Of Fear + Fire

Last night I succumbed to my fear.

Tears flowed, heaving sobs shook my body. 

I am relentlessly optimistic: gold is refined by the fire, right? In every hardship or struggle, there’s an opportunity to grow more fully into our potential as humans. I’ve believed this through every major struggle in my life [which if you really take a step back my life is privileged and my suffering mild compared to most in the world].

So I keep my head up, I #embracethehill in full belief that on the other side of the fire is refinement.

Except for last night. 

Someone we know and love is going to die.

We are going to lose our house.

Those were the two fears that cracked my relentless optimism. I am afraid of this fire. It seems more consuming than refining. I let myself feel the fear, because sometimes when you are working to be optimistic and hopeful in all things you risk denying your true feelings. I had a good cry. Then I quieted my overactive imagination that can vividly create worst-case-scenarios in movie-like fashion in my mind. I didn’t need to go there.

Then I grabbed my jacket and marched out into the falling snow to the Christmas projector light still in our front lawn in mid-March. I brushed off the snow, repositioned it, plugged it in and stood back as it cast multi-colored prisms across our house.

It was a defiant act against my fear. I WILL find joy.

Even if it is as small as turning on Christmas Lights in March

We’ve lost loved ones before. We’ve also lost our house before (back in 2008, you can find a snippet of that story HERE).

We suffered, we grieved, our lives moved forward. And there was joy again.

Quite honestly, we aren’t that far into this and it is likely to get far worse. I asked myself this morning, “If I am sheltering in place and only leaving the house for daily walks and runs, if I am doing the next right thing to move my business forward each day, what good does more news do for me?” The answer, I concluded, was not much. I am informed enough to know what I need to do right now, do I really need more news?

So instead I’m trying to ask myself: 

Where can I find joy?

How can I cultivate peace?

What good can I do?

This fire seems consuming, the wide-spread grief and hardship it is leaving in its wake are unfathomable. Yet we are seeing glimpses of refinement, of change-the resilience of the human spirit and our innate desire to be connected, to be in community keep shining through.

Focus on these glimpses, these prisms of light and then ask yourself how you can add to it. 

Stay well, friends 

Xoxo

Sarah