Reading · Light Up The Chaos

A look across a large modern hippie-dippy type grocery store and its aisles and check-out lanes; with a giant artistic word that looks like “sustainable” on the far wall. This location looks not unlike one of the places I went to to defunkify; although the one in the photo is way huger. Photo by Brittani Burns on Unsplash.

NOTE… This post was written on Thursday, September 4. I couldn’t get it quite finished that day but it’s from that day’s perspective.

I got myself into a bit of a funk, so I thought I’d write about it and how I’ve gone about de-funkifying; at least for one day.

I know damn well I’m not the only one a funk these days, although of course we’ve all got details that vary. But the funk is absolutely definitely out there, and it’s not the fun kind…

Just to underline the point, I’ll tell you that I’m typing this with one finger wrapped in gauze so it’s a bit less efficient than my normal writing… because I burned my thumb last night while I was trying to multitask on low sleep. In positive news, I didn’t have to go to the emergency room. Yay! In lessons-still-apparently-not-learned, I was reminded that it’s not always safe to multitask when you’re operating on reduced sleep.

The last 24-48 hours are not the whole reason for the funk I got into, but they seem to be the thing that’s caused some kind of intensification; the crossing of some kind of tipping point.

It could be because I’ve become a bit zombified due to diminished sleep and not enough food. But it’s more than that.

It’s not just that I’ve had to talk to law enforcement more than once this week and also last month because of something happening in my community. It’s not just that I’m having to do some aggressive risk management related to all that for the next few weeks until a situation changes. It’s not just that that pushes me into some kind of fierce survival mode.

It’s all the things.

There are soooooooo many things that are making things feel funky.

It’s that I’ve been trying to grow this nonprofit work, now called Fierce Community, for so long now that I think people don’t actually believe it will become anything; even as we pivot to be ready for this new moment. That doesn’t mean people actually think that. It’s just one of my thoughts when I get into a funk.

It’s that I announced 37 Zooms on a weekly schedule into next year for that nonprofit… with spectacularly terrible timing right before the long Labor Day weekend so the response has been low. It’s also that I haven’t had the bandwidth since the announcement to drum up more interest, feedback, or sign-ups because I haven’t had much sleep. It could be that maybe I’m trying to do too many things with my life. < insert shrug emoji >

See the excellent zoom schedule

It’s that money has been tight for years as I’ve tried to grow this work.

It’s that since May, we’ve made decisions about a pivot for the nonprofit but the pivot to this new thing isn’t finished. The branding switch hasn’t happened on a bunch of our places where we are online; we don’t have a new logo; and there’s a bunch of pre-this-year content that needs to get reviewed and updated now that the nonprofit is switching its focus more toward Fierce Community and less on the things Shift the Country (the original name) was trying to do in The World Before.

It’s that I’ve been working on ways to increase my own personal resilience in this time of disruption but that that is complicated all on its own and takes a ton of time and focus.

It’s that I’ve helped two people I love move this summer and some of that was really hard for the people involved. Moving sucks. But sometimes it’s harder than others.

It’s that one of the people I love has gotten new news of new cancer this summer, and I feel like I haven’t been able to breathe since I learned about this.

I know the c-word (cancer) is a thing that almost everyone alive still on this planet has a run-in with in one form or another… with friends or with family or with themselves. But good lord in heaven (or whoever we can swear to) it is like a full body slam into a solid wall whenever the cancer thing happens in your life.

The last person I was close to who got an epic cancer diagnosis got a hospice recommendation along with it. Navigating that was breathtaking just on its own; plus I lost about half of my close relatives after it was all said and done. Not that that same thing would happen here; it’s not even a remotely similar situation. But the c-word evokes intense s***. It just does.

In the current situation with my “loved one” as one of my grandmas called her people, it’s also a super, super rare type of c-word. Yay! Everyone loves having a super rare disease! It adds depth, breadth, and intrigue to the fun of navigating a medical crisis in a country where science, medicine, and government entities that might have been able to help are under active assault, active unfunding, political targeting, lawsuits, and various other types of dismantlement and destabilization. What a great time to have any disease.

One of my favourite people has a habit of giving disclaimers before saying significant things, or things that might be controversial, or things that may or may not be completely accurate, and so on.

With that, I’ll note that I’m under no delusions that what I’m doing today to de-funkify is going to work for longer than today.

But that’s okay.

In fact, some of my “loved ones” who are recovering alcoholics often talk about how it helps to do things “one day at a time.”

Okay. So today here’s what I’ve done to get out of the funk. At least for today.

First, I realized I was not in a good place. I was starting to melt down a bit; at least partly from being overly tired.

