives when I do hear them.

I also try to talk in a compassionate way with people who don't agree with me about these same issues. I have a neighbor with very different views from mine: we talk in the driveway intermittently, sharing our perspectives on world events with each other. It's not always a perfectly phrased conversation, and it can get heated, but we do it regardless. I grow a little every time we talk. 

photo by author

I am a person who helps people with therapy, writes on a blog, and paints. I also sign a lot of online petitions, call my representatives a few times a year on really important issues, and eat in a way that feels ethical to me. I donate very modestly to a few causes that I feel are important. These are my contributions to world betterment, and they feel pretty small most of the time when faced with the enormity of global suffering. But I am one person. I hope to find other ways to make positive change, but I will not bow under the pressure of doing more than is possible for one person and giving up entirely. For now I will also enjoy the beauty in this world, making it my purpose to seek out beauty and wonder in every moment.