S1:E14 - Dealing With Uncertainty

Today's podcast is brought to you by uncertainty...and cats. You'll hear quite a few meows, and a few purrs, mixed in with my words. I share a technique that works for me when things aren't as I would like them to be, while also reminding all y'all that not everyone has access to moments of quiet.

Please feel free to check out my websites.

Mom's Strange Magic - www.momsstrangemagic.com
Home of The KimboBurly Tales - www.kimeupton.com

#uncertainty #grannywomen #healing #calm #momsstrangemagic

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

So usually I have everything worked out for the podcast, but today is a little wonky, and I'm gonna step away from the topic that I had scheduled for today, which was more about ancestry and genealogy. Hi, I'm Kim, the voice and face of Mom Strange Magic. I'm also the stu the storyteller for the Kimbo Burley Tales. And today I'm gonna talk about nothing. Really about sitting in the quiet when the world gets wonky. How can we allow ourselves the ability to be okay with uncertainty? I mean, that's really the point of it, right? You have everything planned out, you have an idea of what's gonna happen moving forward, and something happens. You spill coffee on your shirt, you trip over a cat, your computer won't start correctly. And we think sometimes that that's the universe, right? The universe is quietly working to shower us with blessings, and so the coffee spill, the trip cat, the computer must be a sign of something. Very often, in my past part of being me, I would I would have that experience. So, like in my 20s, right? I would, you know, uh a professor wouldn't be in class, and I'd be like, oh, that's probably why I should have not come, you know, whatever. Just we sort of read into things sometimes a little more than what is there. And that is what you do as someone that kind of lives in the liminal. You also, you know, you're like, whoa, I just saw 92 pigeons flying at me. That must be a sign. And while, yes, it could be a sign, not giving yourself the space to just be in the quiet after that happens, to sit with uncertainty. And you know, as I'm going through this, I'm thinking, how am I gonna title this podcast? And it's like I've said some really good titles there, but I think maybe what I need to focus on is, and this is just off the cuff today. I don't have any notes, I don't have anything planned. Um, I think that maybe it's a good day to talk about sitting with uncertainty. This is something that I have a wealth of experience in because life for me has been a little uncertain. Um, starting with family of origin stuff, kind of going through where I grew up and how I was raised, living in a rural poor area, um, being a rather precocious kid that asked a lot of questions and not having kind of access to or having an outlet for that. Um, you know, going through life wanting to kind of be more professional and tell stories and share the kind of gifts and talents that I have, and always making sure that I left no stone unturned put me in situations that I probably shouldn't have been in. None of them were too dangerous, but um, you know, an example of this would be bungee jumping when I was a freshman in college. Should not have done that. At the time, I didn't know I had a connective tissue disorder. Um, and I was like, I'm gonna do it this way. The person that was, you know, got me hooked up and was like, okay, all you need to do is just step off. And I'm like, okay, and they're like, whatever you do, don't jump off. And I'm like, mm-hmm, yeah, sure. That couldn't be problematic. Um, if you've ever bungee jumped, you know that you do not jump off. Just walk off. Um, and how I survived that day is beyond me, but I think the powers that be thought that it it was that there was still work to be done. But the you know, the fact that all life is uncertainty gets a little bit spiritual, uh it gets some excuse me, it gets a little a kitty. It gets a bypassed by um a lot of the influencer like spiritual bigwigs, right? It's it's the you shouldn't avoid uncertainty at all cost. Uh if something is difficult, that means it's not for you. Um, and just things that don't make sense to me as someone who has by the seat of their pants and in serendipitous ways found mentors that have taught me that in the uncertainty, in the quiet parts of uncertainty, is where the real work happens. And, you know, certainly if I come upon a herd of wildebeests or wild boars out in the forest, I'm not gonna sit there and go, this is an uncertain situation. I'm gonna sit here and ponder that. No, I'm going to absolutely make a decision right there based on keeping myself safe. Now, I'm not a very fast runner, so I might not outrun the wild boars or the wildebeests, but that is not a time for contemplation. There are times when the uncertainty is puts you in a position of having to make a choice immediately. So that's not exactly what I'm talking about. The prime example is today. Um, you know, having my topic, having it outlined, and then sitting down this morning to get some work done and having things shift in a way that was not the way that I wanted them to go. So I had to sit in that moment, and I sat with it just a little bit too long, and it gave me, it gave me, as I like to say, um, the wonkiness. It gave me the wonkiness. So I had to sit with that, and I it was not I