How do we stay sane right now?
Hayley closes our series on question-asking by posing a question that’s been on her mind: “How do we stay sane right now?” Is a desire for balance and stability a fruitless pursuit in the midst of ongoing chaos? Radical acceptance may be our way forward together. (Image from Fallon Michael on Unsplash)
SPEAKER NOTES
Questions, wk 4
Intro:
Today, we are closing out our series on question-asking.
Over the past several weeks, we have talked about the value of forming and strengthening community - our community - around the questions that we ask.
That when we look at our own positionality — where we ask our questions from — our commitment to openness and curiosity can bring us to questions that are actually productive and helpful. (Not just intended answers in disguise)
When we keep asking questions, we refuse to stay stagnant. We recognize that growth and understanding can’t really happen in an echo chamber.
Our questions hold our longings, they come up against our fears, our existential dread, they function as laments and they connect us to one another.
So today, for our last question (which not really, we’ll keep asking so many questions together) I wanted to bring one up that has been rattling around in my brain lately.
It was just the other day, end of a long day, my kids decided to fill our living room floor with pillows and cushions and blankets and call it a Halloween bounce house: no tricks, just bounces.
I’m processing or attempting to process stories of a local Halloween parade being met with tear gas and ICE presence, keep up with some laundry, brainstorming about book club, thinking about calling a friend, and then I completely forgot that I had put pizza in the oven that was now burnt to an absolute crisp.
It made me feel a little crazy - mostly because I didn’t realize how many things my brain and body were attempting to do all at once until something snapped me back into attention (the sad, sad, burnt pizzas)
and my reaction was just that question “How do I stay sane right now?” “How do we — in alllll of this —- stay sane?”
Welcome to your wellness seminar — Working Hard or Hardly working? How to Love your Life with Jesus! lol jk.
So sorry to let the people down but Vince and I are not self help gurus.
We do our fair share of recommending things that would fall into the self help category - books and podcasts - but today I’m drawn toward recognizing that being part of a faith community has its own unique contribution toward feeling more stability, more sanity, more balance.
I’d love to use our time to talk through the importance of feeling anchored and aligned and inspired. - And then we’re actually going to collaborate together and chat about how to keep going — crowdsource some sanity for us today
Can we stay sane?
Question may be- how do I stay sane? But can I even stay sane? Is that fully an option?
It brings to mind the unhelpful “I’m fine, it’s fine” that covers up what’s going on under the surface
I had mentioned a couple weeks ago in therapy how nice it would feel to just like, yell. Not at anyone. Just like yell into the abyss.
Kind of thought I was going to be judged but then without hesitating, my therapist immediately said “Oh I just do it in my car” after driving away from here first.”
Of course I had to do my therapy homework! - truly was cathartic, highly recommend.
Bodily feeling of being overwhelmed - it’s all too much, and it’s also just all ridiculous
Is sanity an option right now?
Half-joking answer is I don’t know if we can fully feel sane when we are constantly swept up into political and practical chaos, day after day, in very real ways.
What we are witnessing is a Venn diagram of the ridiculous to dangerous and it’s putting so many of us on edge, in a state of hyper-vigilance
This morning I want to suggest that feeling more settled, stable, sane can’t rely on needing to make everything make sense.
There’s so much senseless destruction and wild distractions — sanity can’t require an absence of chaos. We’re not going to get that
But accessing steadiness and peace in the midst of chaos is more possible if we are able to find an anchor to steady us
Anchor
- Term initially came across in a practical way as a part of yoga practices. You may be prompted to pick anchor to come back to throughout the practice — the mat, the floor, the sound of the instructors voice, the music.
- Some type of cue - visual, tactile, auditory - to check in with yourself, with where you are at, with your needs
- Momentary check in with yourself, a sensation to bring you back to the present moment
- Anchors are ever so important in navigating the overwhelm, and being rooted in a faith community
- And - sometimes there are bigger picture anchors that we need, tradition we stand upon, community in which we hold one another’s joys and sorrows.
- Our regular practices and rhythms that we can rely on to provide comfort or steadiness or peace
- And establishing an anchor can also be helpful in everyday life - maybe my morning cup of coffee is an anchor for my day and most days I enjoy it in a relatively peaceful setting. - The rare morning alone, sharing coffee with my husband Andy while we get the family ready for the day, coffee at a coffee shop with a friend.
- And then, like the other morning, I return back to my anchor - my morning cup of coffee - after rushing out my front door to check on a neighbor who was being harassed by ICE.
- I need the regular, expected rhythm even more then. The embodied sensation to calm my nervous system
- Maybe some of you have experienced first hand how when you are really struggling it is extra hard to get all the things in place to help yourself out of your own struggles.
- I am all in favor of thinking creatively, supporting one another knowing that the days are getting darker and people in our city are being terrorized and burn out is rampant and resources are being cut off. We are not alone in this. We have to keep pausing to ask ourselves what do we need to be well? Individually and collectively?
Reminds me of a quote from Kate Bowler:
There’s no formula for being human. If there were a solution to the problem of being a person, we would’ve found it. We wouldn’t be stuck endlessly managing our beautiful stupid gorgeous lives. So you can fight that; you can spend forever searching for the answer, clinging to everything. Or you can try to acknowledge that everything dissolves in your hands so you just have to live openhanded. — Kate Bowler
There is no formula, no rulebook, no clear-cut path forward. - That can lead us to more of the existential dread that we talked about a few weeks ago, or we can embrace the necessity of holding our hands open and willing
The search for how to do things the “right way” may keep us from greeting each moment as it comes and asking “how can I be present here and now?”
“How can I remain flexible?” “How can I act in alignment with who I am?”
Scripture uses the imagery of having a firm foundation, a solid rock to build upon. But it also talks about how this is a living stone, a living rock — a foundation that moves and is alive - That balance of being grounded and supported while also being flexible and willing to move - I do not know a lot about architexture - other than witnessing my son Ollie’s truly impressive magnitile creations - But I do now that really tall buildings require some amount of flexibility in order to withstand the wind and storms - We steady ourselves together AND we remain flexible and open together - This is having an anchor that is the Living Stone
We need some sense of care and steadiness to be able to persevere in the question asking, in the protesting, in the community participation
So today I want to do something a little bit different with our time together — if you’re willing to join me in this experiment
I’ve been both A. Really inspired by acts of community care I’ve witnessed and been a part of this week and B. Really curious about what others are doing to care for themselves in all of the chaos, and uncertainty.
So we’re going to spend some time talking about that with another!
If you’re new and like whoa what’s going on here, I promise you we’ve got some folks who love to mingle and will help include you in this exercise
We’re going to put on some music and I will give us some time to settle into little groups - if you’re joining online OR if you’re in the Davis and you want to put your answers in discord as well, that would be lovely. Hopefully compile some inspiration and some ideas for how to anchor ourselves.
Some questions if you want to jot them down, Melissa will put them in discord:
What is your anchor right now? How are you caring for yourself?
What acts of community care are inspiring you right now?
Spend some time mingling and then I’ll close us back in prayer
Prayer
God,
Would you guide us in radical acceptance today and in the days ahead — that we can both radically accept the reality in front of us and work to imagine and create a new reality ahead. That we are active agents of change, co-creating justice and healing with you.