Hello,
I'm Alison.
In this talk I want to help you if you struggle with the question of how you can stay connected and informed and compassionate about the suffering and problems of the world right now while still protecting your peace.
This is a tricky one and one that can be particularly confronting for us right now.
Sometimes it's a struggle to find balance between staying informed and protecting our peace and also protecting our faith and optimism in life which is very important to have.
Now it's a deeply positive thing about being human that we do have the capacity to care so much about what's happening not just in our own small corner of life but what's happening in the whole wide world.
But sometimes that can become very overwhelming and heavy and lead to feelings like hopelessness and anxiety and depression.
I want to say strongly that being overwhelmed isn't a weakness.
Overwhelm is not a weakness.
It's just that our nervous systems weren't designed to process the suffering of thousands of people in a single day.
And when we scroll through our phones through tragedy after tragedy and watch a lot of news media and so on,
What's happening is our bodies are responding as if we're personally in danger.
So overwhelm isn't a weakness.
It's actually a response to too much input and we need to listen to that response so that we can be responsive to it and change it.
And here's something else important to understand.
Caring does not require us to carry.
Caring doesn't mean we have to be scrolling and scrolling and watching and watching and consuming all this suffering content.
It actually doesn't make any difference to the people who are suffering in terms of how many hours we put into consuming their suffering online or in the paper or whatever other ways we're hearing about it.
We can care deeply without absorbing suffering into our own bodies and we do have agency over that.
And in fact,
When we remain steady,
We're much more able to act wisely and compassionately.
So we do need to choose balance for ourselves so we can think discerningly and we can be available to others where we can.
We want to continue to stand up for what we believe in,
Sure,
But at the same time we have to make sure that we check in with how we're feeling.
We check in with our own well-being,
Especially our mental health,
And we recognize where we need to find some balance,
Where we may need to stand back and take a break,
Detach.
And also where we need to actively focus on all the goodness and kindness and healing that also exists abundantly in this world.
Because you see,
Our brain just has a natural physiological leaning towards taking in more negative material than positive.
In neuroscience,
This is called the brain's negativity bias and you've probably heard of it.
And this is a survival system that comes from the days of very early life,
Our very early ancestors,
The first humans on earth.
And that negativity bias,
That survival system,
Gives more attention to threat than it does to safety.
So it's not that there's less safety than there is threat or less goodness in the world than there is suffering.
It's where our brain naturally pays attention.
This genuinely once helped humans survive real threats like attacks from wild animals or severe weather events.
But today this primitive part of the brain can be triggered in the same way into a threat response by things like watching the news or reading about suffering or receiving doom-focused fear-based messages.
Because our system responds to these as an immediate threat,
A personal one,
Which is why we can become so consumed by despair and anxiety and overwhelm.
Knowing this is helpful because it helps us understand that when we feel this response,
What we're being asked to do is move away from the threat and move towards present safety and goodness.
And also to know there isn't an actual immediate threat.
It just feels like it.
And sometimes that means that you're deleting certain apps,
Even if only for a few days,
To reset.
Sometimes it means finding other ways to cultivate the ability to step away.
And I know that can be a privilege we have,
That we have the choice to step away,
And we don't take that lightly.
But it's not anything to feel guilty about.
It's not unethical to stop watching so much news media to limit our doom scrolling.
In fact,
It's an important and productive shift to make.
Stepping back to reset and rebalance is not abandoning the world.
It is how we remain resourced enough to stay engaged over the long term.
Burnout helps no one.
Our steadiness,
Our hopefulness,
Serve everyone.
We can still care.
We can still pray for our world.
We can still,
In our own worlds,
Be more loving and more compassionate to ourselves and others,
And to create safety where we can for others.
All of us are the world.
Little pieces of the world going about our business.
And what we consume affects how well we do that,
And how well we feel while we're doing that.
The world is not only out there.
It's also right here.
It's here in your conversations.
It's here in your kindness.
The world is in your patience and the safety you create for others.
There's always something we can do.
And when we do it with heart and love,
And loving life in spite of everything,
It's an act of power.
It does a lot.
This isn't spinning positivity,
And it's not something to feel guilty about.
Life wants to be loved.
It wants to be cherished.
And it's from a love of life that we end up doing good things for the world,
And being good people,
Because we respect and care for and cherish life.
