Do you feel angry, helpless, and afraid following the election results? Is your body in a state of fight or flight?
“What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or in the holy name of liberty or democracy?” – Mahatma Gandhi
While I know that over 60 million Americans have been celebrating all week, this post is for those of us who have been feeling grief, fear, and/or anger since the news of Donald Trump’s election. So much has been said already that I question adding my voice to the sea of others. And yet, for me at least, the written word was made for times like these. Writing allows me to touch deep inside to the parts that are huddled in fear and despondency, and forge a pathway of connection to others, known and unknown.
This past week, my heart has wept for the rift in our communities. For the hatred that has already been unleashed against people of color, GLTBQ, Jews, Muslims, people with disabilities, women and so on. For the defacing of our schools, public buildings and parks with swastikas and words of separation. For the planet and a potential speeding up of climate change. For those who voted for Donald Trump in the hopes that he could bring in more jobs, national security, lower taxes for the poor and middle class, and dismantle political corruption. This past year, research for a novel I’m writing has led me to read extensively about the Great Migration, the Jim Crow era, lynching and mob mentality, and the Great Depression. Watching the events unfolding, I feel like I’m witnessing history repeating itself, and fear we have taken a giant leap backwards.
I also feel hope. Having spent years doing humanitarian and human rights work in communities and countries ravaged by civil war, occupation, martial law, and dictatorship, I know the depth of human resiliency – the will to survive that burns brighter in the face of adversity. The solidarity and courage that arise when one’s very identity and livelihood feel threatened. The election has shaken many of us out of a false sense of complacency and shone a light on the vast differences in experiences and understanding in our populace. Although I know the cost will be high, I also believe that crises and change appear to teach us what we are needing to learn (individually and collectively). This time is an opportunity to look under the veneer of civility to the real pain, anger, disenfranchisement and divisions that have been exposed for all to see, and begin the difficult, arduous journey towards healing.
May the strength of our collective shadow be a beacon for each of us to reconnect to our light and our wholeness. May we learn to love those who disagree with us. May we transcend small-minded scarcity and otherizing to feel the interconnectedness of our pain, the worthiness of each of our dreams, the fallacy of placing our faith in any one leader. May we have greater understanding for each other, and greater compassion for those fleeing autocratic and repressive regimes.
Understanding our collective shadow
In previous blog posts, I have written about fear, our shadow, and self-sabotage. As Carl Jung defined it, our shadow side refers to all the parts of ourselves we have disowned or repressed – including lust, rage, greed, self-centeredness. Folks, welcome to our collective shadow (click here for Deepak Chopra’s analysis on Donald Trump as the country’s shadow). To understand what is happening on a national and global level (the US elections follows in the wake of a number of European countries electing conservative leaders in the past year, and a potential far right win in Austria), I find it helpful to explore how these phenomena show up on an individual level.
As children we all learned that certain parts of ourselves were acceptable, while we needed to hide others, causing us to feel an internal split between different parts of ourselves. There is the part of us striving to be good/accepted, the part of us that feels marginalized and left out, the parts we have developed to defend ourselves, and our inner critic/saboteur – who harangues and mocks the other parts. The split causes us to fragment from our essential truth of being whole and enough. It is also fueled by a belief in a separate self, and that to feel enough/right we need to win over anyone who disagrees with us.
Inner crises occur when the fragile homeostasis we developed as children is getting shaken up. The marginalized parts of us, and our wholeness, are wanting a voice and are shaking up the status quo, while the parts of us that learned it wasn’t safe to be too visible hunker down and try to sabotage us. This crisis may show up as depression, rage, addiction, self-destructive behavior, dissociation etc. In my experience, the only way to move through the crisis is to start understanding what each part wants for us, and to start having compassion for each one.
We are currently experiencing and witnessing these divisions on a national and global level. It is tempting to demonize the shadow, since its ramifications are potentially so nefarious for many of us and particularly the disenfranchised parts of our society. But resisting the shadow only reinforces it (since it is the energy of opposition that created it in the first place).
For many of us, the election results have triggered feelings of shock and put our bodies in survival mode. When we go into a state of flight or flight, our prefrontal cortex (or cognitive brain) goes offline, making it easy to spin out into fear or anxiety. The following are tips for beginning the individual healing process so we can better access what needs to be done from a grounded place.
#1 Feel your feelings
While this may sound trite in light of the magnitude of what we are facing, I invite you to feel into what is coming up for you – the outrage, helplessness, grief, anxiety, shock and so on. See if you can stay with those feelings, and give yourself empathy. These are difficult times, and many of us want to jump over our discomfort straight into action. While action is important, allowing for what is there is an important first step. The feelings that are there may be overwhelming, however, so this is also a time to seek out community and bolster your support networks (see below).
#2 Heal old wounds
For many of us, the feelings that are coming up around the elections have triggered old wounds and/or traumas which left us with feelings of helplessness, rage, grief, terror betrayal, abandonment and so on. For example, we might be reliving feelings of terror at being left with caretakers who were dangerous or untrustworthy, or memories of being bullied for being different. Now is a time to reach out for help (be it from your community, spiritual practice, a mental health professional and so on) and continue to heal the beliefs and coping strategies we developed to survive.
# 3 Find your grounding
When we are in a state of shock, many of us (especially if we have a trauma history) leave our bodies, and search for solace in external factors, such as our thoughts, information, other people, food, etc. Since the elections, I’ve noticed myself having a harder time being present than usual. Part of me is impatient to get it over with so I can get on with “more important business.” Namely news binging, since being informed gives me some semblance of control. My distractibility is a clear indicator that I need the meditation more than ever, so much to my mind’s dismay I’ve increased my practice time and have slowly dropped back into myself.
I invite you to find ways to stay in your body, and to be very gentle with yourself. Breathe. Exercise. Take walks. Slow down, even when the sense of urgency tugs at you. Take breaks from the news and social media. Get massages. Take hot baths. While these may seem like luxuries, we are in this for the long haul, and the only way to access connection to ourselves and others is if we are in our bodies.
#4 Practice gratitude and generosity
It is easy to fall into a spiral of fear, grief and anger, and forget everything else. Now that you have felt into and begun to heal the feelings that are there, I invite you to remember all the things that you are grateful for in your life. Also send gratitude to yourself for doing whatever you need to be doing right now.
The current climate has unleashed insider-outsider tribalism and territoriality. Shutting down and wanting to defend is a normal response to current events, and in cases where we or someone else is being attacked, stepping in/defending is required. When we are not under direct threat, however, can we expand into more mindfulness, more compassion, more generosity for each other – while still speaking out for justice and equality?
#5 Send compassion to your shadow
Ho’oponono is a Hawaiian practice of forgiveness and reconciliation that recognizes that whatever is happening externally is a reflection of our own beliefs and reality. I believe that a first step to healing the collective shadow is to recognize the parts of ourselves that are being mirrored, or that we have separated from. While self-righteousness and “us versus them language” may feel warranted, it only serves to further entrench us in misunderstanding and mistrust.
I invite you to feel into the parts of you that are selfish, angry, judgmental, holier than thou, greedy, defended. And as you feel into each one, you can say the following words “I’m sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you. I love you.”
© Jenny Brav
