In praise of Anxiety
How loving our inner mess helps us meet the world with grace
Written April 21 2025
“Give yourself grace,” my spouse tells me as we lay together in the quiet darkness of bedtime, “You’ve been doing a lot.” I confided to them how I have been struggling a bit. The truth of the matter didn’t make it to my lips — I painted a rough picture, using all that I could find the courage to give breath to. Yes, I think to myself, it’s true. I have been doing a lot. The offering of grace releases some of the pressure I’ve knotted myself into.
I have been struggling — have you?
I’ve been feeling anxious for the past few days.
It’s an unsettling yet deeply familiar feeling. For most of my life, I’ve been a worrier, a worst-case-scenario planner, a horror-film-avoider, and a constant-threat-detector. There have been times in my life where my anxiety has been consuming, and where it morphs into a depression caused by a level of overwhelm in me that feels like it might be easier to be anything other than here.
It’s been awhile since I’ve felt the grip of anxiety in my body. The tightness in my chest and throat. The irritability and shortness stemming from my own inability to regulate the rising fear within. I was so used to anxiety that when it simply disappeared during the deepening of my own spiritual awakening, it felt miraculous. The current of ease and calm that flowed within me was intoxicating.
So, as I sit here feeling anxious, I find myself face-to-face with my own hidden beliefs. I realize that some part of me naively believed that I’d “conquered” anxiety and depression — that I’d never have to feel them again, because I had “spiritually matured.” To notice anxiety’s return, even if only lapping at the shores of my mind, registers to my ego as a failure. Which illuminates to me the deeper, unconscious belief I have been walking around with — that anxiety and depression are not spiritual, and are not good.
Of course, as I write this, I know it is not true. But sometimes we must be confronted with the untruths living deep within our flesh so that we might come to see ourselves more clearly.
It feels appropriate to be sad, anxious, afraid, angry, and overwhelmed right now. That feels honest to the experience of life we are moving through.
I do not abide by a spiritual practice that ignores pain and suffering, or is numb to the losses we are witnessing on a personal and collective scale. I do not participate in a spirituality that escapes the material reality for a place of ‘pure light’.
I believe that our deepest spiritual progression is about connecting wholly with our physicality and our humanity and our Earth. Not being a disembodied Spirit escaping to the astral plane — but calling down the fullness of our Spirit deep into this flesh, into this Earth. And owning the richness of our humanity — without denial, suppression, or control.
And, it is human to be anxious right now. War, genocide, regime, violence, fear, uncertainty circle us. Our relatives are being disappeared. Our rights are being dismantled. The empire is crumbling, for good and for bad. What is coming to replace it is not yet visible. We are in the birth canal, and it is frightening and violent. Not everyone survives birth.
So, I breathe. I breathe again. And I reflect.
Instead of viewing this anxiety as a failure and a disappointment — an undesirable state — can I welcome it home with curiosity and care? Can I listen to what it needs and tend to it? Can I love myself, and allow myself to be loved, in the depths of my pain?
The world I wish to see of unity and oneness starts right here, in myself, each of us, in our own flesh and our own inner worlds.
How can I truly love the other — the violent, scary, confusing other — if I cannot love the violent, scary, confusing parts that live within me?
So, I say thank you to my anxiety. For reminding me of all this and more. For being a beautiful teacher and guide.
To my heart, I offer gentleness, stillness, compassion, and grace. So much grace.
I wish you the same.
six practices for anxious hearts:
take a warm bath / shower with your favorite soothing scents
take a break and listen to this spotify playlist, “forest bathing”
try a free guided meditations from davidji, a yogi with an incredibly soothing voice
put on a playlist of your favorite dance music and dance for a song or two - for me that’s either panic! at the disco or beyoncé. i’ve got range!
go outside barefoot and sit with our Earth Mother. bring her an offering and ask her for her love, ask her to connect more deeply to her, ask her to help you release your worries and fear
maybe, maybe — take some time away from checking the news and social media, or put some limits on how often you do. it will still be there.
