Just before lockdown I had a letter from a dear friend who has been living with crushing fears. She felt that these fears were preventing her from being a good friend or living a good life. After writing back, and wondering if I’d said anything of use, I was on a train (even writing that seems weird at the moment) journalling about fear. We all fall prey to it, after all. I got to London and onto the underground and there was a poster with one of the Poems on the Underground: ‘What I Fear’. It was a sad list-poem with fears that ranged from pain to shame to failure and then started again.
The slipperiness of fear
Photo by Evgeni Tcherkasski on Unsplash
Living in fear can be paralysing. Fear is so amorphous. The volcano might never erupt. The storm might not blow our house down. The medical test might say all is well this time. We might get to that day that’s been preying on our mind so much that we’ve lost weeks of sleep anticipating it, only to find we learn more from it than we thought possible. So often our fears turn out to be groundless or exaggerated.
Sometimes, though, the worst happens, but even when it does, fearful anticipation is more likely to have added stress, than helped us through the awfulness. Some things in life are horrific or tragic. Losing a loved one. Facing our own mortality. The end of an important relationship. Losing the job or home or business we’ve loved and poured heart and soul into. Bad things happen. Life doesn’t come with a promise of security. Change and impermanence are everywhere. But terror never assists the process of working through loss.
And yet, we have a fear reflex for a reason. Fear stops us putting our hand into a burning fire. Fear developed to give us a fight or flight response that can be life-saving. And if it’s unlikely there’s a tiger waiting round the corner to devour us, it’s still useful to have the kind of antenae that keep us alert in unfamiliar situations.
The usefulness of fear
Photo by Nikolas Noonan on Unsplash
Living in a state of high alert all the time is draining and puts a lot of stress on us emotionally and physically. It’s not that we should never be afraid, but that we seem to be good at letting our imaginations run wild with fear.
Perhaps humanity has always been good at projecting and expanding on fear. Or perhaps it has to do with the times we live in. But fear isn’t always a bad thing. Apart from the fact that it can be a genuine alert to real danger, and a spur to action, it can also teach us a great deal about the ways in which we cling to or move out of our comfort zones.
It takes a great deal of courage to write. It makes us visible and vulnerable and can demand a lot of self-reflection.
It takes huge courage to make transformations in our lives. So often we want change but also resist it. We may feel life or the person we presently are are nothing like how we want, but at least it all feels familiar and that makes it safe. When we’re afraid to make radical changes or take new directions … the problem isn’t the fear, it’s how we respond to it. Fear can paralyse or it can be the fuel for bravery.
And as well as providing the momentum for courage, fear can be a way to empathise and work with others. We live in a world in which many fears are held in common. As writers, we have the skills to name the fears, names that bring clarity and reassurance. And we have skills to tell the stories of how we can respond to fear with hope and transformation.
Calling the names
Refugees by Jēkabs Kazaks, rovided by Latvian National Museum of Art. PD for Public Domain Mark
Writers often witness to and write about terrifying things.
Writers tell the stories of refugees who have lost home and land, risked everything to migrate, often losing loved ones along the way only to find themselves in new places, unwelcome and misunderstood.
Writers tell the stories of historical oppression on the basis of gender or race or class or religion or just for the sheer evil hell of it.
Writers tell the story of our planet, stripped of resources, polluted, undergoing a period of mass extinctions, becoming unliveable in more and more places.
Writers witness to and write about terrifying things, not because we are a bunch of misanthropes who want to share the misery, but because these stories matter to communities, to all life; because these stories are urgent.
Ecological writers and activists don’t want us to wallow and die, they want us to change. Writers of dystopias and utopias don’t want us to take to our beds while we wait for the world to end, they want us to realise that there is always an alternative, there is always the possibility of finding a new way.
We name the wrongs, past and present, to draw attention to the extraordinary resilience of people or places or other species or life itself. We give voice and witness and name in order to nurture hope.
The balance of hope
Carrying the Sick. Creator: Weisz-Kubínčan, Arnold Peter. Date: 1940/1944. Institution: Slovak National Gallery. Provider: Slovak National Gallery. Providing Country: Slovakia. PD for Public Domain Mark
In my last blog I talked about how writers need to keep returning, over and over, to hope. Václav Havel, the writer who went from being an imprisoned dissident to president, talked about how hope is not about what is or isn’t going to happen, but the conviction that we should do the right thing and try new things, no matter how things might turn out.
Hope is the flip side of fear and, in our writing, and it how we live, we can advocate for hope in place of fear. Hope is the attitude shift that allows us to live with questions, not always or even hardly ever knowing what comes next. Hope is the mindset of going on creating even when the world around is cynical or closed. After all, we largely don’t know the impact our writing has on others, or how any one of the those others might take what we have written and make some amazing change because of it; or just keep living with hope herself.
Hope is knowing that whatever our fears, there is a level of life, often found in the everyday joy of relationships and simple pleasures, that brings solace. When we focus on the things we can do for the good, however small those things might seem, we tip the balance towards hope. Wherever we nurture community and connection. Whenever we collaborate, love, show compassion, generosity of empathy, there is courage and there is hope.
What’s new story are you becoming?
Thank you for reading — new stories and transformation have never been so urgent and writing is a big part of that. I’d love you to join the conversation by signing up to my email list and you’ll also find free courses here. While you’re there, take a look at my book Writing Down Deep: an alchemy of the writing life, which will connect you to more transformative ideas to become a different story.
