The morning of election day I sprained my ankle.
I was walking in the woods and didn't see the downed log obscured by leaves. My foot rolled off the side of the log and suddenly I was on the ground, looking up at the bright blue bowl of sky.
It was the worst thing.
It was also the best thing.
A New Way Forward
Like millions of other people, I woke up the next morning devastated by the outcome of the election.
I sat in my chair by the window, watching the sun come up on a world that looked the same but felt profoundly different.
I was full of fear and sorrow. It felt like I had a flu in my soul. Trust was hard to find. Meaning, too. I could not stop thinking of all the danger posed to so many people, our planet, our democracy.
I wanted to move my body. To run. To escape. I wanted to sweat and get dirty and then wash myself clean. I wanted out of the emotional hurricane inside me.
But I could barely walk. I could not go to the woods, could not do yoga, could not even walk upstairs.
The voice inside was clear: STOP.
But I didn’t want to. Action is my response to pain, to powerlessness, and I needed it now more than ever. I could feel myself closing and could hear the insistent voice.
STOP. Be with this. Be here now.
So I slapped an ice pack on my ankle, propped it on a tower of pillows and closed my eyes, asked myself if I was brave enough to sit with the despair.
The Cost of Trying to Save the World
I've got a bit of a save the world complex.
It's laughable, I know. And borderline arrogant. The world is a big place and I'm not a head of state or even a head of household.
Still, I stand with my back bowed, the globe across my spine, staggering under its weight. I feel responsible, as though it is my job to witness every suffering, every injustice, every harm, and fix each one.
There is love in this but there are other things, too. Fear and desperation and grasping for control. Tasking myself with saving the world is my antidote to the profound powerlessness I feel.
I sat there with my throbbing ankle and torn insides, knowing that my old ways would not carry me through this. I needed a new path.
Because when caring hurts this much, it isn't liberation.
My brain short circuited and my heart took over. I let the despair crest like a wave and break over me and something quietly awakened: the knowing that I cannot save the world.
I cannot prevent whatever is going to happen in the coming months or years. I cannot single handedly reverse climate change or stop wars anymore than I can control the tides or the planetary orbits or my teenagers.
These are truths I've avoided for a long time. It terrifies me to let go. (We need people to care! To fight for social justice! To advocate for those without power!)
But here's the truth: activism from fear isn't liberation, it's tyranny. Actions taken to save or fix aren't about equality but about superiority.
Carrying the burdens of world doesn't make me noble or impactful. Over-responsibility limits my power to positively impact anything. I am no good without a straight spine.
And so I let go. Not just with in my mind but with my body, my heart, my energy. I don't know what will happen but I know I can't hold on like this.
I've always fought for liberation. But what if I've had it backwards? What if liberation isn't about opposing but about opening, about softening, about releasing?
What if liberation can take a thousand - a million - forms? What if right now mine is in grounding in myself, not because I don't care about what is happening to others and to our planet, but because without a calm body and open heart, I am useless in the world?
Of course outer work and action matter but what if our most powerful contribution to liberation is to first liberate ourselves?
Start With Yourself
I'm taking a break from the world. A time-out, an intermission, a retreat. I'm not taking in any news or social media.
Instead, I'm spending time in the woods (my ankle is better), reading poetry (Andrea Gibson's You Better Be Lightning is such a comfort), doing yoga, lying with my dog and syncing my breath to hers, painting and resting.
I'm looking to the sky to remind me how tiny we are in the Universe.
Every day I give myself permission to step back and ground myself. Every day I have to remember that this is an essential part of me finding a new, more liberated way forward.
Every day I remind myself that destruction, like a forest fire, is a necessary part of any rebirth.
I'm so grateful for that sprained ankle. It forced my back to the wall. It invited me to surrender.
This morning, I sat and watched the sun light the leaves from underneath. It was like magic - a thousand tiny lanterns up in a tree. I looked away for a second and the sun shifted and suddenly they were just leaves. Then the sun moved and they were lanterns once again. But the sun wasn't moving, the clouds were.
Magic doesn’t come and go. It just shifts forms. We must train our eyes to see.
Which means there was magic right here, in this stunningly painful moment. It must be there, doing its tender work.
Maybe we can meet it here.
I don’t know how to heal the world. But I do know how to heal myself. This is perhaps my most mastered skill, sitting inside my own broken heart. Yet how can that be enough?
How can it not?
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