A Spell for Evolutionary Discomfort

Okay, love. Today's incantation might make you more uncomfortable than usual. It will challenge you to be real about your discomfort, and how you choose to experience it. I'm sorry, but I'm not sorry. I believe this world needs you at your most fully expressed, at your most free to grow. I hope today's spell helps you to honor that version of you.

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Evolutionary discomfort is choosing the discomfort of expressing yourself, rather than impressing that discomfort by pretending to be someone you’re not. I can be dangerous. It requires you to be courageous. But the alternative, holding that hurt and frustration inside? That’s incredibly destructive.

Transcript: A Spell for Evolutionary Discomfort

Natalie Miller: Welcome to Mind Witchery. I’m your host, Natalie Miller, and I’m so glad you’re here. 

Hello, my love. Today's episode is about discomfort. As the title tells you, it is a spell for evolutionary discomfort. And this is an idea that has been personally really empowering to my own unfolding and strengthening and liberation as a person here on planet Earth, and I hope it will be the same for you.

OK. So first let's talk about the word comfort. You know your girl went straight to the etymology sites to see the roots of this word. And really what kind of struck me as most interesting and most telling is that the word "fort" is in "comfort," right, like fort as in a stronghold or a place that is sealed off from, protected from the battle.

So once upon a time, comfort was really pointing toward strength. But then over time, beginning in the 17th century, comfort began to be associated with that which produces a kind of physical ease. Yeah? It's like you're in the fort, and maybe you're thinking of like a castle-ish fort with a moat, or maybe you are thinking of a blanket fort [laughs] that you made as a kid, but fort as in this retreat place.

And I want to be super, super, super clear. I don't think there's anything wrong with wanting comfort. Like, of course we want comfort. We are mammals. Of course we want a place that we can feel safe and easeful and able to rest and relax. Yeah?

Like, I think comfort food is great. I think a comfortable home is great. Comfort is wonderful. And/but here on planet Earth, there is a lot of discomfort. There's a lot of discomfort because we don't all live in our completely isolated strongholds, right? There's discomfort because we co-create, we co-exist with one another, with our environments, within all kinds of systems, with all of their expectations and limitations and—right? Planet Earth is an uncomfortable place, in a lot of ways.

So this spell for evolutionary discomfort is sort of saying, listen, there are times where comfort really isn't an option. Even if you can afford to live on a compound, you're still living in society. Even if you are self-isolating from it, you're still in it. There's no such thing as doing it alone for us human beings. We aren't isolated. We are all together in this. 

And so evolutionary discomfort, in my mind, is where we as human beings can show up to the uncomfortable situation, and we can face it. And in facing it, we can shift it. So what do I mean by facing it? I will offer two ways of thinking about discomfort here and, hopefully, illustrate what I mean by facing discomfort in an evolutionary way.

So you've maybe heard me say before that very often when we are in a situation that's not working for us—and this could be anything: this could be you're in a relationship that's not working for you; you are in a job that's not working for you; you're just being in a way that's not working for you—there is discomfort. And you, like me, might be avoiding making a change because the change is also uncomfortable, right? 

So let's say you are an entrepreneur. You know you're not charging enough money for your services, and/but raising your prices feels very uncomfortable. Maybe it feels like going out on a limb. Maybe it feels like taking a chance. Maybe even just declaring our work to be that valuable feels uncomfortable. 

And here's the thing that I think is really important to understand about evolutionary discomfort. You are uncomfortable either way. You are uncomfortable continuing to charge too little for your services, and you are uncomfortable thinking about charging more for your services. Right? 

There is no refuge from the discomfort. The stuff that's not working is not working. There is discomfort either way, so which discomfort do you choose? Which one do you choose? Which discomfort helps you to grow in the direction you want to grow? 

And P.S., there's not a right or wrong answer here. It really is up to you and your values and your own chosen trajectory. The trick here, the magic, is acknowledging, owning that there is discomfort either way.

Right now, I am affiliated with an organization that—it's just not aligned with my values any longer. It's just not. I've been feeling it for quite some time. I mean, oh gosh, this doesn't really feel quite right for a while now. Right? The discomfort has been building.

