navigating familial fear

I almost didn’t come to Europe. 

The week or so before my flight was due to take off, I was experiencing a ton of fear. 

What if I can’t handle the stress of all the travel? 

Will I be safe traveling alone as a woman? 

What if something happens to me? 

I have heard various traditions speak to this phenomenon - where a lot of fear can come up as you are about to cross a big threshold in your life. 

Some call this “monkey-mind”, others call it “ego”. 

What I know to be true as a psychic is that these fears were not mine. 

Meaning they did not originate from within me or my body. 

A few weeks before I started really getting ready for my travels, I was talking on the phone with my grandmother. 

She had called me a few times, and I could tell there was some anxiousness with her calling, so I called her back. 

The first thing she said to me when we got on the phone was: are you sure you want to go to France in September? 

I watched the energy of her concern out in front of me, and I reassured her, with some amusement, yes, Nana, I do. Thank you for thinking of me, though. 

I could have gotten annoyed that she would even ask me something like that. Or annoyed by the fact that she then not so subtly tried to convince me to change my mind ;) 

But, instead I laughed it off. I noticed the places where I still was triggered, or aka couldn’t hold my space in relationship to her fear, and I gave her some grace. She, as well as pretty much everyone else in my family, shows their love to me through fear. 

Is that a fun way to receive love? No, not especially. But it’s the best they’ve got, and I have done enough work in myself that I can give them space to be there, and for the most part, hold my space in relationship to it. 

Pretty much everyone in my immediate family was triggered and worried about me traveling solo to Europe. 

And so the week before, when I started to notice an influx of anxiety and fearful thoughts, I knew where it was coming from. 

So many people, in this spot, identify with the anxiety or fearful thoughts. 

Oh, I am scared. I don’t want to go to Europe anymore. I’m not sure if I will be able to handle this. 

And yeah, I had my moments where I did this too. I’m human. It’s a pretty engrained pattern. It was challenging. 

But I have enough of a practice of asking: what is mine? what is not mine? 

That I was able to discern the truth, which is that all of these fears were not me or my energy. 

This is why, in my view, it is essential to develop your clairvoyance. 

Your clairsentience, or aka your ability to feel energy, can easily be overwhelmed in moments like these. 

So many of us are SO tuned in to what other people are feeling, that it can be very hard to actually determine what is yours and what isn’t yours when you are just using your ability to sense or your gut feeling. 

Looking at the energy gives you a much clearer answer.

If I had listened to the fear in my space the week before my flight took off, I wouldn’t have gotten on my flight. I would have decided to stay or wait to leave later. 

But that wasn’t MY truth. And I saw that. So, I said yes to getting on my flight, even as the fear in my space went crazy ;)

Acknowledging that this fear wasn’t mine also made it easier for me to begin to let it go, though.

Essentially, I was being bombarded by a lot of foreign fear, and it was illuminating places where I still couldn’t hold my space in relationship to other people’s worry or concern. 

What a gift- to have these places illuminated, so I can heal them and become more solid. 

So, instead of being upset with my family and their endless concern for my wellbeing- I can instead say, thank you! 

Thank you for helping me grow and showing me where I am still allowing other people’s fear to run my life. 

I am sitting here, now, writing this to you, looking out across the sparkling Mediterranean Sea.

The sound of the waves gently caressing the shore and the beat of music from a nearby boat wafting in through the open window. 

The moist smell of ocean air that feels like home to me no matter where I am in the world, and I am so, so grateful I didn’t listen to other people’s fear. 

I am so grateful I chose myself, and I am so grateful to have psychic tools that make it easier for me to choose myself, again and again.