I loved this Jan. I don’t think writers set out to write to any particular theme. It’s just what they need to say. And their fears are a big part of that. And vulnerability. Thank you for this. Sandy
Thank you Sandy
Yes – we write the stories we need and our own fragilities are very much part of that and then the wonderful bit of that is that when we do honestly there are parts that connect with what others are exploring. xx
Hello Jan, and thank you so much for this. Thank you for transcending the torpor and paralysis so many of us are experiencing, for describing our shared condition with clarity and compassion, and for shining a light on what we might do, as writers, to put our contribution down on the side of hope and justice and humanity. I really needed to see this, and though it has in fact reduced me to tears, they are tears of relief and release, and come with a sense that I might begin now to shake off the exhaustion of hopelessness and get back to the work of witnessing and truth-telling. Stay well and safe, Jan. Very best wishes, Pat x
Huge thanks for this Pat — I think so many of us are feeling this and then feeling we are simply being self-indulgent and trying to chivvy ourselves out of it when it needs to begin with kindness (to ourselves included) and the realisation that we don’t have to be overcome, that hope isn’t pointless and the truth always worth speaking 🙂 Take good care and keep writing xx
It’s so good to know that other writers are experiencing the same torpor. Head like porridge is a good description. I say my head is like candy floss, swirls but no substance. Ideas spinning but lethargic and exhausted by a mind that seems to be constantly seeking something and can’t rest. The garden is a solace and hearing so much more birdsong a delight so the physical world, restricted though it is, seems to have more importance than the words in my head. Writing goes on but in fits and starts. Concentration variable and anxiety so near the surface all the time. Shopping lists taking priority over poetry and prose. But, as you say, we can hope that the world will become a better place and this pandemic and restrictions will help us to value the simple things in life and the people who are important to us and those we can help by keeping connected.
Thank you, Jan.
Thank you Jacqui
Oh the shopping lists! Yes writing way too many of those — or perhaps noticing them differently. The mind flitting really strikes a chord. I’m trying to learn Wendell Berry’s ‘art of minimums’ — we don’t need to do it all, we don’t have to solve the world — just ‘enough’ for each day. xx
Thank you Jan for continuing to spin & strengthen your web of connection, especially during these strange times. Every week, I feel comforted by knowing that I am one of many writers who read your blog. I am heartened that while we are all struggling with so many issues, personal & universal, we also hold the same values that keep us returning to read more of your words. It is very affirming that holding the same values when “we collaborate, love, show compassion, generosity of empathy, there is courage and there is hope.”, we are intending a world that is different from what the world seems to manifest at the moment.
If anyone is interested, I have found the mini series of three 20 minutes’ episodes by Eckhart Tolle really positive and like being reset. The breath in the present moment is our best unfolding reality.
Heart-felt thank you Jan for all your energy & wise words that give us the long view and a loving perspective on our creativity and on being human.
Big hug
Marina
Thank you so much Marina
I completely agree about knowing there are others out there — lots of others who care about authentic writing and about this strange, fragile, beautiful world.
And thank you for the Tolle link. I do think being able to value the moment makes a huge difference — perhaps now more than ever.
Take good care xxx
Thanks for this, and all your other blogs, Jan. This one reminded me of a poem ‘Atlantis’ by Eavan Boland where the following lines have stayed with me
‘where we come from, they gave their sorrow a name
and drowned it.’
As I wrote in my blog –
Maybe we should face up to our fear as well as our sorrow, give them both a name and drown them.
Many years ago I read a book ‘Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway’ by Susan Jeffers. Her philosophy was basically – Take responsibility for anything you are being, doing, having, or feeling and never blame anyone else. The only way to get rid of a fear of doing something is to go on out and do it. That’s OK if you’re afraid of doing something but what if your fear is not fear of doing something but fear of what other people or other things (like viruses?) might do?
Again and again I return to the saying by Reinhold Niebuhr
‘God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.’
I also find that Thich Nhat Hanh’s words of wisdom are very helpful and inspiring .
I could go on at length, but have already said enough!
One more thing though –
With the help of reading inspiring poetry and listening to other poets reading on Hugh Macmillan’s pestilence poems.blogspot.com (there are 83 contributions from poets not just in the UK)I’ve found lockdown has triggered more writing than I expected so I hope that others find that inspiration will come to them.
Thank you Anne
So good to hear that you are finding inspiration and writing.
There is huge solace in reading and finding others who have tread a path before you.
And thank you also for the link.
Keep well and keep in flow 🙂
xx
Such wise and comforting words as ever Jan, thank you. Interested to read that others are also finding it hard to be creative during this closed time, I feel like I’m not alone! Journalling is the thing keeping me going too, it’s an outpouring of thoughts and ideas that one day might come to something. Difficult to write anything else. Finding inspiration through reading too, not least the Cinnamon anthology ‘Meet me There’ which reminds me that there will be a time, not too far ahead, when the world will open up once more.
Warm wishes
Jo
Thank you Jo
We launched Meet Me There for our 10th anniversary and suddenly it’s the 15th anniversary. How times pass and change! I hope we will emerge to a world in which we don’t take our ability to meet and travel for granted — perhaps structure it differently…
And yes to the journalling!
Take good care
Jan xxx