Leaning Into Trust
Nature inherently trusts. I spent all of July exploring human connection and awe inspiring nature in Indonesia, and the theme of trust kept coming to the fore. Nature trusts the flow of energy; sunlight, water, death, life. As one plant grows over another to get more sunlight there is no fear.
Feelings can get stuck when we’ve had experiences that told us it wasn’t ok to express ourselves authentically, to flow. Fear then builds; the fear of returning to that place where it was just too much for our nervous system. That intense heat rising up in the body. That shame, upset, or overwhelm, when we experience something in or about us as wrong, seems simply unbearable without the capacity or tools for regulation.
The fear tries to keep us away from that place, that perceived danger. It is adaptive and we need not demonise it. The system only has a certain data set of experiences to pull from; anything unknown feels dangerous.
I visualise trust coming in like a giant hug from the earth, calmly holding the fear based on past experiences. Not adding any drama to it. Bringing the fear with you, softly let it know “it’s ok, we’re going to experience something new now”. I trust it will be ok when I am my authentic self. I trust I can feel what comes up when I do this, I won’t die. I trust I don’t need to behave inauthentically to temporarily relieve any discomfort. For all my recovering people pleasers out there (me included) this is a big one.
Here you build nervous system capacity. The capacity, for example, to feel the discomfort in disappointment from another in a close relationship. As you step into that discomfort, the gentle loving energy of trust carries you like a boat over the waves of emotional energy moving through your body.
In developing psychological awareness of past patterns we can hold onto the fear of “making the same mistakes”. I’m by no means a poet, but this phrase I wrote reminds me to trust. Trust that as long as I allow myself to feel, and process my feelings, I need not fear the past.
The problem wasn’t that I trusted, it was that
I didn’t trust myself first.
Not that I loved,
but that I didn’t love myself first.
Not that I gave,
but that I didn’t give to myself first.
Not that I felt for others,
but that I didn't feel myself first.
