Conducting Chaos
Her nerves were always on edge - but she didn’t know it. On edge was normal. When chaos is normal, all else feels unnatural. Uneventful days were defined by managing a nervous system on high alert. When chaos is constant, life becomes a daily experience of waiting for the other shoe to fall.
If today is uneventful, quiet, or even good, then what will tomorrow bring?
For her, survival and belonging were based on being the peacemaker, the umpire, the good kid. But what she desired most was to disappear, fade back, be unnoticed. This was her escape.
Wallflower is often used to describe a boring person, one who doesn’t participate in the party. But wallflower was her superpower. She had learned how to observe her environment for cues, changes in physical presence. A slight tilt of the head, detectable only to her; a shift in mood only she could sense, a change in tone of voice, the skill of reading unspoken words. The sound of a door, a slam, a gentle push. All things were absorbed and processed at life-protecting speed. Though her life was never in peril, her nervous system didn’t know the difference. Looking passive, sitting idle, and watching tv only occurred on the surface. Under the calm exterior loomed a nervous system waiting to process chaos.
How then, does one learn to live without chaos when the nervous system is trained to survive by controlling it?
Later in life, she would be the busiest person, eventually creating her own chaos.
Family
Work
Social obligations
Community boards
Homeroom parent
She would long to escape into a book or movie and would lament about time. Just the thought of these luxuries would bring feelings of guilt and laziness bubbling to the surface. She would retreat to her to-do list because “doing” felt safe.
How she would discover peace is a love story filled with heartbreak and healing.
She is me. Working with a therapist, I began to see my journey with self-compassion, identify my strength, and build hope for the next chapter.
This work starts first, with the acceptance that life is out of control. Second, is the hard work of discovering what’s real for you. What strength do you possess and who are you at your best? This is where we begin to let go of the chaos and define for ourselves what peace looks, feels, and sounds like.
Does any of this resonate with you? If you want to untangle chaos in your life and explore your personal brand of peace, Book a Wake Up Call . Together, we can work through chaos and build a path to personal peace.