Now, leaving the organization, no longer being affiliated with the organization, that's uncomfortable for me because it does feel like a source of connection, a source of some level of prestige, a source of money. There are a lot of assets here. [laughs] There are a lot of things that have contributed to my well-being. And/but more and more, there is discomfort because there's misalignment and, I think, in some ways, because I've outgrown the organization, or my pace of growth, the trajectory of my growth has gone in a different direction, and so now there's strain and there's discomfort. 

So in sitting with the decision—do I stay or do I leave, do I try to keep working this out, or do I let it go, right?—I get to face the discomfort that would come with no longer being part of this organization, knowing that either way there is discomfort, right? I'm not fooling myself saying that, well, you know, it's not that bad. No, it is, actually. 

There is discomfort if I stay, there's discomfort if I leave, and so which do I choose? And, listen, it's not just leaving that is uncomfortable. It's also uncomfortable speaking truth. It's also uncomfortable asking for more. It's also uncomfortable claiming our time. All of these acts are uncomfortable, maybe because we're not accustomed to doing so, maybe because the dominant culture prefers we don't. 

They're uncomfortable and, at the same time, they are absolutely evolutionary, not just for us but for everyone. Truly, when we say, "No, I need more help," when a chorus of us says, "No, we need more help," that does begin to make a difference. 

Now, was it uncomfortable to ask for help? For me, it always is. [laughs] It's always uncomfortable to ask for help. And at the same time, when I do it, and you do it, and they do it, when a chorus of us do it, we get our own practice doing it. We get more facility there, and also we create a different example, a different way. 

It's like those first ladies that were wearing pants. I'm sure it was very uncomfortable at some point to walk in someplace with pants instead of a skirt. But they kept doing it and thank goodness, because pants are great. My point here is that honoring our needs, asking for more, that is also evolutionary discomfort. 

Another layer of this that was a huge realization for me last year that I hope will be helpful for you too is that, often for me, when there is discomfort—and this could be, again, in a group affiliation or even in a one-on-one relationship—what I choose to do is to take all the discomfort, and kind of keep it inside of me. That is, to avoid an uncomfortable interaction, to avoid an uncomfortable conversation, right, I often—not always but often—will prefer to hold all the discomfort in my own fort [laughs], in my own stronghold, rather than allow the discomfort to exist between me and the entity with which I'm not aligning or resonating.

So what does that look like? It looks like, rather than expressing a disappointment, I will just hold the disappointment. I'm speaking in present tense, but actually after I recognized that, I began to get better and better and better at not holding it in or down. Yeah?

Now, there are all kinds of reasons that people would gather up discomfort, and hold it in, rather than allowing the discomfort to exist out in the world. And of course, as always, the more privilege you have, the easier it is to do that, and the less privilege you have, the more difficult, the more, frankly, dangerous it is to do that, right, to allow discomfort to be out in an interaction or to be expressed, right, not impressed into us but, rather, expressed into the world. 

So this feels to me really important to say because holding in all of the discomfort, holding back all of the discomfort, like, having it inside of ourselves rather than working it out in our interactions in the world, it's really harmful. I believe it causes chronic pain. I'm working my way out of chronic pain right now, and, really, I think that the chronic pain has come from me impressing my discomforts rather than expressing them, for a decade. 

And we know that things like systemic racism impact communities of colors' access to health services, but I think also systemic racism requires a level of impressed discomfort that of course manifests in all kinds of health problems in and of itself, right? Like, "don't ask, don't tell" is impressing discomfort rather than allowing it to be expressed. All of the anti-trans legislations are impressing discomfort rather than allowing them to be expressed. 

Part of the reason I chose the word "evolutionary" is that if we are going to be with discomfort in an evolutionary way, this idea of having the discomfort outside of ourselves rather than inside of ourselves, I think, is the way for us as a humanity to evolve. And maybe something to say here is that, you know, when we are doing this for ourselves, when we are being with discomfort in this evolutionary way, that is, we're choosing the discomfort that helps us grow and align with our values, or we are choosing to express the discomfort rather than impress it, we're never just doing that for ourselves. We are doing it also for the collective. 

