Stepping Through Fear
Image by Norbert Buduczki
I am in a state of agitation.
There. I’ve said it. In front of you. On the internet.
It feels good to finally claim it; to have a name for it. Most of my life I haven’t actually known what I was feeling. I had a steadfast solution for it though: Stuff It Back Down. It was a deeply uncomfortable feeling for myself and others around me. It was easier to stuff it down or at least I thought it was. I’m guessing you can imagine how that went. Leaky. I had a friend tell me once I was like a teapot left on the boil for too long. So, I’m like an immense amount of pressure building up with water spewing out of every crevice and hole. Awesome.
It was a pretty apt image for how I felt though. I wanted so badly to control it. I didn’t know what to do about it, except feel ashamed. And express blame, sometimes myself but mostly others. I have been really good at projecting on others - all of my pressure and unprocessed pain. Most of us have done that at one point in our life…or several. :) It’s good to be honest where we can. Most of us haven’t really been taught or role-modeled how to accept our vulnerability and take responsibility for our mental and emotional states nor have we been guided passionately and intuitively toward our greatest gifts and power. No wonder our lives are pressurized and drama-filled. We are so confused about who we are. Many of us are living our lives so far from authenticity trying to stuff ourselves into a version of the story that was sold to us. It’s agitating!
I try to offer myself grace and compassion, and move away from shame and guilt when I can. These kinds of feelings take a ton of energy and only serve to keep me feeling so small. But it is tough. Agitation is a seriously challenging state of being when you don’t know what’s happening to you, and even when you do, it’s a tremendous amount of energy that keeps building and will not leave you alone until you do something about it. In my case, that something is usually provoking. And for most of my life, I have been absolutely terrified of it, so I thought I had no other option but to ignore it. So I’d ignore it and keep ignoring it until it would inevitably erupt and spew indiscriminately all over everything and everybody. See? Like a teapot. Then after the agitation had somewhat relieved itself of its heavy burden, it was manageable enough to stuff back down again. And on and on it went.
Until now. I have finally found a path toward accepting, owning, and working with the energy instead of against it. I have been slowly expanding my awareness of when agitation sets in, and locating its related sensations in my body. For example, right now, I know I am agitated because I can feel a rigidity in my abdomen, a tightening in my chest, and a subtle closing down of my heart. I can feel the energy moving into my throat with a grabbing sensation, like I have a lump in my throat, and my jaw is tightened down. It is so helpful to witness agitation in this way. By listening to my body, I have discovered that when I feel agitated I feel like my heart is moving into my throat. And though I don’t really get excited about leaning into the discomfort, when I consider that it could be my heart in my throat, I feel pretty motivated to sit with the discomfort and take a deeper look. And as I did I finally saw that fear was lurking in the shadows.
Why is my heart stuck in my throat? What is happening for me? I kept connecting with the fear through contemplation, and started seeing a rhythm to its reason. It was showing up most often when I wanted to express myself but was afraid to. I was afraid to share my voice and vulnerability, afraid of what others would think of me, afraid I was too much or not enough. In essence, I was afraid to be me.
It was a raw and powerful realization, and it was honest. All these years, instead of honoring agitation for what it was trying to tell me, I had been actively dishonoring it by stuffing it down. Where it could have been my opportunity to transform into my most authentic self, instead I prevented my heart from flowing out through my voice into the world. So my heart was actually stuck in my throat!
I had stepped into and through my fear instead of resisting it, and the information on the other side was stunning. While it was challenging to digest, I was finally taking responsibility, and it was liberating.
Now whenever I sense Agitation in my body, I no longer run away from the fear but lean into its wisdom. Am I sacrificing my authenticity in order to be accepted? Am I feeling out of control and unsafe because of someone else’s judgements and opinions? Am I paying more attention to others' needs than my own? Am I stopping myself because I feel inadequate? By stepping through the portal of my fears, my shadow of Agitation has become a warning signal and an invitation for me to open to the fullest expression of myself.
