How to Stay Grounded When Everything Feels Out of Control

THE EMERGENCY LANDING

I remember thinking this was going to be a bumpy landing. There was turbulence, and the wind was tossing us around. I looked out the window and saw we were just about to touch down when all of a sudden the plane started climbing back up into the air.

OMG. WTF. 

Instantly, my nervous system launched into a full five-alarm panic. My heart was racing so hard I could feel it in my ears. I'm sure there was a massive flood of cortisol coursing through my body.

I grabbed my sister's hand. I was shaking. I heard her say, "It's okay, the pilot is doing the right thing. It's okay."

My brain wasn't having it. I wanted to scream. We touched down, and now we're going back up. WHY??????

I tried desperately not to go to the worst-case scenario. My heart was pounding so hard I could barely hear Maie say, breathe. 4-7-8. And I did the breathing. The one I teach my clients. The one I had actually taught Maie. 

She seemed calm. She's always been the calm one. I'm the histrionic one.

Later, Maie said she thought the landing gear was broken. I thought it could be a wind shear. I'd heard about wind shears and knew just enough to know that they were deadly.

Whatever it was, my nervous system was completely hijacked. The full realization that I was not in control, that I had to trust the pilot, that the plane would hold, that the winds would let us land.

This was the ultimate in letting go. My body said NO at first. But as I breathed and worked through the I'm going to die thoughts, it slowly relaxed.

As we circled Baltimore, my breathing slowed. We sat there clenching hands. I thought, if I die, I'm grateful I'm with my sister.

Maie and I, very happy we survived 

The pilot finally announced that the winds had changed and that we needed to circle around to land.  I felt my body ease a little. I tried not to think anymore.

It had already been an intense trip. Seeing friends and family in Georgia, being in a red state, and carrying things that are hard to carry. I was exhausted before I ever boarded that plane.

The night before, in Savannah, we were on our way to dinner from my friend's house, and the road was blocked by a house that had suddenly burst into flames. We could see black, smoking clouds and red-hot flames. It hadn't been 15 minutes since we had driven right past this house. 

The road was blocked, and we weren't even sure that the fire trucks had arrived. Someone motioned us to turn around.

I kept thinking about how fast fire takes over.

How quickly everything can change.

Back in the Air

We landed the second time, bumpy but on the ground. I said a quiet prayer of gratitude.

As we taxied to the gate, I looked out and saw another Southwest plane being sprayed down by two fire trucks. No smoke that I could see. But there they were.

Mon dieu.

We found a restaurant in the Baltimore airport and ordered salads and wine. Our nerves were shot. As we sat there, I heard a noise and looked toward the kitchen. Two men were wrestling behind the serving counter while two women yelled at them to stop. People around us kept eating like nothing was happening.

Maie got up to find security. The Southwest agents at the nearby counter said they couldn't help. She was persistent with an airport information agent, who couldn't reach airport security. What the hell? 

Eventually, security did arrive after the fight had ended. Then, straightaway, they ran past us to the adjacent gate, where an elderly man had fallen while getting off a flight.

I sat there with my wine and thought, " You really cannot make this stuff up."

That flight was dramatic. But it reminded me of something I see all the time in the women I work with.

We're living in a world that keeps delivering turbulence.

Bad news, uncertainty, things we can't control and don't see coming. Our bodies are in a constant state of bracing for what's next.

And it shows up in quieter ways than an emergency landing.

It looks like a conversation you've been avoiding. A decision you can't seem to make, or one you made and keep second-guessing. The feeling of being frozen when you know what you want to say but can't find the words. The exhaustion of holding everything together when nothing feels stable.

Sometimes life just feels like we're constantly in midair, waiting to find out if this one is going to be okay.

What I know after that flight, and after 30 years of sitting with women in hard moments, is this:

Steadiness isn't the absence of turbulence. It's having somewhere to come back to inside yourself when it hits.

On that plane, I had Maie. She held my hand and reminded me to breathe. I had the tools I already knew. And slowly, my body remembered what it knew, too.

This Is Why I Created the Circle

The Vision Circle is a place to come back to yourself. 

Three Tuesdays in June, where a small group of women are together online, say what's true, use the tools, and hold each other steady. Not to fix the turbulence.

Just to make sure you don't have to white-knuckle it alone.

The world is going to keep doing what it's doing.

The question is whether you have somewhere to get steady.

If you want to be in the circle this summer, the link is below. We start Tuesday, June 16.

Give this as a gift to yourself

The Summer Vision Circle

With love, Jo 💛