I’ve been doing a lot of personal, emotional work during the pandemic. Not because I’m so brave and ambitious necessarily. It just seems that my growth requires a good look in the mirror these days. One of the things that came up for me in CPE was an understanding that I don’t have a deep relationship with certain emotions, namely fear. Because I downplay my own fears, I also tend to downplay the fears of others. That’s not such a great habit for an aspiring hospital chaplain. Turns out, fear is a really important human emotion. Apparently, I’m quite repressed. Perhaps this is what emotional people do who don’t become addicts? If we can’t escape our emotions through drug or drink, we just block them off? I’m not sure. But it seems to have been my unconscious path. Honestly, I’ve got my hands full with the feelings I’m aware of so it’s taken me almost 40 years on this Earth to go searching for more.
I’ve been spending a lot of conscious (journaling) and unconscious (dreaming) time exploring that which I fear. As a younger person, I was so determined to not let fear dominate my life that I often made choices that made address fear head on. I specifically did things if they scared me. Looking back, that was an admirable way for a young person to navigate risk, but now that I’m older, there are many things that make me afraid that I cannot simply face head on. Things about my children’s safety or about the world at large - these are not individual choices. My world has gotten more complex with age.
I might have picked up the idea that “fear not” in the Bible meant that being afraid was not a Christian feeling to feel.
I thought tonight, America’s Election Night, might be a good time to publicly state that Christians are people and it is human to feel fear. It doesn’t make me less faithful or less holy to feel fear. It also doesn’t mean that I need to play hot potato with my fear to make it go away. In order to address my fear, I must explore it in my heart and in my body. I’ve tended to address fear with my mind. I manage my feelings with logic instead of holding them and addressing them with my heart. My ability to sit with my fear and just feel it is only just beginning. It certainly a deeper form of self-love than I’ve had in the past. It’s a way of integrating all parts of myself and to nurture all my feelings, not just the ones I prefer.
Allowing myself to explore the fullness of my feelings is helping me learn about myself. My fear reflects what matters to me most. And that is why I feel afraid today. I care about marginalized people in my community, in my country. This election feels like a lot is on the line for people of color, for the gay and trans community, for women. I know it’s not just a feeling. It’s a reality to many of us. And so, because I care, I feel fear.
To be honest, I don’t really need to hear that I don’t need to be afraid or that God is in control or that everything will be okay. I’m not sure that any of that is true. What I am sure of is that I want to live in a world where the most vulnerable among us are given the dignity they deserve. That means the right to breathe for black people, the right to medical care for the trans community, and the right to make reproductive decisions for women - those very basic things are deserved in a land of the “free.”
So today, while holding my fear, having cast my ballot weeks ago (thank you mail-in ballots in WA state from forever), I will make bread and chili and muffins because cooking connects me to my body and to my family. I will comfort my child who had a meltdown and answer questions about homelessness for a school project. I will support my husband as he navigates how this election will influence his work with the impoverished. I will surround myself with music and films that inspire and encourage me. I will message those I love. And I will wait and see what comes to fruition in this very frightening time.