I’m wondering if this resonates with you. I have worked with many different people over the years and no matter where we start, we kind of always end up somewhere in the vicinity of here. Fear stopping you from putting yourself out there, asking for what you want, or dreaming big because you feel small, inadequate, unloveable, unworthy, a fraud, and/or (insert whatever fear resonates with you most). Regardless of what words you choose to name your shadow, they are the pattern of cyclical harm rooted in fear keeping you stuck. What I didn’t know then, but have since learned through studying the Gene Keys is that within your Shadows lie your unique Gifts, and a Shadow most often shows up when you lose touch with your true self (where your light is being blocked). In my case, within Agitation, lies the gift of Initiative. While Agitation is intense, it shows me where I am afraid to take the Initiative to manifest my power, my dreams, my potentiality, and change. Initiative becomes possible when I accept and embrace Agitation.
But How?
For me, the way I have learned how to embrace my agitation is through balancing the masculine with the feminine. I have gotten cozy with Agitation’s opposite - Gentleness. Until I started a relationship with gentleness, I had experienced a lot of harshness: from my parents, teachers, friends, and from myself. It was so easy to think there must be something wrong with me and blame myself which only bore more pain and harshness. Gentleness is such an ease-filled, compassionate path that offers permission to wander, pause, savor, feel, and surrender to the flow. It has even helped me surrender to others which is something that because of my upbringing, I never thought I could do. Gentleness has helped channel my Agitation into creativity by giving me permission to be utterly unique and follow my soul’s desire despite what others around me are thinking and doing. Instead of judging myself harshly, gentleness has enabled me to see through kind eyes. Gentleness has helped me break my many patterns of self-harm, and has given me a path through with such feminine, loving energy.
Initiative is my gift and my soul’s work, but in order to access all of me, I had to learn how to embrace its shadow of Agitation. For you, it could be dullness, compromise, judgment, dissatisfaction, control, chaos, stress, oppression, etc. It's all uncomfortable and it’s all fear preventing you from being vulnerable, sharing your zone of genius, becoming your gifts, opening more fully to love, and experiencing your flow with life.
So if you are feeling inspired by this journey, give it a try:
Name your Shadow. Allow it in. Start noticing how often you are fighting or distracting yourself from it.
Go within your Body. Listen to what it feels. Locate the sensations. Make meaning from those sensations (i.e. it felt like my heart was in my throat). Remember to breathe, and bring light and joy to your imagination.
Accept Yourself and your Fear. You do not have to run from it, but can contemplate it with grace and compassion. Be soft in your approach, like with a frightened child or wounded animal. It will eventually open itself to you, and you will see your incredible resilience.
I know it’s vulnerable! And I know you can do it. Slow it down. Take your time with it. Study it without judgment. And YES! It can be incredibly challenging to pause and lean further into the discomfort. As I shared earlier, my shadow of Agitation is so uncomfortable. But not sitting in the discomfort is what was keeping me from moving through the fear to the other side, the chance to initiate my authentic self - my soul-filled self.
Maybe it might help to look at it this way: By not sitting in discomfort, you end up making yourself even more uncomfortable anyway. As you have no doubt witnessed through my experience, these things have a way of making themselves known eventually, but are often far more manic and over the top dysregulated by the time you become aware. Instead, if you bring in a quality of softness with no expectations other than to sit and breathe on your own terms, then it makes it less trauma-inducing and more grounded. Pausing allows this to happen. Don't underestimate the power of that.
These days I am working to allow, accept, and embrace my fears. It’s definitely a process, but I have learned the invaluable lesson that fear has been trying to communicate with me all along. It’s been trying to tell me my secrets. My friends, the Shadows are meant to be mined.
“The more deeply you accept each feeling of fear that comes the lighter you grow and the more love you feel toward life.” –Richard Rudd
I’m sending you so much love. Please reach out if you are struggling to see your value or your gifts or are maybe feeling stuck in your shadowland journey. I would love to support you in finding the courage to engage your dragons (your shadows) and finally uncover your buried treasure (your gifts, love, and trust in life). As always you can learn more about who I am and what I do as well as connect with me here. Until next time.