So we don't want to get weary,
Overwhelmed,
And fatigued in our caring.
We want to keep adding to that love,
That cherishing of life,
By soaking up and taking in the good,
Which is how we correct that negative brain bias.
We point our focus regularly towards goodness,
Rest in it,
And absorb it.
Whatever goodness there is.
And there are so many different kinds of goodness.
When we bring more love,
More kindness,
And more caring into our immediate lives,
We're already contributing to a more humane world.
We have a real impact there,
And one that is absolutely possible to take action on,
To achieve.
My friends,
We know there will always be suffering,
And equally there will always be so much goodness.
And our task is not to choose one over the other,
But to let the good nourish and sustain us,
So we can meet what is hard without losing ourselves.
That is what keeps the flame of humanity alive.
So before we finish,
I'm going to invite you to take a moment to do a little practice to arrive back into yourself,
And into this very message that we are allowed to step back,
And we are allowed to drop the weight we're carrying when the weight of the world is on our shoulders,
And we have permission to choose goodness,
And that we can care without carrying everything.
And I've also recorded this as a separate track for whenever that reset is needed.
So let's do that now.
Let's take some moments to land here.
You might be breathing now some slow,
Delicious breaths into your own body,
Into you.
Our breaths can naturally deepen if we breathe as if we were inhaling the scent of something that we absolutely love to smell.
And can you feel your own feet on the ground,
Or your own body connecting to something solid?
Can you feel the whole weight of your bones dropping into their support?
And as you feel that,
Know that you don't have to push anything away,
You don't have to solve anything.
You're just coming back to the place where you already are.
You're here.
And now notice one thing in that space that you can see,
And just let your eyes rest on it,
And name it out loud.
And then one thing that you can feel touching you,
So that might be the fabric of your clothes,
Or what's underneath you,
Or the air touching your skin.
And does that touch feel cool or warm?
Answer out loud.
And now what can you hear?
Listen,
And name one sound,
And see if you can find a sound that delights you in some way,
That's good to hear.
And now feeling yourself land,
And your body sending down its anchor,
Register,
This is where I am right now.
You're not in every place at once.
You are here,
Feel your presence.
You're in your place,
Meeting the here and now.
Take a big breath in,
So that your shoulders rise,
And then let it all out in a long,
Slow exhale,
Right down to the last drop.
And let your shoulders release.
Literally dropping the weight of the world that you have been carrying.
Not withdrawing your caring,
But dropping the weight.
You can care better without that weight.
Let's do that again,
Taking a big breath in that fills your shoulders.
And then a long,
Slow exhale that lets any weight just tumble away from you.
Fall to the ground,
And your body is all yours again.
And now leaning into something good,
Just for a moment.
See if you can bring into your being some positive experience.
Maybe something beautiful or reassuring in your environment.
Or you could think of a particular person who lights you up.
You could bring to mind a memory of a happy time in your life,
Or something you're looking forward to.
Just think about some things that you're grateful for,
Perhaps.
See if you can stay with that feeling for just 10 seconds.
Having this experience of this goodness in your whole being.
Breathing with it.
It's okay if your mind wanders a little bit,
That's pretty natural.
But on the whole,
Can you dwell?
So that you're resting in this goodness,
And even absorbing it into yourself as you breathe into your belly,
Feeling that fullness there.
Beautiful.
And now,
Finishing that practice.
So you can get nice and loose in your body,
Maybe shaking off anything remaining that wants to leave now.
And come back to your space,
And just ask yourself how you feel.
How you feel now.
Does anything feel any different from when you came to this talk at the beginning,
Just moments ago?
And maybe naming for yourself,
As you check in to notice what's changed for you,
Or how you feel generally.
And what that tells you.
This is what coming back into our own being is.
This is what dropping the weight is.
And this is what leaning into goodness does.
So what does that make possible for you,
Do you think?
That didn't feel so possible perhaps before?
And remember,
This is a healthy and helpful way to meet life.
And the more you do this practice,
The more it will sink in.
Maybe it's sinking in already.
And when that happens,
It creates a new kind of presence for you to inhabit.
One where your caring is full,
And your heart is putting your love online,
And your peace is protected.
That's the kind of presence that really changes humanity in positive ways,
Person by person,
One small moment at a time.
Thank you for joining me,
And until next time,
Be well.
Bye for now.
