I will be the first to admit that sometimes things get so crazy I want to close my eyes and pull the covers over my head until it passes. I think this is a comfortable go-to when dealing with the things that confound us, we shop too much, drink too much, sleep too much, or do whatever it is that distracts us from the chaos and turmoil of trying times. The good news is these phases will pass, the bad news is if we haven’t consciously dealt with them, and the chaos they cause, they will come back as a do-over. Believe me when I tell you there will always be another opportunity to see if we’ve learned to handle the issues that perplex us.

It may feel unfair, and sometimes downright irritating, but what’s really being asked of us is to intelligently and capably make sense of our personal chaos in severely stressful times. We are asked to deal with the impossible, to face what we think we can’t handle. But it’s the difficult times, these overwhelming situations, that end up showing us who we really are and more importantly who we want to become. Is it fun, not really. But the payoff is invaluable, it’s the gift of being able to stand firm in ourselves, in our abilities and beliefs and remain unshakeable, even when the tough times come. Somehow we become the beacon in the storm, and more adept at dealing with the curve balls life throws at us. Now that really is something.

The tough times come to us all, but how we handle them makes us who we are. It’s the deepening of consciousness that eases the chaos. Is there pain in facing what frightens us, absolutely. But is there really an alternative? Do we let the circumstances of our lives bully us into submission? Only we have the power to create the changes we want to see in our lives and that takes courage.

This kind of awareness doesn’t just descend, we have to do the work but luckily we have the tools that can help. So we look at our dreams, we journal our feelings, we draw, meditate, walk in nature so we can connect the threads and look at how we really feel about what is going on in our lives. Then we begin to change what we don’t like. That’s how to navigate the chaos, we pay closer attention and then act. It doesn’t have to be a life-altering change, it can be small, every little thing we do adds up and begins to shift our world and our ways of thinking.

Only by looking closely do we discover.

kb