Anxiety Archives - Allison Crow

Get Out of The House and Magic Happens – A road riff episode

Elyse Rich — Sun, 19 Mar 2023 19:04:02 +0000

Hey, this is Allison and this is a two part episode.

The first part I recorded as a road riff, and it’s about the magic of getting out of the house.
Then stay tuned for what the Magic Act really was.

I wanna tell you what the magic was and it wasn’t what we expect.

Love,

Allison

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PS: Camp Cultivate is May 7-11 in the Austin, Texas area- we will be exploring the theme of The Wild Edge of Being Human and how to actually BE in the edges. It’s a small and intimate event this year. Find out more at Camp Cultivate 2023

Apply to become a member of the Soulies Self-Leadership Coaching Membership, where we have weekly life and business coaching calls for small business owners and a community of Soul-Full humans doing this thing called life.

You Can Message Me:

allison@allisoncrow.com
IG: @allison_crow
FB: @AllisonCrow

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Struggling with the Social Media Marketing Machine

allisoncrow — Fri, 17 Feb 2023 17:16:25 +0000

An insight about my creative process that may point you to insights about your own creative process:

When I openly acknowledge the hard and I can compassionately witness myself and even the tiniest of suffering, the hard often lifts within a few days.

It is a part of accepting the both/and – of living in the Wild Edges of Being Human.

PS TL/DR people move on. I’m not here for your dopamine hit; my writing is here to help me and then you think differently and change your life.

Current Hard:

In my current facebook memories – are the promos and images for the course I used to teach called Share Your Heart: Show Your Work – a delightful and helpful course about authentic marketing on social media. The course was reverse-engineered from what delightfully worked for me in the first 7 years of moving my business online after leaving corporate.

I LOVED and enjoyed my relationship with social media.

And currently -I don’t feel that love. I am aware that my lenses are cloudy and the “lens cleaner” is in my own hand, not outside of me.

Since 2008 I have created and shared prolifically online. Since even before that, if you count my blogspot blog.

I do love to write and to process and share with words.

I did thousands of live videos and have recorded almost 200 Podcast episodes. For the last four years, I have written and then published a book from my heart.

For most of that time, it was effortless – truly 98% spontaneous overflow of my precious yellow heart .

And that Sharing My Heart and Showing My Work allowed you all to get to know me – and many of you – hundreds – stepped forward to work with me in some way. It never felt like selling.

Recently, I have inner parts that are overwhelmed and irritated, and deeply sad about the extreme parts of crappy capitalism. My brain can’t unsee the patterns of greed. I, like many of you, often feel the burnout of crappy capitalism and the burnout of shitty social media. And yet, here I am, a capitalist, selling a high-fee service – a luxury. And my revenue has become reliant on me “Sharing My Heart and Showing My Work.”

“Content creation” in order to….. SELL has been repulsive to me. I feel like I’m standing in a house of mirrors and can’t escape it. Go viral, get followers, convert in your DMs, do this reel, do that tiktok, get famous on booktok…….

Be in the world, not of the world, became a mandate instead of an opportunity.

Of course, instead of letting it rest, I wrestle and inquire with that repulsion; I judge myself and become hard on myself – not mean, but certainly, I put pressure to come to a conclusion.

My discernment has gotten foggy, and I’ve slipped into full-on waiting for people to ASK to hire me. It’s been easier to judge others for not choosing my credibility and value than it has been to stand in it and make offers.

In writing this and speaking with my friend Jeanine – things are already starting to clear up. It makes perfect sense that those muscles would atrophy after the year I had last year. Grief and a heart attack will do that to you.

The questions I’m tenderly pondering in this content creation marketing kerfuffle:

What do I truly desire?

What would feel fun?

What obligations could I release?

What if I didn’t give SO much..what if I let less be more.

What’s possible in business and networking relationships away from social media?

What in the garden of my business is ready to be uprooted and released, what just needs some pruning, and what needs to be planted, anew?

And for now, I’ll end right there and just BE.

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What to Know About the Place Between Where You are and Where You Want to Go

allisoncrow — Fri, 17 Feb 2023 16:51:21 +0000

In conversation with my coach (and my therapist) – when I tap into the clarity of where I’m pulled to BECOME, the light shows up in my eyes in one instant, and then in the next, I hit the gaping space between where I am and where I want to go…

And I wobble.

