Security
Staying safe, restricting vs. expanding, and finding freedom in realising I am always inches from death.
I have always had a disproportionate affection for airports. Specifically, it is the airport routine of any travel itinerary that I find myself looking forward to almost more than anything else.
I know I have to check in online, and that I have to be there 2.5 hours before my flight leaves. I know exactly where to print my boarding pass, and how to find my way to the departure terminal. Everything works as it should.
Of course, this isn't entirely true. Familiarity with these procedures doesn't mean that things can't go wrong.
For many years, the airport checking in process was a huge source of anxiety. Because the input fields when you purchase your ticket online are often formatted for Western names, there would inevitably be a technical discrepancy with my official identification (where my Chinese name precedes my English one). That my name contains a comma only further complicated things, and on more than one occasion I've actually had to fork out money to rectify this.
Yet when I think of airports, I recall only the predictability and the slow, languid coffee that I usually have time for while waiting to board. This is despite multiple experiences of airports so crowded that being 3 hours early did not prevent me from barely making it to my boarding gate on time.
When I was recently in Tokyo, I woke up one morning to the jarring squawk of the Earthquake Early Warning blaring from my phone. Upon googling what one should do in such situations, and reading the advice to seek shelter and keep my head covered, I thought this sounded like a perfectly good reason to go back to sleep.
And so I pulled the sheets over my head, and promptly did just that. It was 6:30 in the morning after all.
Later on, however, I couldn't help thinking—what if things had turned out differently?
Advancements in technology and building construction mean that we are safer than ever during events like this. In fact, you should want to be in a taller building rather than a shorter one during an earthquake.
But does this mean that there is no danger? Or is life simply more manageable when we believe that we are not perpetually at risk of death or permanent disability due to bad luck and happenstance?
Just this year on January 1st, the earthquake that struck Japan's Noto Peninsula left 260 casualties. There are still people missing; over 3300 residents remain evacuated, and the region is still recovering from the structural damages sustained.
These things can and do happen. Maybe they don't happen to all of us all of the time, but they do happen.
Every once in a while, when I'm working with a coaching client, they'll start noticing that even though their lives are improving, they still find themselves wrestling with difficult emotions or unhealthy thinking patterns.
Sometimes, they'll ask: "When does it stop?"
This question can surface in various forms, but it is always kinda sorta about the same thing.
How can I get rid of my desire?
How do I never feel fear/anger/sadness/envy ever again?
When will I stop needing validation from others?
In other words, what do I need to do so I never ever have to suffer again?
I never have the right answer, because in every case what they are hoping I will say is that these are the exact steps you need to follow. Do this and that and this, and it will stop.
"Honestly, I too wish that life worked like this," I usually say, and we have a good laugh about it.
We laugh because it is so human to want life to be like this, but deep down we also understand that the goal of working on our shit is not so we will never feel pain or suffering ever again.
The reality is also that the older we get, the heavier life becomes. There is more joy, but also more loss. More to look forward to, but also more that we are no longer in control of.
We cannot run away from the fact that we are all seeking security—for some of us this looks like meeting our material needs, for others it could be about surrounding ourselves with people we love (and who love us back), or about achieving things that tell us we are worth something in this world.
Yet my own life has also taught me that even though there are many things I can do to shape and influence my environment, I cannot fundamentally control what happens.
So what then, is the goal? What can we hope to seek security in?
Tara Brach, in her book Radical Acceptance, talks about the concept of meeting our experiences with ‘unconditional friendliness’. She says:
Instead of turning our jealous thoughts or angry feelings into the enemy, we pay attention in a way that enables us to recognize and touch any experience with care. Nothing is wrong—whatever is happening is just “real life.”
This made me think about how our need to control the content of our outer lives often reflects our need to control something within ourselves.
So perhaps instead of seeking security in building fences, avoiding risk, playing small, or conversely, in seeking status or accumulating excess, we should aim to seek it in ourselves: in having confidence that no matter what happens, we'll figure it out; in learning how to ask for help and rely on others; in accepting that life is hard but realising that we are capable.
I don't think we will ever stop doing what we need to do to survive and to trudge on in the face of life's shocks and disappointments. But I do think we owe it to ourselves to see our lives as they are and to be honest about what is happening.
I may not have died in an earthquake, but for a few days after, I kept feeling pulled to questions about how I've been using my time. Have I been restricting or expanding my life? What more do I want to lean fearlessly into?
I am reminded of a scene from the movie Annie Hall, where the young protagonist Alvy is sitting in a doctor's office.
Next to him, his mother laments, "All of a sudden he's depressed! He can't do anything!"
When the doctor asks why, Alvy answers, "The universe is expanding. If the universe is expanding, one day it will break apart and that will be the end of everything."
"What is that your business???" his mother retorts. To the doctor, she exclaims, "He's stopped doing his homework!"
In response, Alvy mutters, "What's the point?"
It's hilarious to watch, and also very poignant because I think there is a little bit of all of us in this child wrestling with overwhelming questions about the nature of life and the universe. But this scene also unearths a particular truth, which is that the stories we choose to tell ourselves are often what shape the texture and trajectory of our lives.
Later in the same scene, Alvy's mother says, "You are here in Brooklyn! Brooklyn is not expanding!"
"It won't be expanding for billions of years! Why don't we try to enjoy ourselves while we're here, huh? Huh?" the doctor adds.
The adults are condescending and dismissive, but they're not wrong.
If we choose to tell stories about tragedy and hopelessness, then it becomes easy to be cynical, to believe that we have little agency over the events of our lives.
If we choose to tell stories about hope and tenacity, then it becomes easier to see life as a constant unfolding of possibility and opportunity.
"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage," as Anais Nin writes in her journals.
As always, if you are keen to work with me, don’t hesitate to get in touch.
Fantastic pictures you have here ✨