was not in a position where I had to make some kind of decision. There's a cat. Hold on. Patches, Patches. I'm pretty sure you can probably hear her, but she's going to keep making that noise until I acknowledge her. So you can't see her, but just know that there she is. Patches, come here. Do you want do you want to say something to the podcast people? What? Patches is a very good um mascot for uncertainty. When things get a little uncertain for her, she likes to make a call, meaning if she can't figure out where the next bits of food or pets are, no, really, she's not that. She's just a very, she's a very deep feeling cat. So yeah, maybe she'll hop up here with me on the podcast. But anyway, so that put me in a place of very, very, very wonky uncertainty when I was like, this is not whatever, you know. So now that you know that story, and Patches has come to tell us sing us the song of her people, um she's like, hey, I want to be your special guest on your podcast today. Usually it's whiskey or tootsie, but today it's Patches. And what's funny is that even though I have kind of the cover on, I have a cover on my microphone to try to keep out ambient sounds, when I listen to the playback, I can hear her clearly. It's hilarious. Um, so yeah. So what are some tools that I have when uncertainty happens? The first thing is that I just get still. I I think, okay, brain, you and I are having a tussle. We're trying to figure out something that doesn't have any answer. Don't use confirmation bias. You don't need to run to any Oracle tools or anything like that. What you need to do is just sit for a minute. This is some something that's telling you to sit. Sorry. See? See, that's how like Patches is like, I'm coming to teach your listeners how to sit with uncertainty. That's her answer. So, you know, the end of the podcast is now, Patches has told us that when uncertain and wonky things happen, all you do is meow. Anyway, I do something that um some of you that are children of the 70s and in the early 80s will remember the stop, drop, and roll, where if something was causing you to be a little bit incendiary or hot due to flames, you would stop, drop, and roll. And I adapted that to stop, drop, and get into the body. And by that, I mean what is my body feeling right now? So when the wonkiness happens and things aren't going the way, and I'm having a reaction, right? I'm having, well, come on, do you want to get up on the I'm gonna have to look at where the planets and the moon and the stars are today because this, I mean, from the moment my feet hit the ground this morning, I have literally been like, Where, what, why, and how? Okay, so stop, drop, and get into the body. If there's wonkiness going on, if I'm having reactions, the first thing I'm gonna check to see is do I need a snack? Do I need to get up and walk around? Have I been sitting in my office too long? Do I need a drink of water? Do I need to pet a cat? What is it that my body is trying to tell me because it is having an intense reaction to something that wouldn't normally cause me any kind of stress? So I stop, drop, get into the body. I get my drink of water, get my little snack, and pet a cat, and things still feel really off. My next course of action is to look back at my journal, to look at things that I've written about, to analyze my dreams, to see how my interactions have been with people that I know, and what was something that could have brought on this kind of feeling of uncertainty or of reaction to something that is just normal, right? People spill coffee, people trip over cats. Sometimes our technology doesn't work. Yesterday, in the middle of something that was very important for me to get done before I had to run errands, the power went out and I was unable to finish that task. It's the Patches and Cambo show. Yay! Uh, what Patches wants is for me to put her blankie on the couch. So I'm going to do that. You can't see me do that. Um, okay. Yes, there's there it is, honey. There's your blankie. There's your blanky. That was patches, everybody. Okay, so back to my main point. Okay. Stop, drop, get into the body, looking at anything that had happened in the past few days that might have made me feel insecure or unable to handle uncertainty. And then the third thing is I get a breath. I just get a breath in and I get a breath out, and I say this I am loving awareness. I borrowed that from Ram Das, but it always brings me back to center, it always brings me out of that uncertainty. It always helps me see a situation from a different angle, it helps me to be proactive instead of reactive. So I find that that is very helpful to just say I am loving awareness. I have a mala, which is a like a prayer bead set. It has 108 beads with the guru bead. And I just say that 108 times. Patches now wants to get on my lap. Patches, I am loving awareness. What do you need? What do you need? I wonder how the transcript's gonna look for this after this is uploaded. So that's my three tools, right? The first one is stop, drop, and get into my body, feel my body. The second one is to look at past experiences or interactions I've had over the over the course of the last few days or the last week or so. Um, also I find that the wonkiness does get worse if I get on social media or uh look at the platforms owned by the uh company that rhymes with FETA because that is that is made to fire