The funk was not due to waking up in a single fluid action of moving my cat from nearly puking on my head to instead puking on furniture with a hard surface, but that sort of added funk-emphasis.

But I knew I was on the edge of some kind of emotional meltdown. Recognizing that pushed me to try to change it. At least for a while.

So.

I wasn’t sure what would break up the funk, but I knew I needed to shake things up to get started. Which involved realizing that what I’d been doing the last few days had not been working.

So I made a plan to go to a favourite happy place. To write. To work on projects.

This was a viable plan today because I happened to have enough resources and capability to both get to this favourite place, and to actually order something while I was there.

Also to be fair, working from a restaurant or similar isn’t super unusual. The difference today is that there is a particular restaurant that I love love love, and as a side-benefit it’s also a great place to work on stuff for a few hours.

So I threw out whatever plan I had had for the day and dug into this new plan. Which involved leaving my place with some kind of increased organization and wherewithal. After about an hour and a half, I had reordered enough things at home that I was already starting to feel slightly better, and definitely better positioned to get through the next few days. Sometimes you have to go back to basics. Laundry, food, picking up, checking on money, taking care of things that just need a little extra attention.

Then I headed out.

My work is remote and can happen anywhere where I can bring a laptop and get cell service. So I spent the afternoon in a favourite place, and finally got some food. I did some work. I read some news. I did some thinking about the things that were getting to me.

I drove around a bit in a larger city than where I normally live; observing how society continues to function even when so much news is breathtakingly awful, fearful, disheartening, confusing, and shocking.

I found myself near an airport and realized that if I had money and active passport, I could just vamoose myself right out of here and just be somewhere else and maybe not come back. Which a lot of people are doing, and for good reason. I forget how easy it is (at least for now), if you have means. And for those who can go and especially for those who have good reasons to get the heck out: more power to you. Godspeed, and all that. Humans need to do what we can for ourselves and our people.

But right there so close to the airport, I realized a thing that maybe helped me turn the funk around: I couldn’t go, and I couldn’t stay away. Even if I had the means to just jet out of here and stay gone… it’s not how I’m wired.

I’m here for the community, for the people I know and for those I don’t, and for the changes and the future we will build here from in the middle of instability, disruption, and transformation. I’m here for the long haul, for the through-finding, and for the journey we’re fixing to take — together.

Realizing that was sort of breathtaking and also very matter-of fact, at the same time.

It just is.

It’s also empowering. It’s not technically a choice since I can’t afford to leave, anyway.

But it also is a choice. Because I would choose to stay.

I’m in community here where I am, with people I love and a community in which I have very deep roots even if they are somewhat obscure and non-obvious. Roots are roots. Grounding is grounding.

And I found that my non-decision-decision to stay here through all of this was more grounding than any escape flight would be for me. This is the place.

So. Through, we go.

I ended my shaking-things-up day out and about at another favourite place — a hippie-dippy-now-probably-yuppy grocery store with a cafe kind of like in the main picture for this post. I got more food, which I needed.

Spicy ramen, at a grocery store cafe in Des Moines, Iowa. Photo by Vanessa Burnett.

I’d gone too long without eating… and if you’re not going to sleep, you at least need to eat. Not doing one or the other absolutely contributes to things going funky in your mind and in your emotions. Not doing both the sleeping and the eating makes everything harder and more emotional.

I wrote this post. I realized I needed to say some of these things out loud. I realized I need to share where I’m at, with those of you here who are taking the time to read this and hopefully add your thoughts as well.

In the end, what helped me on this one day was to break up my normal way of doing things, my normal spaces, my normal operating realm. It helped to get away from some of the things that were causing overwhelm and stress. It helped to make a physical change and to do something different. I came away with some different thinking. It also helped me shift my perspective. A bit.

I spent time in places where I was comfortable and safe. There’s a lot to be said for that. It’s not an option everyone has in every moment, but we can identify spaces where we can feel grounded and comfortable. We can find spaces that are even energizing, or healing, or which just help us appreciate the planet we’re on and the people we’re around. Humans and earth can be pretty amazing. We’re up to some cool stuff, even if we’re also in lots of disruption and big change.

It was one day. It was a way through, and it got me more grounded.

As we go through rising instability and increasing societal disruption, we’re going to have to find little things every day to help us get through. What those are will obviously be different for each of us.

The big picture risk landscape, deep health issues, mental health challenges, and all kinds of things may well persist… but we’re still going to need to get through each day. Maybe we need to help each other through. Maybe we just need to get through it ourselves. So I share this one single day experience because maybe it helps one person.

Anyway. Be well and be safe out there. Join one of our Fierce Community zooms if you’re looking for connection and community.

Onward and forward.

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A DeFunkifying Story, For At Least One Day

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