On election night, I jolted awake around 2:30 am filled with an impending sense of doom. My circadian rhythm was whacked out from daylight saving time a few days prior. So I did a few yoga stretches and turned over to go back to sleep.
But sleep eluded me. When I have insomnia, I practice a pranayama (a yogic breathing technique) where I lengthen the space between each breath. In that space, I can often feel my heart beating.
Inhale … tick, tick … exhale … tick, tick. After a few rounds, my unsettled mind added a coda: tick, tick, BOOM. I immediately thought of the Doomsday Clock.
Created in 1947 by scientists who worked on the atomic bomb, the Doomsday Clock represents how close humanity is to destroying the world. Midnight represents the moment that Earth becomes uninhabitable. Over the years, the clock has been set closer to midnight according to an increasingly diverse range of threats, from nuclear war to climate change. Currently, we are set 90 seconds away from midnight.
Tick, tick, BOOM.
A sobering thought. Now I am, by nature, an optimist, one to naturally assume the march of time brings more good than bad. I’m aware that this is a fairly privileged world view; my life has been one of general peace and prosperity. But I have also had my share of world-ending heartbreak and bounced back because I’m resilient and my default setting is a sunny disposition.
Except lately, when I’ve been besieged by thoughts of catastrophe. Everything feels really wobbly.
Of course it does. Entropy is written into the cosmic bargain. The Second Law of Thermodynamics basically guarantees chaos. Things fall apart. That’s the nature of things.
Yet despite it all, Nature has an astounding ability to persevere, adapt, and thrive when given the time and space to do so. A dandelion pushes up through a crack in the concrete and a forest regrows after a devastating wildfire. Trees carefully grow away from one another to allow each tree equal access to sunlight and rainfall. Polar bears thrive in the Arctic due to their thick fur coat and desert locusts survive arid regions due to their evolved tolerance to water scarcity. Coral reefs rebuild after rising temperatures bleach them.
If nature can find a way, so can we. We are, after all, nature too. History has proven humans resilient, with plenty of coping strategies for dark times, should we choose to lean into them.
So I lean in, determined not to start this year filled with dread and hopelessness. I set my phone down and turn my face to the sun. I create more than I consume. I take deeper, longer breaths and encourage those around me to do the same. I ground in the moment and choose carefully the energy I share with the world. I effect change in whatever small way I can, in whatever small corner of the world I inhabit. I hope.
