Tolerating Enough Anxiety for Openness and Connection

We’ve got to be okay with a little bit of anxiety; we’ve got be okay with a little bit of excitement. We’ve got to be okay with that kind of “Woohoo!” or we’re not going to get to that place of connection. There are a lot of people who are missing out on the connections of their lives, because they’re crunched down on excitement—because they have no tolerance for anxiety.  

We are engaging Fire health, starting with the body language, so that we are increasing our tolerance for Xi, for joy, or excitement, or anxiety—for dishevel! Flowers are disheveled!  

In order to have propriety—the feeling of direct connection in the midst of madness—we are doing that which allows your heart and my heart to know each other, and to exchange a spark. That spark may or may not set fruit. Not all flowers set fruit.  

There may be, during your day, a glance that passes between you and someone else—one smile, that you weren’t even sure they were smiling at you. But maybe they were, and you took it to heart. Your flower was open enough that it got in, you know what I mean? Right?  

When your heart is a closed flower, you may receive a smile, but doesn’t really change you. When your heart is open, and someone smiles at you, it’s like, “Oh, you got me!” because the flower is open.  

You got me. It got in. That’s the cross-pollination moment. That’s what we are looking for—that transfer of spark that is potentially life changing, life saving. It does not matter if you get married to them or not. That exchange of spark, in summer, stokes the fire that keeps us going all winter long.  

We are post-Solstice right now. We are in that time of realizing that oh, the initial time of blossoming is now feeling the back pressure. There’s a little bit of the feeling, “Do I have buds left? Am I going to have time for them to open? Are they going to have a chance to love and be loved, to exchange that spark, to feel that “whoooaa!” that happens when we really connect, even if it’s momentary and fleeting?  

I say that right now is a time when we have some national challenges around Fire, and there’s going to be some depression coming up if we’re not learning how to tolerate anxiety, Xi excitement, enough to open and say, “I see. I see. I’m looking at you. I’m looking at you. I’m looking at you. I am sending warm Fire. I’m extending beyond myself.”  

Are we open enough to say “Oh, you got me, you got me”? Yes. Whether or not this relationship continues, I just got fed in my heart.  


To learn more, check out my Fire Seasonal Resources, the Whole Heart Connection archive, or join me at one of my upcoming live workshops.

To join the discussion, find us on my Perennial Medicine discussion listserv (all are welcome).

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