Hello Reader
(This one is a longer essay I've been musing on for a week. Grab your favorite drink and a journal to take notes if anything fits. No sales, just strategies to help you relax and ease the tension in your shoulders.)
The world is heavy right now. If you’re a sensitive, deep-feeling person, you’re not imagining the weight. The cruelty is real. The grief is real. The rage and confusion? Real. The incessant bombardment of life, both culturally and personally.
If it feels like you’re being asked to keep functioning inside a system that is burning while still paying the bills, walking the dog, managing your own midlife health, maybe parent or kid care taking, and tackling your never-ending to-do list.
It’s legit - a lot. So what do we do when the “Death Eaters” are gaining ground? <– Harry Potter reference thanks to one of my wise clients.
We get scrappy for hope.
Scrappy hope isn’t naive. It isn’t detached or delusional. It’s not dissociation, and it’s not drowning in doom. I have definitely waded in the doom here and there of late.
Scrappy for hope is a strategic refusal to let despair rot your insides. When it is tempting to give in, quit, or worse, this phrase reminds me of the tiniest things that can keep my feet on the ground. I wanted to offer them to you. With this cheesy ass bee image I made on Canva. Almost too happy for the zeitgeist, I know. But damn, if those backyard bees and my wild flowers aren’t a part of my Scrappy for Hope Strategy.
This is not visionary or aspirational. I don’t believe now is the time for those things. This is chop wood, carry water strategies for sanity in an insane world.
It’s not about pretending things are okay. It’s about staying human enough to still care… and clear enough to not get consumed. Here’s what I’m practicing. Not perfectly. But persistently. Note: this is not meant to add more to your to-do list.
This is nervous system triage. You need a few “handrails” you can reach for without thinking. Water. Rest. A walk without your phone in your hand. A daily dance off in your closet to a good rage playlist. Sticking to your supplements, meds and water routines and friend chats because those basicas are not shallow during these times. They can be life-saving. Make them visible. Make them easy. Make them non-negotiable.
- Step Away From the Screens (Often)
Outrage is addictive. It makes us feel alive and connected, but drains our capacity to act meaningfully. Screens rarely regulate us - they support the function freeze and often actually flood us, depending on your individual feed. Turn on your internal “Social-Media-Scanner Intuition” and listen for her wisdom regarding logging off. Doing so regularly may be the most revolutionary thing you do all week.
Go back to the real: your garden, your dog, your hands. I’ve been swatching watercolor paint (I’ve swatched a thousand times) in my journals.
- When You Don’t Know How to Help: Claim Your Role in the Social Justice Ecosystem
You can’t do it all. You’re not meant to. Some are disruptors. Some are nurturers. Some are educators. Some are artists. Know your specific role - where and how you help best. Claim your place. Let others claim theirs. (Example - in dog rescue - these days I do more home visits and transports…behind the scenes, but still vital to the whole organization).
For more on this, you can look into the “Social Change Ecosystem Map,” created by Deepa Iyer. It offers a framework to understand diverse roles individuals and organizations can play in social justice movements (this includes resisting fascism).
The “Social Justice Change Wheel 2.0” has an even more specific breakdown of various ways to work and a helpful PDF. Made for higher education - but still works for simply being human.
Just like my clients have done, you might quickly identify your one or two key roles and give yourself permission to focus on them, rather than feeling overwhelmed by trying to do everything. It’s nice to see the shoulders drop when a tool gives clarity in 60 seconds.
Clearly, this concept deserves more than 60 seconds, but for now, just knowing YOUR role can help you reset and refocus when the chaos is non-stop. (I was also reminded of this when, even in one of my favorite shows, there was a therapist doing therapy at a table in a makeshift bar after the zombie apocalypse.)
Interdependence is not weakness. It’s how the mycelium survives. And do not ask me to cook - hold your heart, yes, some manual labor, sure, but feed the people. Nope.
When it feels like the world is unraveling, make something. Art doesn’t have to be pretty. It doesn’t have to be public. Art is life. Create something. Creating is a way to reclaim your agency. Fingerpaint. Write a poem. Arrange stones on your windowsill. Light a candle like your soul depends on it. Because it might,-
We are not creating for capitalism or performance here - simply create…and if you don’t wanna create art, create joy.
Tiny moments of Joy - like wildflowers or birdwatching, or seeing the depth of your dog’s eyes as he looks at you. That is SEEING art, and this works too.
- Root Yourself in Human-Scale Community
You don’t need a massive movement to stay sane. You need one or two people you can be real with. You need to be witnessed and to witness others.
Host a potluck. Sit with your neighbor. Text your people, “I’m thinking of you.” Community won’t fix what’s broken… but it reminds you you’re not alone inside it.
EEEk. This one is a challenge for me because I love being at home, and going out can feel exhausting, and I’m making micro moves connecting outside of my home and my computer screen.
- Meet Your Legitimate Stressors with Structure
You have real stress. Financial, emotional, and physical. Create SOPs (standard operating practices) for various tasks that are frying your brain and draining your capacity…if you can.
I first learned the concept of SOPs for neurodivergent accommodations in a workshop by Brair Harvey.
Set a reminder to pay bills. Make a plan for how you’ll take a break when you feel like you’re drowning. Set an auto-responder on your text messages. This is the gritty stuff of staying alive and functioning. It’s also sacred.
When I met my husband, for years, he would say, “You need a system for that.” He was right. It took me 16 years to get, and now I have a “system” - a certain way I do things, sometimes external tools that help.
This may feel like a mental load to set up - but in the long term, the “system” takes that mental load off your nervous system. I love strategizing these standard operating procedures with my clients.
And..if this feels like too much- F*&k it. it for real. Shame be gone. Shame is more dangerous than the piles on your desk or a text your forgot to reply to.
- Guard Against Frothy Activism and Spiritual/Positivity Bypassing
Performative rage is not the same as sustained resistance. Spiritual/positivity bypassing, such as saying “It doesn’t affect me” or “I don’t pay attention to politics,” is not peace. It’s control & privilege wasted dressed up as detachment. Be real. Be substantive. Speak truth, feel grief, take breaks, stay grounded.
- Hold the ‘Both/And’ Like a Compass
If you know me, you know I love and live in the both/and. You can be grieving and still laugh. You can be overwhelmed and still show up. You can be tender and still hold boundaries. This is what scrappy hope looks like. It’s full-spectrum, full-hearted humanity. It’s moments. This one, and then the next. Perfection be gone. And here you are, staying in it. Living and being with it ALL - all the way to the Wild Edges of Being Human.Hope isn’t a personality trait. It’s not a performance. It’s a practice.
Be scrappy. Be steady. Be sacred.
💛 Love, Allison