you up. So I I I if I engage with that too much, yeah, I find myself just exactly. Um patches is like meow, I'm like, yes, that's exactly how I feel. Um so I, you know, what was my usage? I have a great tracking app that says, oh, you were on the Feta platform for 20 more minutes than you should have been, and that's probably whatever. Um, and then the the mantra, I am loving awareness, or you could say anything. You could say this this wonkiness is not my path, or this wonkiness is only temporary. And that is that is how I sit with uncertainty. Now there are so many great techniques out there, and I know that using excuse me, the Google can be difficult because a lot of things are search engine optimized, so you might find you might find something that just doesn't sit with you. Also, I suggest finding something that fits within your personal belief system, and don't try to walk yourself into another path or belief unless that's something that you're already studying. Um folks that I've worked with that aren't familiar with like prayer beads or rosaries or malas, when I suggest getting one to use in their daily practice, they don't feel comfortable with that. And I understand that completely. That is not something that is what they grew up with, so we work together to find a prayer or a passage that they like in their particular holy book that brings them peace. Um, that is how that is just important for me when working with people is to meet them where they are, and tying that in to my day is that very often when people come to me, they have been dwelling in uncertainty for so long that often they cannot even tell me what it is that they're looking for, and that is also something that I have experience with because as I have taken my journey to where I am now, from being locally teaching art classes on watercolor and journaling and storytelling and working with the adult education system, and then I had to I had to do my primary job, which is to be a parent, and I need I was needed in that role far more than I was in the path that I I wanted. Um, I needed to step up and do the right thing, and that made me be on a 10-year hiatus where I'm well, I know, and my appearance was that of a super flake, the most wishy-washy of wishy-washy, because I could not step back into the role or my path or my vocation outside of my personal life without having to stop and start and stop and start. And that whole decade of and plus a little more really taught me the importance of not letting uncertainty take you down and not letting what others observe about you define who you are. And there are some people that still find me that way, and that's okay. It's not my I don't need to change their opinions of me, they don't pay my bills, they are not here helping me. Um, I honor that they feel that way, and I move on, right? I stop, drop, and get into my body. I see if there are any past things that might make me aggravated about that, and then I say my little mantra. And then I have cats. Cats are definitely magicians. I mean, I think really all pets are. If you are able to have a pet or to be around animals, um, they are definitely arbiters of spiritual and sacred ways. Um, again, often by tripping you after you spill coffee on your way to your computer. So as I as I wrap up for today for this short little podcast, there's a few things that I would like to talk about. Just sorry, I'm I'm moving, I'm moving. This is an interactive podcast of uncertainty and wildness. Join me, Kim, the voice and face of Mond Strange Magic, as I take you on the magical mystery tour of my Wednesday with the high pollen count and an allergy to cats, um, a slight allergy to cats, but anyway. We don't like uncertainty. We want our leaders and our practitioners and the people that we know to show up as we want them to show up all the time. It is hard to understand sometimes when a person who has been one way for so long might make some kind of shift or pivot off to another way. And when you really, really want them to be that specific way. It's the same with the computer, right? You you go to sit at your desk, um, work in your office or whatever, you turn on your computer every morning and it works, but this morning it doesn't. You get your coffee, you picked out your favorite outfit, you're gonna wear it to work, you're you're gonna wear it to run errands, and you spill coffee on it. You don't have time to change, you don't have time to clean your shirt, so you just have to show up as you are. And then with the example of the cat, you know, you trip, you might tear your pants, you might hit your hand, you might, you know, just get really frustrated. And that is part of the magic of being human, right? And I think it's also part of what makes people want to run to things they see, um, you know, especially if this tarot reads for you, or if this reading shows up on your uh timeline, or if you see this message, or whatever, kind of that clickbait hook that you see a lot of in social media, that we start to put things together and feel like, oh yeah, this is definitely it. But the the real thing, the true thing is that while this might be something that is for the whole human population, say, for example, like astrology or world news or something of that nature, the important part of uncertain times is how you Work and walk within them. Uncertainty doesn't mean that the universe