The panic began when the emailed-itinerary arrived, though I wasn’t conscious of the scope of the experience about to unfold until much later. Well over a month ago, I reserved an AirBnB in Covington, KY as the ‘retreat space’ for a leadership cohort-journey I had elected to begin. Given the pandemic, this retreat would be all on Zoom, but crafting a space ‘away’ seemed like a good way for me to fully enter in, fully focus, fully allow. I did my research for a couple days, as you can get lost on the Airbnb.com website with all the choices! I let my gut lead and eventually made the reservation that appeared to promise privacy, a nice kitchen in which to prepare my own meals, a nice sitting room with both comfy chair and desk options, and a nice bathtub. Fireplaces, plural--one inside and one outside--were a plus I could use if it were chilly outside. I’d even received a Spirit-nudge I’ve come to recognize that this was the invited course of action to take. All good.
The itinerary email arrived the morning I was to depart, just like clockwork. It had detailed instructions with complementary photos, for clarity. One of the home-front. Pictures of the street-signs to follow. The block to drive around to get to the private alley. The parking garage and the latched gate that would need to be opened. The number-keypad-lock. All of which were what sparked the panic. The house looked like it was in a potentially questionable neighborhood--old brick, small, tightly packed houses on an urban street. It was different than I had expected or imagined. To get to the parking space and ‘carriage house’ out back, you had to drive around the block to a private alley. Each picture showed more of a packed urban neighborhood that felt different from what I had imagined it would be. You were to park on the right side of the garage/drive-way, and the latched gate was to be unlocked (picture provided). The number-pad on the door was shown, with an entry code provided. From this side of the experience, all of this was hospitably provided and could be construed as a clear welcome, all information provided.
Except that is not how it all landed in me, in this body of mine.
Unaware of it at the time, I went into full-blown visceral fear. I immediately doubted my earlier research and review, imagining I had missed crucial details that would have insured my safety. I feared I had chosen a rundown neighborhood in which I would be then be unsafe as a woman by herself, in an unknown location, disconnected from resources to keep herself safe. I feared I had been duped by false pictures, misleading photoshopped images that suggested one kind of space but when the cancellation time had already passed, insured a moneymaking scheme, preying on clueless middle-aged white women like myself. I feared looking foolish in front of my husband and/or friends, having to cancel a reservation at a loss of a couple hundred dollars. I chastised myself the entire drive down to Covington, convinced I had made a mistake and would have to quickly rectify it before beginning a retreat with 24 unknown companions.
I saw that the cancellation deadline was 3 p.m., so I rearranged my plan for the day so to see the property before 3 p.m. This meant a mad dash of final packing, getting the cold food into coolers and all of my clothes/necessaries into my roller bag. It meant rushing through any sense of ritual “beginning” this new journey, like spending time with my dear Nala or any sense of conscious presence of leaving my home for the first time in months, if not a full year, for a journey into an unknown Invitation. I’m usually pretty ritualistic about this kind of thing, but not that day. I was out the door in a flash, figuring I’d pick up anything I’d left behind, if I were to be even be staying in the Cincy area that night after all. It crossed my mind that I really didn’t want to be doing this after all. I took my Zoom grief-group ‘circle’ on my phone, on the road. I pulled over into an unknown neighborhood, to be present to my grief-circle-sisters for that hour of sharing time. Then found my way to the AirBnB, for an energetic sense of the neighborhood and the space itself.
To cut to the chase then? The BnB was beautiful, just as advertised. The neighborhood was an historic neighborhood of the city, with grand old houses and beautifully distinct architecture to enjoy--large front porches and remarkably diverse buildings, textures, landscaping and more. The river I had hoped to enjoy was less than a five minute walk away, just as I had envisioned, and the local grocery was a 4 minute drive up the street. The living space itself was sparklingly clean, beautifully crafted, welcoming and cozy. The deck with the outside fireplace looked homey and the ceiling fan kept the temperatures just right. My stay involved several long walks, in loops, in the neighborhood as well as the next one over. It was everything I had hoped for, even prayed for. My earlier research was accurate, and my instincts were sound.
My experience of this day of departure is what interests me here. PANIC. Visceral fear that I did not really recognize as visceral. A collection of cognitive responses to a visceral event was my day. I problem-solved in response to the panic, rearranging my day so to be on the road and see the property before the cancellation deadline. I assured myself that I could cancel if I felt any hesitation about my safety. Yet it was all just as it had been. Nothing had actually changed in the world, but my relationship to it had been awash in fear and driven by distrust. Even after realizing it was all going to be fine, there were echoes of the visceral fear throughout the first day there. I slept with furniture in front of the door and an extended pocket-knife on my bedside table. I’m never “that anxious woman on her own”! The echoes of fear finally waned by the second full day there.
The part that seems noteworthy to me now is that I was completely awash in a visceral fear that I did not recognize as a physical event at all. I problem-solved it all through logistics and an immediate, defensive distrust. I let the stories of distrust completely drive my body, my day, my behaviors. Arguably into 24-36 hours of all that was to come. Talk about noteworthy.
My gentle learnings so far, then… One, I did not really consider as significant the felt-sense experience I would have in leaving my home and companions, post-pandemic, for the first time in a year. My days and weeks have had a familiar discipline-rhythm that was going to have to change to accommodate this new pilgrimage into Fire&Water leadership journeying. Second, I did not really know how to make room for the feelings of fear that were building in me as I prepared to enter into one of the most diverse learning communities I’ve ever had the privilege or opportunity to enter. I have learned in some intentionally diverse communities in higher education, but I so need this one to be different, to be grounded in human being together, compassion, vulnerability & grief, healing, interdependence and love. (Just to be clear, higher education is not interested in those things, per se).
Ultimately, I think I did not know how to make space for the fear arising in me, which leads me to begin asking how I might learn to do just that. I did not make space for me to even wonder aloud with a friend if I would have the courage necessary to be seen as the flawed and unsophisticated white woman that I am. I do stand firmly in my gifts of presence, intuition, compassion and devotion, but I do not know learning environments in which those gifts are valued, with anti-rascist work, within social justice advocacy work. I’m not a very good social-justice advocate in the modern-sense of that term, and I am well aware that this can look like complicity with injustice. What I am, however, is fierce for those willing to enter into practice and journeying with me. When I can feel the relationship or even potential of relationship, I will advocate for them to the end of the world and back again.
So I was not remotely prepared for the visceral fear that would ultimately break me open a bit, aerating the soil of me to be more receptive and open to whatever would unfold. Nope, I lost my balance entirely into a several-hour panic, relying on a cognitive approach to a visceral event, and an immersion into mental stories of distrust barely grounded in anything real. As I told two friends/elders when I picked up my ‘bag’ of candle&goodies for the retreat: “I am already exhausted and it hasn’t even started yet. So exhausted that surrender to the flow of whatever would come is all I have left.”
We all smiled at one another and began to talk about horses, the invitation to draw near, and the skittishness that is so familiar in trying to draw close. So it begins...
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