a love letter to patience vs. paralysis

Dear patience vs. paralysis,

The first is a choice, born of stillness and intention and hope.  Patience is an acceptance of the flow of life of of trusting how I participate in it.  It is not only contemplative: it is creative, generative and active.

Paralysis is a primal feedback loop, born of a protective instinct (I cannot flee, I dare not fight, I must freeze) that builds on itself with each incapacitating repetition of fear and shutdown, then guilt. Then despondence. It is not a choice, but a pattern.

Patience is built through practice and from a safe place of my heart.  From here, patience leads to action that unwinds paralysis.  It starts with trusting the intuition that arises in my body and an awareness of the signs that guide me.  It requires a readiness to face discomfort and a gentle repeated uncoupling of fear from the ability to take action.

Let me begin.  Begin to convert paralysis to patience and into action with intent and compassion, with rage and sorrow and ferocity and commitment.  And let me never stop.