Off the Ledge

You know that it's about to happen before it happens. Your heart drops, pulse quickens, stomach ties in knots, head pounds. You're nervous as you step out onto that ledge and let your mind go there. You imagine all the different scenarios and play out pretend scenes in your head. You lift one foot off the edge as your imagination spirals out of control, creating the massive event you believe might be about to happen and your eyes open wider in disbelief. You start to think about what you'll do "if" or how you'll feel "if" or just how you'll articulate in the event that you have to defend yourself. Okay, it's really getting crazy now...you're out of control and you can hardly breathe and you lean forward, poised to jump, your muscles tensed in anticipation of the fall! But wait! In reality, nothing has happened yet. At the moment, things are perfectly fine. There are no storm clouds rolling in, no boogey man hiding in the closet waiting to jump out. You've created all this drama in your head because you feel ___ (insert the word that best describes your heightened emotional state: afraid? overwhelmed? unsure? hormonal? irritable? betrayed? angry?). So now that we've clarified why you are out on the ledge, let me tell you how you can start to talk yourself back off the ledge. Gently remind yourself that you can't control everything and sometimes you just have to go with the flow. Encourage yourself not to let past incidences, where something similar may have happened, dictate your circumstances for today. That situation--the one that had you so up in arms before--is over and done with and you learned invaluable lessons from it (right?!); so now instead of that burden weighing you down, those lessons will keep you afloat in a sea of confusion. State decisively (out loud if necessary) that fear has no place in your life and that there is only room for peace and love to take up residence in your heart. Come on in off the ledge, Sister. Things are better than you know, you are stronger than you think, and this too shall pass.

Signed,
Feet on Solid Ground