Powerless*

There is sorrow here as I write this. It’s beautiful outside -  bright sunshine, birds flirting, new growth emerging and I feel like I’m wrapped in a heavy dark blanket. I feel powerless. It’s a toxic and intoxicating feeling. I feel as if I have no control over now or the future. I feel oppressed by the requirements of the Stay Home order and at the same time furious about the actions of other people. I want so badly to make others understand. I want to scream “You're putting others at risk!” ”You’re the reason the Stay Home order will have to be extended!” But I know shaming, blaming and policing others doesn't work. Also it's dangerous to start othering people. I try to anchor in the fact that I can only control my actions but they seem so small, so insignificant, so unimpactful.

So I’m sitting here giving myself permission to feel sad. Sad that it will be months before I can hug someone again. Sad that those I love are at risk and I’m powerless to protect them. Sad that friends and colleagues are struggling so much with the new patterns of life. Sad that essential workers don't receive essential benefits or pay. I’m giving space to this feeling because shaming, blaming or policing my feelings doesn't work.

While sitting with these feels I listened to a podcast by Christa Pratt and while talking about ever day leadership she share an idea that made my jaw drop, literally.

If our small everyday actions spread this pandemic then our small everyday actions can spread power and change.

 It seems kinda like a duh realization on the surface. Of course our actions made the pandemic possible but then I peeled back some layers and there was more truth to that idea then I had realized.

Small actions like we’ve all been conditioned to make, I’m not really that sick, I can work. I’ll just order it online. Does it matter who I vote for as State Treasurer?  All my micro and macro decisions since, well forever, have informed and influence the current situation in the world. My everyday choices have contributed to the cascading culmination of this pandemic.

So with that logic, can my decisions stop this pandemic?

I do believe the answer is yes but as much as I want my decision today to make drastic changes to tomorrow it will take time. So yes hugging the people I love will still have to wait until a vaccine is available but I can make a decision today that will have the same influence on the future. I don't want to reestablish the inequitable norms of before, I want change. I want to support my communities physical and economic health. I want to address the systems that brought is here. I want take personal responsibility for my future.

The task is huge. This belief has the potential to feel as oppressive as the pandemic. But I don't have to make one giant decisions, its the every day decisions that build to change. And yes I recognize that there is still so much that is uncertain but times of uncertainty are also times of possibility.

I don't have to make the perfect decision but I just have to try to make the next right decision.

My next right decision is to learn how to use click list. I've been going to the grocery store every couple of weeks since the lock down began in Washington. My next right decision is knowing that the sense of control walking through the grocery store and picking out my food gives me isn't worth adding my body to the grocery aisles making it so social distancing isn't possible for the essential staff working there. I don't know the next right decision after that but I will use my decisions to makes my community, local and global, a safer place, a place with functioning support systems, a place full of possibility.

I don't get to claim the idea of the next right decisions, its another wisdom that was imparted to me via a podcast, Invisibilia, and they ended their show by asking people to share their next right decision. If you feel comfortable doing so comment with your next right decision.

With Love,

Erin

*Original Post Date -April 14th 2020