My voice begins to shake, and my stomach gurgles – my brain amps up her stories and excuses. The doubt fires up and conspires with all the reasons not to grow.

And my coach, Tony, lifts his hand and vibrates it horizontally where I can see it – to remind me of the wobble that happens when we are attuning to something new. It’s a visual anchor to remind me to slow down and be with what I call the wobble. While he shakes his hand – he often says, “I’ve got you.”

The Wobble is a Part of the Human Experience.

This week, I also saw the wobble:

In a few of my clients, as they saw the responsibility they were pushing away instead of rising in their leadership
In one of my writing colleagues as she hit a grand new awareness about who she is becoming through writing her story
In a high school friend who was sharing some of her tender therapy realizations with me over a salad and a bowl of mac and cheese at Panera.
In a few of my clients as they bravely navigate becoming their more authentic selves even when the world asks for them to “fit in.”
In a precious friend who held a hospice vigil with her dying mother.

The Wobble is Not a Weakness

It is a sign you are building strength and new muscle memory.
It is a sign you are attuning to new experiences.
It is a sign you are attuning your nervous system to a new state of capacity and calm in the face of doubt and fear.
It is a sign you are stretching.
It is a sign of the becoming you are in the middle of. (yes, I ended that with a preposition).
If you are a goal person – it is proof you are making progress toward that outcome.

The wobble, the soreness, and sometimes even big trembles are what live in the space between your atrophy and comfort — and the being or doing you are growing into.

How will you hold the wobble In your mind with your thoughts In your body?
I offer to you to slow down, and hold the discomfort with compassion and strength.
I plant the seed of remembering, “YES – this is growth, and it’s working,” when the discomfort rises up and starts to freak you up.
And finally, I invite you to be the one that says to all parts of you, “I’ve got you.”

“Where have you atrophied#8221; is a question I’ve been considering for myself and offering to my clients.

My wise inner self shows me were it’s time for me to build strength and courage to be with the wobble. Yours can show you too.

And if you are looking for a coach to help support you – one who can say, “I’ve got you,” as you lean in, I can help with that.

Here are a few ways I can support you.

This is the work I am helping my business owner clients do. These are the conversations in my book Unarmored: Finding Home in The Wild Edges of Being Human . This is some of the focus of my live event Camp Cultivate in May, and this is the foundation from which we do group life and business coaching in my small membership program, Soulies: Self Leadership Society .

Love, Allison

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Step into the Making to Get Out of Your Head

allisoncrow — Wed, 04 Jan 2023 16:16:42 +0000

It’s post-book launch. I still show up for my writing practice group most days.

My favorite dog has died, the year has ended, and my nervous system is slowly recuperating from a year of challenge after challenge.

My writing coach asks each of us, “What are you working on today?”

Inside, a part of me feels lost and ashamed – I don’t know what I am working on today. That heady part looks for an endpoint, a goal, a result – something to give her certainty.

I have a list of ideas – each simmering in its own mental crockpot – yet none of them feel ready to put on the page. I find myself longing for the direction I had when I had the end result of a book on the horizon. Before that longing is even finished crossing my mind, I giggle at where I find myself standing once again.

I’m simply in the creative process. The squirrels and whirls, dead spaces, frustrations, deaths, and emptiness ARE a part of the process. My Gawd, how we hate and dismiss the mulching and fallow seasons. But they are the precursor to new life.

They are a part not only of our art but also of our humanness. They are also the nutrients our souls need. (This awareness comes at the exact moment I sip a slightly nasty but nutrient-filled green drink with the texture of dirty water – again, I laugh at how life shows me exactly what I need if I will just drop into the noticing instead of arguing).

Lately, I am passionate and frustrated and righteous that no one has taught us these aspects of being human. In the same way – can one even really “teach us” how to write, paint, or make art Nope. They can tell us the steps and give us the materials. But we must step into the physical process of the making to make sense of it all in our bones. And there is no linear path there.

Without the stepping in and making – I am only in my head, and my body gets left behind. When I do this, life starts spinning, and I start suffering. I lived there most of my life – in an analytical, head-led life.

The old residue of an incomplete belief, “change your thinking, change your life,” shows up. I’ve been so busy managing my mind -when stepping into the making is what makes everything make sense again. Bring my body to the practice begins to soothe my mind. It certainly slows her down. I remember that I am a maker, not so much a manager.

