If you truly trusted yourself, what would you do? ~ Tiffany Han
In the summer of 2020, I was burned out and sputtering. I led online classes most every day – something I’d started in March because we’d be on lockdown for — what? — maybe a few weeks? a month?
As the pandemic stretched on, I was at a loss about how to proceed. It was clear we all needed movement and connection, but I was stretched to the limit offering what I could. Months in, I was swamped and sinking and I didn’t know what to let go of.
In those days, weeks and months, I learned new technology and new music, I made a whole slew of offerings, and I felt somehow responsible for helping my community through a deeply difficult time. I walked around my neighborhood listening to playlists while my mind ran Eddie Murphy’s line from (the exceedingly silly) movie Bowfinger:
keepittogetherkeepittogetherkeepittogetherkeepittogetherkeepittogether
At some point that summer, I came across Tiffany Han’s podcast that focused on reimagining life outside the paradigm of hustle culture and burn out. I listened like it was a lifeline. She was gracious and responsive when I sent her distressed little Instagram DMs (Hi! I’m Susan. I love your podcast. Help me. I’m drowning.).
One sweltering afternoon as I walked and listened, Tiffany posed this question:
If you truly trusted yourself, what would you do?
I stopped walking. I think I said, “Whoa.” Or maybe I just swallowed hard. What would I do if I trusted myself?
I had no idea.
In that moment, I saw that instead of trusting, I was trying to control. I wanted to control everything: my body, my work, my relationships, lockdown, the well-being of my community. Everything.
When challenges (both big and small) arise, I get a little tight place in my solar plexus, this scrambly anxious swirl in my head. Things are not going to be ok; people are not going to be ok; I’m not going to be ok and I need to do something.
keepittogetherkeepittogetherkeepittogetherkeepittogetherkeepittogether
keepittogetherkeepittogetherkeepittogetherkeepittogetherkeepittogether (photo: Rebecca George Photography)
Author and podcaster Glennon Doyle observes:
“I am beginning to unlearn what I used to believe about control and love. Now I think that maybe control is not love. I think that control might actually be the opposite of love, because control leaves no room for trust—and maybe love without trust is not love at all. ...Maybe if love is not a little scary and out of our control, then it is not love at all.”
Control leaves no room for trust. No room for trusting other people, circumstances, the world...myself.
Recently, I contemplated Tiffany’s question: If I truly trusted myself, what would I do? I wrote in my journal (among other things), “leave more space for possibility and the unexpected.”
That morning, when I arrived for class, my playlist was gone from my device. The only thing I had was a playlist I was experimenting with. I took a deep breath and thought, “Trust yourself, sweetheart.”
Was it the best class I ever led? No. It was a little scary and out of my control and it was full of trust and love.
