What Gives Me Hope?
I am struggling with a lot of fear and anxiety these days,
and I observe how these deplete my energy and distract me from my faith and my
ability to take positive action. I get
caught up in “what ifs?” and there are no assurances that they won’t happen.
What if I don’t have insurance, get sick,
unable to work and homeless, and die? What if my country is taken over by
billionaires and destroyed? What if the end of the ACA means many people with
preexisting conditions die? What if the environment is destroyed by fracking,
drilling, pollution, global warming, and “natural disasters”? What if more
species become extinct because there is no longer any protection for them or
for their habitat? What if freedoms of speech, assembly, the press are
curtailed? What if abortion is once again criminalized? What if marriage
equality is overturned?
I’m
experiencing, not quite flashbacks, maybe “flashbits,”to times when my physical
body, my wants and “won’ts” were regularly violated, my needs neglected,
without anyone to turn to for assistance. I felt helpless, alone, and
overwhelmed. I developed coping strategies (dissociation, escapist reading,
numbing with food, etc.). And I SURVIVED. I’ve spent many years seeking healing
from abuse, and as I healed, I often heard negative “voices” challenging my
right to health, happiness, joy, connection. These were angry, abusive voices,
and I’m hearing echoes every day that are frighteningly familiar. Only this
time, it is my country, my neighbors, God’s creation, our freedom and many
other rights, that are being violated. Daily we are seeing freedoms threatened,
lies promulgated as truth (“alternative facts”), distortions of “law and order”
in the service of control, most of the progress of the past 50+ years (most of
my lifetime) being reversed or under threat of being overturned. And the
temptation is to seek comfort in ways that got me through abuse and through the
challenges of healing. But those coping strategies are no longer appropriate or
effective. So what do I do?
When I focus
on what-ifs, I can become mired in despair and apathy—I have learned that when
that happens, I need to turn my attention away from believing that I KNOW what
will happen. I need to keep returning to this moment, this is where I find my
strength. As a person of faith, I turn to God with my prayers for courage and
strength. And lately, I’m hearing “VOICES” every day that remind me that there
is power in our commitments to our values, our freedom. Here are a few:
·
The Women’s Marches
·
Marv Knox https://www.baptiststandard.com/opinion/editorial/19893-editorial-practicing-faith-in-the-age-of-trump
·
Pantsuit Nation
·
Rebecca
Solnit, "Hope is an ax you break down doors with in an emergency; because
hope should shove you out the door, because it will take everything you have to
steer the future away from endless war, from the annihilation of the earth's
treasures and the grinding down of the poor and marginalized. Hope just means
another world might be possible, not promised, not guaranteed. Hope calls for
action; action is impossible without hope." (Hope in the Dark: Untold
Stories and Wild Possibilities)
I’m not physically able to march at this point in my life,
but I can write and I can listen and I can share what gives me hope. What gives you hope?