My head and my body make peace…and then we step into the process of making our art.

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Let go to be in the moment

allisoncrow — Tue, 29 Nov 2022 14:27:32 +0000

Tone: peaceful

Bianca Forte is the choice today. Carmel Cookie is my go-to.

For the last few months, I’ve been waking up with slightly anxious parts going through all the things pressing on me. Anxiety in the early morning is new for me. Weeks ago, I was judging these parts and irritated that they couldn’t wait until regular waking hours to bother me.

Today I just see them. And I spend time with them. “Hello, Anxiety and Racing Concerns. I am here for you. Let’s visit.”

I am willing to rise before my dogs even, and just connect with all the thoughts and words in my head.

Sometimes my anxiety parts and I stay in my head- but many days we write. Writing helps. Today we write.

Does anyone tell the world when they lose clients Or just when they get them . I have a membership that has no long-term contracts. People come. People go. 4 went this month. I wish them the best and trust the decision. It’s a big swing math wise, but I always absorb the loss. I’m strangely peaceful about even this. The right people come and go at the right times.

Once, seven people left in one week. It was a gut punch. wanna learn not to take things personally and truly trust yourself and your clients – build a membership with autonomous doors.

I’m making my own shifts in life and work – and for a few people – I am the client completing.

I have parts that long for some of the joys of the past when there were community events every quarter in LA. I miss being in the room with my peers as a peer. I have a community I lead – and I miss being a peer in those rooms. My closest companions are from that season.

There is no going back. There is no going back to 85 members. There is no going back to the “good ol days” – there IS the now. The warm coffee and cream in my 2crows cup.

The light of my undecorated Christmas tree. There is only me and my anxious parts together at this moment.

There are the 45 clients I have who are also waking up across the world. Many of whom, I know what they wake up anxious about. Some are sharers and connectors and shower-upers and others, more private, have me on retainer for moments when they want to check-in.

People. Not just clients. Friends. Some of my significant friendships shifted this year. So many people in and out of our lives. Deep moments and energized connections become sweet memories and best wishes.

I see past clients in my feed. I’ve seen five clients over the years pass away. This month 2 of my past clients lost their beloved children way too soon. we are all doing this thing called life. It’s not just about the math and numbers of our businesses.

Social media tends to keep our histories in our feeds. Memories of many different seasons pop up when least expected. Thoughts can spread into the past and into the future.

No need to avoid either- dance into the past. Race into the future. Do it with mindfulness, Allison. And then come back to the moment that is NOW. Let’s see what unfolds in the day. I have new paints to play with.

It’s going to be a joyful day.

Love, Allison

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It Can Be Safe to Feel

allisoncrow — Tue, 22 Nov 2022 15:38:41 +0000

Something BRILLIANT my therapist helped me see.

“I am safe, AND I am feeling ______.”

There were moments in this post-heart attack and post-hard-ass emotional summer – that I felt NOT OK.

The subconscious sensation of my difficult emotions and thoughts was that I was not safe feeling these things – “I’m not ok.”

He gave me this distinction to begin telling myself, my body in these moments. (It’s working).

I am safe, and I am feeling grief.

I am safe, and I am feeling anxious.

Many of us were “trained” by caregivers and society not to feel safe if we felt strong emotions.

“Stop that crying bullshit.”
“I’ll give you something to cry about.”
“Suck it up.”
“Stop worrying.”
“You’re being a baby.”
“You’re just being dramatic.”

The subtle threat of withdrawal, rejection and disconnection often came with these words, and it trained our physical and emotional muscle memory that strong and uncomfortable emotion = threat that then cues the fight, flight, freeze, or fawn response.

No amount of cognitive insight can override a body that subconsciously doesn’t feel safe. So we can begin to learn the skills of creating internal and somatic safety and self-regulation.

We can learn to KNOW that we are safe- and we are safe to FEEL ________.

So much of what stops us in life isn’t just our thinking (that’s the surface) – it’s the internal safety and learned ability to experience difficult emotions.

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Your Leaders are Mortal

allisoncrow — Mon, 07 Nov 2022 20:45:19 +0000

Your leaders, whether they show it or not, are human.

After my heart attack – one of my former clients sent me a message saying, “I love you, and your heart attack scared the shit out of me because I relate to you & can’t stand the thought of you being scared….and MORTAL.”

