Coping with the Not Knowing
Photo by Caspar Rae on Unsplash
“Patience is not the ability to wait, but the ability to keep a good attitude while waiting.”
~ Joyce Meyer
Last week my 97-year-old uncle passed away. He was a giant of a man, tall in stature and impactful in the ways he took care of his family, his church, his community, and his country. He was a man of good cheer, which made him great fun to be around. He will be celebrated and missed by all who knew him.
Hospice had been called in a short time before my uncle passed, so his family knew his death was imminent. They had sent out a family email to let the extended family know that his time was near and to ask for prayers.
I remembering being in a similar situation with each of my parents. It’s a surreal time, knowing what is to come but still trying to savor those last few hours together.
In pondering the experience of all the families in that waiting period, preparing for a loved one to cross over but not knowing exactly when, the phrase “in the liminal space” came to my mind. I had an idea of what it meant, but looked it up to be sure. A Google search revealed that it was originally an architectural term for a physical place of passage such as a hallway, stairwell, or waiting room. As a psychological term, it refers to a metaphorical threshold, “an ‘in-between state, time, or place of transition...representing the ambiguous period between ‘what was’ and ‘what's next,’ often evoking feelings of eeriness, nostalgia, or uncertainty...”
If you think about it, we spend much of our lives in liminal spaces:
Waiting to get into college
Waiting to hear about a job, which may necessitate a move
Waiting for a pregnancy test result
Waiting for a baby to be born
Waiting for the results of medical tests
Waiting to see if a treatment is going to work
During these times, most of us do our best to remain calm, stay positive, and call on our inner strength to get us through.
We turn to our spirituality and our faith: we hold out hope, we meditate, we pray.
Still, the anxiety that comes with the not knowing can be intense. Because it’s such an uncomfortable feeling, I’ve written about anxiety frequently on this site, and included the advice of various experts on how to get ourselves through it:
Retrain Your Brain to Manage Your Fears
The Benefits of Focused Breathing
Choosing a Different World View
Changing Our Relationship with Worry
This week, I came across a video that offered some new-to-me advice for reducing anxiety: something called slow walking. The video seems to be available only on Facebook and Instagram:
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1CFxm8toAE/
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DU5jxkrgAOp/
Since I’m familiar with walking as an oft-suggested remedy for anxiety, I nearly skipped the video. I’m glad I didn’t. Typically, we hear that brisk walking helps relieve anxiety by releasing the pent-up, nervous energy in our bodies. In his video, licensed professional counselor Nate Jones explains that, by contrast, slow walking sends a message to our brains to calm down. It works to ease our stress response and bring us back into the present moment.
Slow walking apparently acts as a reset no matter whether we are in fight, flight, or freeze mode.
As Mr. Jones is talking on the video, he does a very slow, almost meditative style of walking himself that helps set a relaxed tone for his message. I actually felt myself calm down as I was watching him.
Cliché as it may sound, it appears that one very good way for us to deal with days fraught with worry is to simply put one foot in front of the other.
No matter what method we choose to manage our anxiety, the most helpful thing we can assure ourselves of is that we will be able to handle whatever comes our way.
If you are currently in a liminal space, I wish you peace.
Affectionately,
Elaine