doesn't like you or that God is angry at you or whatever deity or um diaspora you follow is upset. Sometimes things just happen. And how we react in those moments is more about our sacred self and our divine self than some, you know, shenanigan energy trying to mess with your day. When you feel those moments of uncertainty, sometimes there are lessons in them, but from my perspective, those are lessons about how you can better navigate life and your experiences going on around you. At least for me, that's how it's been. And while I'm not one of those people that say this is how it is for everyone, maybe just ponder that a little bit for yourself. That if there's wonkiness, what can you learn from it? How can you make that wonkiness change and shift to something that is going to move you further on your path? That's kind of where I want to sit with that. Now, here's also my favorite little caveat. Not everyone in the world can do that. I have the resources to do that, and I am able to take those moments to find clarity. There are large populations in the world that cannot do that. They are constantly in fight or flight. They don't have an opportunity to catch their breath and make a decision on something going wrong in their day, because very often they are making a decision that will impact the rest of their life. So I'm, you know, I'm walking that tightrope between the two of them. What I find is that the more trying to get access to good wellness and good care is often overlooked for those that are in need. And oftentimes, because of that, because they cannot pay the exorbitant fee to go to say the oncologist or whatever, they often rely on things that they have read on social media and things of that nature, which makes a whole group of people think that those people are illiterate or not smart, or they use colorful, inappropriate phrases for them, um, i.e. uh deplorables, and they turn the act of uncertainty into this weird us versus them. That really is upsetting for me, and I find in the work that I do where I sort of align with the energy of the greenny woman, which I was gonna do green woman part two today, but that was not in the cards, so to speak. Um, just wasn't the day for it. I just it I I I have a lot of emotion around that based on my own research uh for my family line and trying to engage in not being not not having appropriation in my work because you know I am a white girl from Ohio, and I don't want to take the the culture and faith of other people, and that's sort of why the work that I do goes under the name Mom Strange Magic, because that's sort of the path that I've formed on my own, uh, with the help of my husband and family. But that's that's kind of what I do, and that is in that I'm constantly living in sort of this nebulous, uncertain place because I want to stick to the ways of sitting on the porch and having, you know, the people that need help come in and get it and you know, bring their their flower or their whatever to you know to really uh sort of engage in that traditional community healer for those that could not get access to the wealthy um wellness avenues. But also knowing that being online and using the methods that I do and the platforms that I do might help educate people on what this work is and maybe help them find a way to feel like someone is listening to them, that they are heard and that they are understood. And many times it is those people that don't have access to the moments to sit in uncertainty. They don't have access to seek counsel from someone, they don't have that access. And it is my hope that by doing these podcasts and my videos and the things that I do that uh you know, and the that someone will hear it or see it and feel like someone understands who they are and where they are in times when they feel uncertain. So there's my little PSA, and you know, as the professionals say, I'm supposed to ask you to like and subscribe. Um, but you know, do that if it calls to you. Uh if it doesn't call to you, then that's fine too. If you've made it this far and you're like, what is this lady trying to tell me? I get that as well. Um, but if there's one thing that I would like to leave, you know, leave you with is that in times of uncertainty, you are able to take a moment and just get a breath. And that I also understand on the opposite side of that, I understand that sometimes people don't have that opportunity. So if things are really going wonky for you, and the best that you can do is just get a breath and turn around and try again, then go for that. If you have a little bit more time, again, I suggest that you know, where do you feel it in your body? What could have maybe made you feel a little tender and try saying a prayer or a mantra to kind of get back to being grounded in yourself. So with that, this is the end of this week's podcast. I appreciate each one of you for being here. If you would like to check out my personal website, it's kimeupton.com. It's where I write little random things every day. If you want to learn more about my services, you can check out momstrangemagic.com. And I will be writing there soon. Uh that's on the schedule, but for now you'll just see a beautiful welcome, a little bit about me, how you can get to my YouTube page, and how you can get to the podcast. So thank you for being here. I appreciate you listening, and I will see you next week.