I spent the first 46 years of my life escaping my mortality and humanness, and boy, did it please other people. The “positivity.”

The full of hot air promises to manifest with thought alone. A pretty pollyanna package with tons of mental information, but also hiding disassociation from my own body. I was wearing the masks society conditioned me to wear in exchange for validation and acceptance.

I note the people who, the moment I let any humanness slip – even with humility and an attempt to repair – REJECTED me and LEFT. They only wanted to plastic and polished version of my leadership. But their ability to hold my humanness was never their responsibility; it was always, only ever mine.

I know that when I don’t have the capacity for the messy and uncomfortable parts of being human in others – it is only ever a reflection of the lack of love and compassion I have for myself.

I would rather be rejected for showing pieces of the wild edges of my humanness than be adored for being a masked and performative me.

This may not make for popular or feel-good leadership. Last night the thought “Leadership is a LIE” crossed my mind. It only serves to create an above or below status, and traditionally it requires one to present their masked and plastic performing selves in service of shareholders to the front-facing world, thus leaving an impossible standard of measurement that followers will no doubt, consciously or subconsciously, hold themselves to.

For me, Leadership is horizontal and circularish – I am the other you – I just might be willing to go first. Let’s go together – I’ll be there right by your side.

Yes, dear J, I am mortal, and you can relate to me because I will tell you the truth, and I will tell you the truth is OK – even if it doesn’t feel comfortable.

You are mortal too. It’s not a failure to be mortal. It’s not a moral failure to have a heart attack, or to experience anxiety, or overthinking, or be out of alignment, or to be in the whiplash of grief. Enlightenment isn’t escaping our humanness; it’s loving it fiercely. Stop fighting and harshly judging something that doesn’t need to be FIXED.

What if we put the energy we spend into bypassing, disassociating, shaming, judging, and ignoring our humanity ~into holding it with compassion This requires entirely new “programming” and muscle memory. It takes practice. It takes repetition. It requires choice, over and over and over – as we are undoing the “you’re doing it wrong” that has become a part of every cell in our bodies and bones.

Most days (I’m still practicing), I no longer need it to be easy; I just need it to be real.

I notice that when I can LET myself be REAL with myself – which means breathing self-compassion and self-acknowledgment for the most uncomfortable states, I experience – when I can gently welcome all parts of me (without the intent to fix or heal or change those parts) – THAT is when my heart softens, and I remember that I am ok.

Another benefit is I don’t buy as much shit I don’t need.

Another benefit is that I want to punch other people in the face WAY less.

Some will see my willingness to meet my own suffering as indulging complaints – that I am in a victim mindset.

Who are the victims, really Is it the ones willing to belong to their own sweet selves with compassion and enoughness, even and especially when it is a tad messy & extremely uncomfortable Or those jumping through plastic masked hoops to pretend they aren’t exactly what they are?

Make no mistake, this path of self-compassion and choosing the holiness of humanness is NOT EASY. But this is the hard I choose.

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For my fellow leaders who are highly sensitive and overthink often.

allisoncrow — Fri, 04 Nov 2022 21:13:08 +0000

Sensitivity and Overthinking. These two qualities are deep in the cells in my body and way of being. They are not only my biggest struggles. They are also my truly greatest strengths.

They do not always fit nicely in a “contained & performative culture.”

If I wanted to stop feeling or stop over-and-expansively-and-excessively thinking, I could not. No more than I could change the color of my eyes.

Life certainly would be easier and “happier” if I weren’t so sensitive. And I’m sensitive because my mind and senses see sooooo much. You have heard the saying, “Ignorance is bliss.”

Seeing and caring, and feeling come with some burdens. Some days those feel heavy, and on my worst days, I admit to entertaining hopelessness.

Perhaps I don’t run around with a shit-eating grin, kind of bliss in life. But I do live in a different kind of bliss.

I live in the bliss of welcoming (as much as I can) all parts of me. I live in the bliss of living to the wild edges of being human.

Less and less self-shame and self-judgment every day. Only my judgment of myself or others makes me miserable. I’m building the skills and mental muscle memory of seeing myself and the world with compassion.

Instead of trying to fix my sensitivities and the burdens I take on feeling the heaviness of the world, instead of hardening my heart and deciding not to care (I’ve considered this a lot lately), I’m choosing compassion. Again and again.

