Present-centered awareness remains the exception for me, still, instead of the rule. Growing up, I witnessed two polar ways of handling the emotions that bother us — the head-on tackle (sometimes exhausting, but insight-producing) and avoidance (where emotional needs seeped out in less-than-healthy ways). As a result, I’m often erring on the side of emotional confrontation — with others and myself. If I analyze enough — and piece the puzzles of my reactions, thoughts and feelings together — I should be able to understand and heal core issues. In general, when things do click into place, progress is generally more immediate in nature as the mental obstacles fall away.

Forcing the Pieces Together

The downside of this direct approach, however, is that sometimes the “clicking” won’t come. I find myself circling an issue, believing that with enough attention and effort, insight will come. One of the things that has struck me about being present is that insight seems more organic. Others have told me as much — that by simply being and living, insight arises, largely by virtue of releasing judgments and paying closer attention to experience. Despite the fact this notion makes little sense in my paradigm, I’ve begun to notice this dynamic taking place.

Reaction vs. Anticipation

I’m often trying to analyze anxiety (a recurrent struggle for me). Anxiety by nature confounds us, and quite often, its paralytic force leaves us unsure of its origins. I view it as a reaction to a notion or event, and am constantly trying to discern the source so I can logically talk myself down from the worry ledge. Today, it struck me that anxiety may not qualify as a reaction at all, in the purest sense. Instead, it’s anticipation of an event that has not occurred. How can we react if there has been no action? In those moments, I’m walking an emotional path of a fictitious place. Something about this notion felt profound. Just as I could never write a review of a hotel I’ve never stayed at, there’s little sense in breaking down a reaction to a thing I’ve never experienced.

Maybe the larger point is simply to recognize that the source of fear has not occurred; it’s tomorrow’s weather, it’s an undiscovered country, it’s a potential romance (or heartbreak) with someone you’ve never kissed, it’s a job you’ve never experienced your first day at. Fear of these things and their inherent negative possibilities may be natural, but it’s difficult to defend the positivity of an experience you’ve never had. As a result, sometimes our attempts at talking ourselves out of anxiety become less than effective, because we have no compelling evidence to counter the fear yet.

Trading Knowing for Noticing

Roughly 18 months ago, my father received an unexpected, terminal diagnosis that numbered his months to live. He seemed fine at the time, and we did all of the things that come naturally to such a situation — educated ourselves, saw specialists, cried, feared, made plans and contingency plans, and tried to relax. I’ve thought a lot recently about Christmas Eve, asking my (then new) boyfriend how to get through a holiday without that anxiety rocking me. “Just look at him,” he said, and that’s what I did. For that day, I immersed myself in being near my dad, holding his hand, talking to him, and being with my family. He was okay and every imaginary path was simply a possibility.

For all the living we did between then and the following fall, there was no way we could have imagined what would have occurred. We had no idea that his prognosis would ultimately improve, beginning a near-unbelievable decline in bodily markers that indicated disease. We didn’t know that he would live, symptom-free, for that next year. We had no way of knowing that weeks after this improved and symptom-free state, he would have a freak accident while shopping in our hometown, indirectly activating the disease. We had no way of anticipating brain surgery (neither expected nor related to his condition), a medically induced coma he would never quite come out of, our that by Thanksgiving, his chair would be empty.

But we also had no way of knowing that he would speak to each of us in the hospital before things got bad. We had no way of knowing he would stir for three days, allowing each of the three of us kids to experience a little more of him before we lost him. We had no way of knowing that we would gather, laughing, crying, playing guitar and singing, the day he left us. We had no way of knowing a light rain would fall outside the hospital as we hugged goodbye. We had yet to experience the joy of holidays spent together in his absence, the growth that even a few months could bring thereafter, and the breakthroughs we would make as a result. I had no way of anticipating creating this blog, typing this post, or doing laundry in anticipation of a weekend coastal trip I’m about to take. The future did not exist back then. In the same way, the future does not exist now.

Letting Life Exhibit the Evidence

Whether we battle anxiety disorders or not, we’re all looking to avoid pain. The needle itself is always less emotionally painful than the wince before the shot. Anticipation can be the most wonderful thing in the world, or the most terrible thing, but it will never, ever be the equal of experience. Perhaps that’s why experience can so powerfully bring insight. Sometimes the healing comes when you least expect it. Sometimes you wake up and realize you’re no longer crying. Sometimes you wake up and realize you suddenly are. Some forms of healing come through mere experience, just as some wounds do as well. All we can do is allow it to happen, try not to run, and try not to live an event that is merely one of a myriad of possibilities. Sometimes you just have to look at something to recognize this is your reality, this is your job right now. Few of us are professional psychics. We don’t need to be. Our job is instead, to do the living, not the prediction, to be the evidence for or against the fortune cookie, horoscope, weather report, or prognosis.