{"id":1009,"date":"2020-04-02T02:00:22","date_gmt":"2020-04-02T07:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/?p=1009"},"modified":"2020-03-31T12:16:09","modified_gmt":"2020-03-31T17:16:09","slug":"turn-toward-the-pain-a-counterintuitive-approach-to-the-fear-of-covid-19","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/2020\/04\/turn-toward-the-pain-a-counterintuitive-approach-to-the-fear-of-covid-19\/","title":{"rendered":"Turn TOWARD the Pain: A Counterintuitive Approach to the Fear of\u00a0Covid-19"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

To listen to an audio reading of this post, click here<\/a> or go to bit.ly\/TurnTowardAudio<\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Most people have turned their solutions toward what is easy and toward the easiest side of the easy; but it is clear that we must trust in what is difficult; everything alive trusts in it.\u200a\u2014\u200aRainer Maria Rilke<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

In the past couple of weeks I\u2019ve had the good fortune to host Zoom meetings with several groups of therapists I consult with and teach. I\u2019m moved to tears by the end of almost every one of these meetings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The willingness of these open-hearted, caring professionals to rise to the occasion to bear and care about the pain and fear their clients carry in the midst of the coronavirus situation cracks my heart wide open. Especially since I also hear the fear and pain these caregivers are facing in their own lives\u200a\u2014\u200aoverwhelm at getting the hang of teletherapy at a moment\u2019s notice, anxiety about what the virus means for a pregnancy, heartbreak about postponing a long-planned wedding, illness in their own families.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The courage to engage in deeply personal conversation about our feelings and responses toward the lockdowns and social distancing necessitated by the coronavirus pandemic brings us close to each other. Opening our hearts to the intensity of the difficulties in the world\u200a\u2014\u200ain the presence of each other, we are transformed. Our overwhelm melts into sadness, which overflows into compassion for all of us humans who are struggling to make sense of being here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By walking directly into the center of the difficulty\u200a\u2014\u200atogether with peers\u200a\u2014\u200aI am indeed moved to tears. And I am grateful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hardness Begets Hardness<\/em><\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Violence is what happens when we don\u2019t know what else to do with our suffering.\u200a\u2014\u200aParker Palmer<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Over and over again\u200a\u2014\u200ain my own life and the lives of my psychotherapy clients\u200a\u2014\u200aI see that observing and engaging difficulty, rather than avoiding it or fighting it, leads to growth. Yet over and over again, I see that our natural reflex as creatures is to involuntarily resist difficulty with every ounce of strength we possess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is it about difficult situations, difficult relationships, difficult feelings that makes us want to eradicate our discomfort and turn toward what is easy?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Oxford English Dictionary defines difficulty as \u201chardness to be accomplished; the opposite of ease<\/em> or facility<\/em>;\u201d and says that something is difficult when it is \u201cnot easy; hard; hard to understand.\u201d That is, difficulty is characterized by hardness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And what is my automatic reaction when something hard comes flying at me? I harden against it. Out of fear, I reflexively meet hardness with hardness\u200a\u2014\u200ato protect myself, to deflect the oncoming strike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Protecting against a hard emotional assault seems to make logical sense. Yet when two hard things collide, such as stone clashing against stone, they violently bounce off of one another. They break or shatter. Since violence and shattering are the results of a naturally hard reaction to difficulty, why wouldn\u2019t<\/em> I want to turn away, and instead turn toward the easy (yet deadening) path?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Paradox of Softness<\/em><\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

When we cross a new threshold worthily, what we do is we heal the patterns of repetition that were in us that had us caught somewhere.\u200a\u2014\u200aJohn O\u2019Donohue<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Fortunately, there\u2019s another choice: the paradoxical response of softness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If I can access that courageous soft place inside me that resides on the other side of fear, the core that can meet the hardness of difficulty with curiosity and openness, then things don\u2019t bounce or break. Instead they shift and deepen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead of clashing against the stone of difficulty, in softness I become a pond. As a pond I can observe the stone of difficulty as it slowly sinks into the depths of my being. I can watch the ripples created by the stone as they permeate my life and transform me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, some stones are so big that they threaten to empty me with their violent splashing. But that kind of emptying only means that the ripples of transformation are that much larger, irrevocable, and indelible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Curiosity and openness in the face of difficulty cause the ripples of transformation to manifest in a number of significant ways. Hardened fear, rage, paralysis, and reactivity give way to feelings altogether different:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  • The hard defensiveness of fear melts into the approachable vulnerability of grief and sadness, whose tears wash clean the crevices of my heart to reveal the depths of compassion.<\/li>
  • The rigidity of rage against the-way-things-are transforms into the fierce motion of outrage, the source of world-changing action.<\/li>
  • The dull paralysis of numb avoidance gives birth to a lush and passionate awareness of my true strengths, allowing me to enact<\/em> my compassion and outrage.<\/li>
  • And the chaos of blind struggle and reactivity breaks open into the receptivity of discernment, which allows me to make good decisions about difficult situations, such as distinguishing between the time for patience and forbearance, and the time for outrageous action.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n

    Courageous Softness Yields Giving Back<\/em><\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

    Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing. We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don\u2019t really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It\u2019s just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.\u200a\u2014\u200aPema Ch\u00f6dr\u00f6n<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

    Softness in the face of difficulty leads to transformation, and transformation most often hurts. To trust softness as a response to difficulty\u2019s hardness requires strength, courage, and awareness. This trust is much easier to come by when I have support and holding from fearless others who meet me in the difficulty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Today I stand at a poignant intersection between relief from years of great personal difficulty, and time of tension and difficulty in the world. When I lean into the softness I\u2019ve learned from dealing with my own intense adversity for so many years, I feel what can only be described as a desire to give back<\/em>. Overcome by a sense of gratitude for all I have received in the journey through my own darkness, I feel compelled to respond to the pain of the world by offering myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    That pull to give back vividly illustrates what I\u2019ve been trying to say: With much help and support from many good people, I learned what it was like to soften into hard times. And now, rather than feeling drained and used up by years of difficulty, I feel full, strong, grateful, alive. Now I <\/em>have the capacity to hold others in difficulty. And so they<\/em> soften.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    And so it goes. On and on and on\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Rilke says, \u201cEverything alive<\/em><\/strong> trusts in difficulty.\u201d I know I do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    How about you? What’s your experience with either turning toward or away from difficulty?<\/em>
    <\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    To listen to an audio reading of this post, click here or go to bit.ly\/TurnTowardAudio Most people have turned their solutions toward what is easy and toward the easiest side of the easy; but it is clear that we must trust in what is difficult; everything alive trusts in it.\u200a\u2014\u200aRainer Maria Rilke In the past couple of weeks I\u2019ve had the good fortune to host Zoom meetings with several groups of therapists I consult with and teach. I\u2019m moved to tears by the end of almost every one of these meetings. The willingness of these open-hearted, caring professionals to rise to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1013,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[35,37,65,64],"class_list":["post-1009","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-courage","tag-difficulty","tag-strength","tag-vulnerability"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1009","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1009"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1009\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1016,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1009\/revisions\/1016"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1009"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1009"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1009"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}