Love and Courage in a Global Pandemic, Part Two

by on March 19, 2020

two hands under running water to signify hand washing during the Covid-19 pandemic

Rachael and Dan continue to talk about the impact of Covid-19 and the rapid ways our world continues to change, even in the few days following our first episode. Throughout their conversation, you’ll hear words of hope, encouragement, and some practical ways to help us connect with our bodies and engage the realities of trauma.

How are you engaging your own and others fragmentation?

“Fragmentation requires you to slow down. You may not be as efficient or ‘successful.’ We’re not operating at our optimum. How will you take that into account without trying to outrun the trauma?” Dr. Dan Allender

“If you know how to anticipate what you might be feeling, there can be a sense of disruption. There has to be a tenderness and a grace that this is going to be one of those seasons where you get to disrupt the fragmentation.” Rachael Clinton Chen

Rachael encourages listeners to find a Psalm or two to meditate on during this time of uncertainty to bind our hearts to what is true and engage our fear with a sense of kindness.

Numbness is the body’s natural response to threat, fear, or dread.

“There has to be grace to pay attention to the places where it is easier to dissociate In some ways it’s a context for survival, but it limits our capacity to be present with what is.” Rachael Clinton Chen

“How do we allow ourselves to hold grief for what we can in the moment but know there will be seasons ahead that bear an even greater sense of what this loss has brought? You must be kind to the losses that you can’t even allow yourself to enter very fully.” Dr. Dan Allender

How do we have imagination for a different way of being when isolation is a natural response to this heartache?

As Christians, there are practical ways we can live boldly into this moment in time, including finding a church service and community online, donating to food banks or paying for previously scheduled services, and intentionally connecting with friends over video chat.

“If we can lean into that good impulse in us to be creative, to be playfully defiant, that to me […] will push against realities we have no control over right now.” Rachael Clinton Chen

“Can we honor that we’re all in trauma, as a nation, as a family, as an individual, and can we begin to bring knowledge about trauma to our friendships and conversations?” Dr. Dan Allender

Resources

If you are interested in going deeper with the resources mentioned in this podcast: