Resistance
Resistance is NOT a one lane highway, by Dr. Jordan Fields Resistance is NOT a one lane highway. Maybe your lane is protesting, maybe your lane is organizing, maybe your lane is counseling, maybe your lane is art activism, maybe your lane is surviving the day. Do NOT feel guilty for not occupying every lane. We need all of them. We NEED everyone
I heard a word earlier in the week that I’ve been chewing on since: resistance. It stems from the Latin roots, resistere, meaning “to stand against” or “to withstand.” Those two definitions feel essentially different to me. To stand against something feels like the creation of a fortress of sorts, a strength to keep something from entering in and to openly say in body, words, or action that something is not welcome. In yoga terms, this reminds me of standing in Warrior pose with my feet firmly planted and my gaze steady before me.
To withstand feels like resistance as an act of containing whatever is unwelcome and not allowing it to break me. Here, in yoga terms, I imagine myself embodying a seated posture—grounded, available to yield, but steady in assurance.
Either position, either form of resistance, I sense is only possible with a nuanced nervous system, one in which I am not exhibiting the signs of overwhelm but awake and resourced. I know what those descriptors look like for me—able to communicate, to discern, alert to possibility but without paralysis or reactivity, supported. Most of all, I sense these definitions of resistance as a way in which my heart and spirit are able to withstand the presence of hatred and fear by refusing the entrance of either.
How to withstand and stand against each new day? Some moments it’s easy to find even a small glimmer of light and watch it shine, remember that darkness has not dismantled light. But other moments bring my heart into my throat, and I find myself choking on the painful experience or words.
Today, I drove past a vehicle painted with a combination of promotional and hate-filled messages. Reading the large-lettered words, shocking and provocative, on a vehicle parked across from an elementary school, rocked me. I arrived home to hear our landline portable phone sending out a persistent message: low battery, low battery. Me too, phone, me too.
My stance today is exhausted, so I am searching for a softer breath, more rest, a call to a friend, a date with beloved family who I can trust to laugh with me. Thank God. Laughter is an essential form of heart resistance. Because what I don’t want to miss is the wonder of creation and to celebrate the simplest blessing of my breath. And yes, I truly believe this is the best and most holy form of worship in these days. It’s so easy to miss both when my nervous system is calibrated to the noise around me. So, how to be involved in repair and healing and resist collapse into anger and despair?
Dear friend, you might be thinking of other kinds of resistance. They’re important too. This is the lane I know right now—to consistently practice care with my heart and nervous system that can allow me to offer refuge as a teacher and friend to the heart and nervous system of others. So that maybe together we can resist hatred, fear, and injustice in the lane that is ours.
If refuge in the form of yoga practices, prayer, poetry, and communal friendship is something that would benefit you or someone you know as you stand in your own lane, but budgets won’t allow for the financial commitment, please email me. I would be honored to share every full post to anyone who finds value here.
For this week, I’m including the week’s yoga practice and full post for one and all. What is giving you refuge in these days, friend, or what would you like to? Sometimes community provides us with the best tools, so write your response in the comments. And in the week ahead, may you have what you need to feel both the strength and the softness to enter this world and witness how beautiful it still and ever is.
Yoga this week: Yoga with Christa
❤️