Can I Make You Feel Safe?

Sometimes, I hear folks speak of their safety or lack of it. The most frequent expression is, "I don't feel safe," often spoken in reference to being in the presence of a particular person or a group/venue, as in, "I don't feel safe around J____." I wonder about these words and what they really mean.

If I don't feel safe, then I must feel myself to be in danger. If so, in danger from what? I am lucky to live in a part of the world where I am not in immediate physical danger. No overt war is being waged inside my country's borders. My neighborhood is without visible criminal elements and the dangers that follow their illegal enterprises. There aren't even any vicious looking dogs on my block. Even J_____, that person around whom "I don't feel safe," is not waving a weapon at me or advancing upon me with menace.

Many of those from whom I have heard this sentiment -- "I don't feel safe" -- live in similar circumstances of apparent safety. This mismatch of reality and perception begs the question, then: What is the source of danger? I look around and ask myself, is there someone lurking nearby ready to do this person harm? Is there an impending natural or man-made disaster roaring toward us? Every time, the answer is no. But the implied plea is for someone else to take some action to remove or reduce the threat. "I don't feel safe" seems to often be a request that someone do something about that lack of safety. Maybe we should make J_____ go away? Or maybe we just need him/her to act differently?

If there is no imminent threat of physical harm, then the fearsome danger must be from less tangible harms -- emotional or psychological damages. Fine. Valid. I appreciate that this damage can be as great, greater even, than physical harm. But how can you be made safe when your fear is of humanity's human-ness? Yes, there are a few individuals out there who seem to be on a mission to be mean but my experience is that, mostly, this kind of damage happens when well-intentioned, even loving, friends or family members "act out" of their own wounds. When I am emotionally or psychologically hurt by someone's behavior, it is most often when that person is reacting from a subconscious fear, rather than acting with conscious intent to hurt me.

Can I make you, me, or anyone else feel safe from that kind of harm? Can I stop every person in the world from acting out their internal dramas in ways that affect others? Well....in a word, no.

The 7 Childhood Treasures offers an alternative to this impossibility. You can make yourself safe from that kind of harm. Never again do you need to feel that you are not safe, if you have two wondrous tools. First, you need an awareness that you always have choice about your behavior (another blog post, another day). Second, you need boundaries.

Loving you as you need to be loved

I feel so clearly this morning how love is an act of patience and presence. Love asks not to be pushed or hurried. It says, "I am a river that flows," and I cannot force the river to flow faster. By the same token, if I  surrender to the river, I may be spun in a whirlpool, battered upon rocky rapids, tossed over the edge of a waterfall, or floated gently into a pocket of stagnation. Love requires awareness of and eyes-wide navigation of Her currents. The act of loving is one of focused learning, not of A-B-Cs and 1-2-3s, but of the contours of another's heart, mind, and soul.

In the marvelous book, All About Love, bell hooks quotes M. Scott Peck's

definition of love as "the will to extend one's self for the purpose of nurturing one's own or another's spiritual growth." This definition of love appeals to me, as it requires choice and intention. These words describe love as my own directed action, rather than as something I "fall" into. These words require me to be conscious of -- and present to -- both myself and you, as my beloved. Loving each other as adults requires the same focused attention as parenting a newborn. I must see each subtle clue and cue that communicates what you need. I need to learn, thoroughly, how you need to be loved.

bell hooks goes on to write, "To truly love we must mix various ingredients -- care, affection, recognition, respect, commitment, and trust, as well as honest and open communication."This view of love explains why Love is not one of the 7 Childhood Treasures. Love requires that ALL the Treasures be developed -- gemstones cut just so and polished to a lustrous glow -- to reveal every possible facet of their beauty. It is the integration of the capacities for Trust, Independence, Faith, Negotiation, Vision, Compromise and Acceptance that enable me to intentionally love you, to love you with recognition and respect for who you are, not with affection, only. I can easily be affectionate with anyone. Truly seeing and respecting someone requires focused and joyful effort.

Consciously seeking and creating

Yes. I freely admit it. I am an extremely sporadic blogger right now. Don't look; I'll fess up: I last posted on February 15th, almost 7 weeks ago. I have many quite excellent reasons to explain my absence but know that none of them is truly important right now. I also have much to say that will be MUCH more interesting and enlivening! Please don't judge me. :)

This morning I listened to a video sent to me by a friend -- a heady little exploration of the intersections between spirituality and quantum physics. One of the scientists in the piece said, "The act of consciousness searching is the creative force that puts something in place."

Fascinating. That statement exactly describes how I feel about Leaps (and smaller movements) of Faith. When I truly believe -- heart, mind, and soul -- that I have a
purpose beyond my daily mundane life, then I become that "consciousness searching." I say to the universe, to life, to the Divine: "I see this possibility that has not yet become reality. I believe in it and I will give my time, energy and focus to make it so."

This gift of belief in and conscious searching for a Big Dream is how I define the Childhood Treasure of Faith. Real commitment to a life purpose is, indeed, a creative force that puts many things in place. For what are you consciously searching? And no, I don't mean the shiny new car or house you want. What is the change you wish to see in the world? What is your conscious searching creating, right now? What is being put in place that was not there before?