Society, social media, friends, and family provide us with so many messages starting from a young age. Some of these messages are meant to be harmful, while others are intended to be helpful, or possibly life-changing, but even the messages intended to provide uplift can serve as a hindrance.
As we repeat these narratives over and over, they become ingrained, and it can become more difficult to distinguish what is our own worldview, what is from an external source that we want to incorporate into our perception of our surroundings, and what doesn't serve us.
Alicia Sanchez of Dear God, Are We There Yet?, a community service organization, described life as a roadtrip in her recent interview on the Soul Sugar Podcast. If this is true, I imagine that I'm driving a blue retro RV, traversing the contiguous United States with a road atlas, instead of mobile maps (ironic, I know).
When it comes to being encouraged to trust our intuition, it can feel natural to push back and say, "But I have so much to learn" or "What if somebody else actually knows better?" or to point to our recent missteps as an indicator that we aren't in tune with what our gut is telling us. The beauty of the roadtrip metaphor, though, is that we are each the driver of our own vehicle. From day one. The universe, God, or whatever greater power you believe in trusted you with the keys from the very beginning. You are enough, right here and right now, and that isn't in conflict with the fact that you still have road to travel, that you might have gotten a flat tire a few days (or minutes) ago, or that you might get into an accident in the future. Not only do you have the keys, but nobody else has your atlas. You are the only one who knows your own journey.
In order to make driving my own road a bit easier and quieter, I took the past month off from Instagram to think about what I want my road atlas to look like, or how I want to live my life, and realized it was not in perfect harmony with the way I was living. Through this, I was able to find clarity in a few major areas.
The first point of clarity is that uncertainty is okay. I came across this theme a number of times, in this episode with Brene Brown on the 10% Happier Podcast, on Sahara Rose's podcast, and on this episode of Dax Shepard's podcast with Elizabeth Gilbert.
Social media can be a tool for connection, but it can also tap into our most basic, oldest fears:
Am I popular?
Am I the only one not invited?
Is my tribe still on my side?
The brain, opting for activating maximum protection against later harm, will prefer to craft the story that everyone is in fact hanging out without you than the more uncertain, incomplete tale that perhaps it was an impromptu get-together.
Even though it's immensely uncomfortable, uncertainty is okay. That doesn't mean the brain likes it, and that doesn't mean that I personally like it, but, especially right now during the shutdown, uncertainty is an inescapable part of our daily lives, perhaps one of our few certainties. Sorry for that one.
Coming back to the idea of the roadtrip, this uncertainty doesn't mean that your atlas has been thrown out the window, although it may feel that way. Instead, it's like the visibility of the road ahead is poor. We don't know how long this fog extends, but if we stay on the road, eventually we will get through this.
The second point of clarity is that life often looks very different than one would expect.
That statement on its own is relatively cliche, so allow me to add a bit of nuance with an example. During this shutdown, I have heard more than ever the importance of meditation. Then, I read a book that encouraged journaling three pages each morning right after you wake up.
These pieces of advice are meant to be helpful, they come from a place of good intention, and they may put somebody's life on the exact right track. But, if I were to write "morning pages," they would just be about how much I want my two mugs of dark roast coffee and bowl of yogurt, because I'm starving.
As for the meditation, my meditation doesn't---and doesn't have to--look like somebody else's. Before turning on my phone each morning, I have my coffee looking out at the surrounding trees from my window. That's what meditation looks like to me, and it would be draining to feel that if I don't meditate in a specific way then I haven't met yet another requirement to be considered "enough." We are each on our own unique journey, and the tools we use to keep going won't be identical.
If I were to recommend one thing and provide a, perhaps helpful or maybe incredibly unhelpful but well-intentioned, piece of advice, it would be to take a month off from social media.
When I turned down the endless noise, I found that I could finally hear what the universe was trying to tell me.