I choose compassion for my sensitive and overthinking being. I choose calm presence with these parts of me.

I am no longer trying to “be enlightened” as a means of escaping my humanness. Instead, I’m turning toward my humanness with compassion.

If you think and feel deeply, if you sometimes feel you ”care too much,” and if sometimes wish you didn’t give a shit because you’d “be happier and lighter,” I see you. I feel you.

You’ve done nothing wrong. Your concerns are valid. And you are not alone.

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I Believe You.

allisoncrow — Thu, 13 Oct 2022 21:57:18 +0000

Today is a new day. Yesterday was low, low, low….. grateful for my compassionate friend Heather and compassionate nurse Bethany. I spent half the day at the Heart Hospital having some tests (planned, not an emergency).

Here’s what I noticed about being in the hospital while Bethany was tenderly tucking me under a warm blanket for a nap between CT scans:

In the hospital- someone else makes allllll the decisions for me. An

d when this feels GOOD – it is a sign that I am physically and emotionally beat.

Normally I enjoy freedom in making my own decisions.

And I’m not alone. This isn’t just heart attacks, dogs dying, and everyday life and work stress. When I talk to my clients and friends- many of them are DONE.

The mental load is overloaded. Overstimulated. Fragile.

Then there is the internal self-gaslighting, “but most of the world has it sooo much worse, you are weary from quality problems.”

The invalidation makes it worse, and the edges fray a bit more.

But Bethany, nurse Bethany didn’t say – you’re a lucky lady. Many heart attacks are way worse. Suck it up.

She didn’t compare my difficulty to someone better or worse. She validated my experience. She didn’t hold it as a “complaint.”

I believe you.

She said,

“Oh honey, yes, this makes you really nauseous, and that is no fun. May I bring you some juice Stay here as long as you need. We can’t have you going home feeling crummy.”

I believe you.

I believe your experience and I don’t need to invalidate it or criticize it or just because it’s uncomfortable I don’t have to squirm away from it. I believe you.

Dear Ones, you don’t owe anyone your relatability. You don’t have to invalidate your experience because it isn’t as bad as another’s. It’s YOUR experience, and your discomfort and stress are valid.

I wanna be more like Bethany – to myself and others. That tenderness heals. And when we’re healed, we can care more for those that have it way worse.

Today is a new day. Coffee in my cozy bed helps.

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One way anxiety shows up in my mind

allisoncrow — Wed, 13 Apr 2022 15:42:58 +0000

Remembering who I BE in the world has always been tricky for me. Perhaps it’s because my feelers and seeing are always out 362 degrees – it’s a holdover from childhood that makes me brilliant, intuitive, and exhausted. I pick up others and only recently am learning what is mine and what is theirs.

I wake up in the morning and all the ideas are there for me- jumbled in a GIANT, buzzing pile of socks just out of the laundry. No order, not many matches, and many of those socks aren’t even mine. I am very specific about my socks. At times I get so lured in by not mine socks.

On my calendar in the mornings, every day, until at least 10:00 is ME time – to sort the mental socks. Somedays they line up well, and the last few days, like the leftover static from a dryer, my ideas have a tinge of shock and anxiety in them.

Whoever the hell encouraged multitasking in the 80’s – well, I can’t-not multi-task AND, damn you.

Slowing down – as a way of life and time and space has helped tremendously. With each breath I can tune out the chainsaw buzzing down the street, the dogs fighting outside next door, and bring my attention to my own body, and then my own sacred and full desk – where my 9 notebooks, and all my pens and pains, and all my lippies wait for me. A big sip of cold, refrigerator water in one of my favorite steel cups.

I listen in to the anxious and antsy parts.

Hello.

I am here for you.

I see you.

I won’t leave you.

I connect….and listen.

And I hear:

“Things are changing – some things are falling away. That feels uncertain and you know how we feel about uncertainty.”

“Eek…I know we need to loosen our grip with some of these ideas…” and a gasp of scarcity grips my lungs.

I am HERE FOR YOU. I WILL NOT LEAVE YOU.

We are here now. Together.

Breathe in, we are love. Breathe out, we are love.

Breathe in we are creative, breathe out we are held.

Breathe in we are not the world’s ideas, breathe out we are our own.

Breathe in we are safe to be ME.

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