{"id":1032,"date":"2020-04-16T02:00:06","date_gmt":"2020-04-16T07:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/?p=1032"},"modified":"2020-07-01T16:07:09","modified_gmt":"2020-07-01T21:07:09","slug":"bearing-our-souls-a-crash-course-in-soothing-the-overwhelming-emotions-of-a-pandemic-part-2-why-uncertainty-is-scary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/2020\/04\/bearing-our-souls-a-crash-course-in-soothing-the-overwhelming-emotions-of-a-pandemic-part-2-why-uncertainty-is-scary\/","title":{"rendered":"Bearing Our Souls: A Crash Course in Soothing the Overwhelming Emotions of a Pandemic \u2013 Part 2\u200a\u2014\u200aWhy Uncertainty Is Scary"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

To listen to an audio reading of this post, click here <\/a>or go to bit.ly\/SoulsPart2Audio<\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

If I cease searching, then, <\/em><\/p>

woe is me, <\/em><\/p>

I am lost. <\/em><\/p>

That is how I look at it\u2014<\/em><\/p>

keep going, keep going come what may.<\/em><\/p>


\u2015 Vincent van Gogh<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

At the end of a loooong workday last week, I felt agitated and stressed.\nMy son was heading out for a walk, so I went with him to decompress. Stretching\nmy legs, breathing hard, taking in the outdoors and the (socially distant)\nfellow walkers, agitation gave way to exhaustion. Though it was relieving to\nmove my body, I was so tired I had to drag myself down the home stretch back to\nthe house. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Out of nowhere, the thought \u201cLet\u2019s go out to dinner\u201d popped into my head.\nAnd I burst into tears. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such a reflexive way I feel taken care of at the end of a long day\u2014being\nserved dinner by friendly-faced fellow humans in cozy, familiar\nsurroundings\u2014was utterly out of my reach. During shelter-in-place, my familiar\nneighborhood restaurants are all closed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet my tears weren\u2019t for simply not getting to go out to dinner. They\nwere for the fact that, because of COVID-19, I have no idea about when (or if) these\nlocal businesses will ever reopen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I. Have. No. Idea. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

No one has any idea. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When will our kids go back to school? When will we get to work\nside-by-side with our co-workers? When will we be able to meet friends for\ndinner? When will we be able to mindlessly shop for groceries? Or for anything?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And those are the \u201ceasier\u201d questions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because beneath every one of those questions lies:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When will we feel safe again? Will we feel safe again? When will we have\nto stop worrying that simple contact with other humans might make us or someone\nwe love deathly ill?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Uncertainty abounds. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And our tender, mortal brains are more afraid of uncertainty than of physical pain.<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

***<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I always have to dig beneath emotional information into the WHY<\/em>, because if I understand why, I can help you work with the feelings that emerge from situations like the one we find ourselves in together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So WHY<\/em> is uncertainty so stressful?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because at the root of all uncertainty is a fear of threat. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If life is predictable, I have an unconscious plan for how to respond to\ncircumstances so that I and the people I care about can continue to be safe in\nthe world, and to ultimately remain alive. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once I can\u2019t predict what\u2019s going to happen next, some part of me must\nremain on alert so I can respond to uncertain circumstances in ways that will\nlead me (and my loved ones) back to safety and remaining alive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m not saying we all walk around consciously aware that uncertainty is\ndiscomforting because of our need to be guarded against threats to our safety\nand life. I know I\u2019m not! But by becoming aware that that\u2019s true we can begin\nto understand the deepest essence of why we\u2019re all so stressed out in the\nmiddle of massive uncertainty: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We feel better when we know our safety and our survival are\nsecure.<\/em><\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Another WHY at this point deepens the conversation:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

WHY is feeling that our lives are safe and secure supremely important to us? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That may appear to be so obvious that there\u2019s no point in asking it. But\nsometimes the most obvious things are never stated, so we remain unconscious of\nthem even if they\u2019re obvious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So I\u2019ll state the obvious:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. The deepest underlying reason we feel anxious and afraid in times of uncertainty is because we are unconsciously remaining vigilant to unpredictable circumstances so that we can survive and so we can protect the lives of those we care about, which leads to\u2026<\/li>
  2. The fundamental reason we care about survival is because life is valuable. <\/em><\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    That\u2019s right. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Uncertainty makes us afraid because we profoundly value life. <\/em><\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

    We realize at some bedrock level that it is an honor and a privilege to get to have an embodied life here on this planet. And we don\u2019t want to lose that life any sooner than we must. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Understanding that fear of uncertainty stems from valuing life can help you create a reassuring story that calms your nervous system<\/a> whenever you notice you\u2019re feeling anxious or stressed about the constant unpredictability we\u2019re all living with in the midst of this pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    You can say to yourself, \u201cI\u2019m feeling scared and out of sorts in the midst of this uncertainty because I care about my life and the lives of others. If life didn\u2019t matter, I wouldn\u2019t be scared. Yet life does<\/em> matter, so my brain is causing me to feel especially awake to a situation where I don\u2019t know what\u2019s going to happen next. Letting myself know that I deeply care about my life and the lives of others awakens me to my vulnerability, which paradoxically awakens me to an appreciation of this precious life I have.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Click here to read Part 3<\/a> of this series, where I\u2019ll help you understand how naming what you\u2019re feeling<\/em> and naming exactly what you\u2019re afraid of<\/em> can help you to feel better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    I hope this vision of how fear of uncertainty translates into an appreciation of life will help you find a bit of reassurance in the midst of these difficult times\u2026<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    To listen to an audio reading of this post, click here or go to bit.ly\/SoulsPart2Audio If I cease searching, then, woe is me, I am lost. That is how I look at it\u2014 keep going, keep going come what may. \u2015 Vincent van Gogh At the end of a loooong workday last week, I felt agitated and stressed. My son was heading out for a walk, so I went with him to decompress. Stretching my legs, breathing hard, taking in the outdoors and the (socially distant) fellow walkers, agitation gave way to exhaustion. Though it was relieving to move my body, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1038,"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":[57,62,70,25,71,72],"class_list":["post-1032","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-emotion-regulation","tag-emotional-expression","tag-existential-emotions","tag-grief","tag-polyvagal-theory","tag-uncertainty"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032","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=1032"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1105,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032\/revisions\/1105"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1038"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}