bravery and nothing less

every day is a choice to be brave. every day is a miracle to exist. these are two truths that rattle around in my brain — knocking into each other, colliding, remaining as far away from each other as possible before inevitably coming together again. as we swim downstream of our existence fates guide us. their tender yet frightening hands grasping us, sometimes so tightly we struggle to resist, other times so loosely that it seems as though we’re floating aimlessly. we always have a choice though. we steer ourselves through the waters. we choose to look forward or to look away. the choice is a gift. the choice is always ours.

i choose to be brave most days, yet sometimes my voice shakes. for me, the meticulous way i write, carefully selecting each word, allows me more control over what seems so amorphous in my soul. i struggle to say out loud what is so true to me inside. i use these words to paint, to create something and find some resolution within myself. at times, it feels cowardly to hide behind words on a screen. to type and delete and perfect. i don’t want to be misunderstood. there’s a coldness to that need for control. in focusing so much on being understood completely, i end up actually losing parts of myself in the process. the uncertainty, the ambiguity, the complexity, the nuance and the contradictions all leave. yet those are all me too. how can i leave so much out? words become empty, a veneer of how i truly feel. there are clues, yes, but even those i keep at a distance. tightly wound, yearning to be understood, yet so indiscernible.

bravery requires trust in yourself. this is what i tend to lack. i second guess. i feel anxious. my mind and my heart and my voice and my body misalign. i should trust that my voice deserves to be heard no matter how slippery those words are. i cannot grasp them in my hands. they fall through as i try to contain them. but, they’re real and they are meant to be free. i should not hold them back. i should trust my heart when it knows something is not right for me. the uneasiness i feel when someone does not fulfill my needs, or is being inauthentic to me, or does not truly care for me should not be ignored. yet, i do ignore it. it eats away at me, silently, in the back of my mind. my mind thinks one way and my hearts feels another. they pass briefly, exchange looks, but don’t meet until it’s too late. lessons i’ll continue to learn.

building the trust in yourself is hard. being brave is harder. i reached a plateau of sorts. maybe a steep incline. i do need to trust myself more. i see this in my workouts as well. after three years, i still do not trust my body. not completely at least. at the bottom of a heavy barbell back squat, i’ll lose trust in myself. i think i won’t be able to get myself back up. that i’ll remain stuck there, the weight crushing me farther down. when pressing, i fear the same that i’ll push and the bar will remain heavy on my chest. these fears take center stage. no matter how much i try, i cannot shake them yet. despite encouragement from someone i trust and have trusted for years, i still struggle to overcome this fear. i focus too much on what i’m not instead of looking at what i am and can do already.

yesterday, i took an inversion workshop at my gym. the workshop was focused on preparing yourself to do handstands. i signed up because i wanted to challenge myself. i was afraid, but i knew i’d lose more if i let fear overwhelm me. the instructor, an extremely unserious man whose pilates and yoga classes i took for years, was someone who comforted me and whose encouragement has allowed me to trust him. a close friend joined as well — she on her own handstand journey. both of these people helped me overcome my initial fear. throughout the class, we warmed the body up with various movements and flows. we isolated certain movements of the shoulders, hiked our hips up in downward dog position, shifted our body weight forward on standing splits, our fingers gripping tightly into the ground. handstands require trusting yourself, controlling your body, inverting all you know and have grown accustomed to.

despite all this preparation, when we walked over to the wall, i felt all that work slip away. i was terrified of trying. the movement felt so new to me. there was so much i could do wrong. there were so many ways i could fail. the first time, i positioned my hands close to the edge of the wall. i straightened my right leg, i bent my left and tried to kick up. i did not make it. i tried again. i did not make it. i was frustrated. i took a breath. i watched others around the room do what i could not do. they kicked up. some gracefully, others with loud thuds that echoed in the small yoga studio. i tried again. my heel knocked against the wall. i tried again. my wrists strained. eventually, my friend watched and she told me i was getting close. i tried something different. the instructor came over and i asked for help. he stood in front of the wall. he told me to place my hands forward until my shoulders hit his thighs. i hiked my hips up in downward dog, stepped in closer. i could see the whites around my fingernails as my hands dug into the ground. i straightened one leg and bent the other. with as much force as i could muster, i kicked off the bent leg and sent my legs soaring up and backwards. the instructor caught me and told me to straighten my legs and pull my legs together. i looked forward. it was the first time i truly saw the classroom upside down. i could see everyone looking at me. i could feel the instructor’s wrists around my ankles. eventually i came back down. my friend cheered me on and i thanked the instructor for his support.

that was the first step forward in a long journey towards fully trusting my body and myself. i know that this will require practice. i will be frustrated. i’ll have days where my body will shake with fatigue. i’ll have days where my voice will tremble and the words will be stuck inside of me wanting to be let out. i choose to be brave. every time i kick up, i need to trust myself. every time i speak up, i need to trust myself. to trust my body is to control my body, to move with intention and deliberateness. to trust my voice is to loosen control of my emotions, to let my feelings pour out and fill the spaces they’re meant to. each day that i chose to be brave i move forward. i steer myself downstream. i let fate guide me, but i move with purpose.