And the result of the expression will also evolve. It will unroll over time. So I was thinking, what could be a good example of this? And I thought, oh, Anita Hill—Anita Hill—Anita Hill, who testified about the sexual harassment she endured from Clarence Thomas who—how is this man still on the Supreme Court of the United States? 

But Anita Hill testifies. She expresses her discomfort. She explains it. She brings it out into the open. Now, the immediate result was not a win, right? [laughs] Like, expressing that discomfort did not give her the triumph over her harasser, and/but she ignited a much more frank discussion about sexual harassment in the workplace, and we can look at history to see the effects of that.

The year following her testimony, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission saw a 50% increase in sexual harassment complaints. Like, sexual harassment was inserted into the national dialogue in a different way. And even bigger than that, for Anita Hill, the discomfort didn't have to be locked into her. It got to be out in the world. 

And she said in an interview, "I think there's someplace in your conscience that says if I don't act, then I will have been a part of something I don't want to live with." Right? Like, better out than in. And she also talks about how, for her, what was motivating is that it was bigger than her, meaning, bigger than the return she might receive on the uncomfortable act. 

She—I imagine [laughs] she didn't think for a moment that she was going to win. Like, what evidence would she have to suggest that that would be easy that a room full of elected white men, for the most part, would stand behind a Black woman? And indeed, she says, Anita Hill says, "Had there been more women in the Senate in that moment," she believes that maybe he wouldn't have been confirmed. 

Now [laughs], as we have seen in Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation, a lot of women, especially white women, are perfectly willing to support an abuser, so—and/but when we think about what Anita Hill is saying, hey, if there had been more women, if there had been more women of color, for sure, in the Senate, maybe it would have been different.

And, listen, what does it take for more women to be in the Senate? A lot of discomfort, a lot of evolutionary discomfort, a lot of women stepping into their worthiness to lead in a culture that would prefer that they do not, a lot of women using their voices and being willing to be more visible in a dominant culture that is hell-bent on picking them apart and criticizing them, yeah?

It takes a great deal of evolutionary discomfort to put ourselves out there, to stand up for our values. And it is that, it is that evolutionary discomfort that creates more space for all of us to be who and how we are. I truly believe that. 

So the spell for evolutionary discomfort has these two parts. One of them is what we were just talking about: better out than in. If I'm uncomfortable in a job, in a relationship, in a role, if I'm uncomfortable with my abuser being nominated to office, if I'm uncomfortable having to pretend I'm someone I'm not, evolutionary discomfort is choosing the discomfort of expressing rather than impressing that discomfort.

And I know that can be dangerous, and I know it is incredibly courageous, but I also think it is dangerous to hold it inside of ourselves. I think it's incredibly destructive. So that's one part: better out than in. 

Here's the other part: there will be discomfort either way. It is not truly comfortable to live out of alignment, out of alignment with our values, out of alignment with our desires, out of alignment with our own evolving selves. 

All the time, we outgrow situations. We outgrow affiliations. We outgrow relationships. And that is OK. But holding on and pretending that hasn't happened, that is very uncomfortable. 

Will it be uncomfortable to speak our minds, to disaffiliate, to break up, to move out, to quit? Yes, that will be uncomfortable. But let's honor that it is as uncomfortable to stay. So which discomfort do we choose? 

All right, my love, today's spell [laughs] might have made you more uncomfortable than usual, or might have asked you to honor and recognize and be real about your discomfort. I'm sorry, and I'm not sorry. 

I believe this world needs you at your most fully expressed, at your most free to grow, and I hope that today's thoughts help you do that. Thank you as always so much for listening. Bye for now.

Thank you for listening to this episode of Mind Witchery. To catch all the magic I’m offering, please subscribe to the show, or if you want a little bit of weekly witchiness in your inbox, sign up for my Sunday Letter at mindwitchery.com. If today’s episode made you think of a friend or loved one, your sister, your neighbor, please tell them about it. We need more magic-makers in this troubled world. 

Like all good things, this podcast is co-created by stellar people. Our music is by fabulous DJ, artist, and producer, Shammy Dee. Our gorgeous art is by the sorcerers at New Moon Creative. Mind Witchery is produced in conjunction with Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, executive producer. And I am Natalie Miller. Till next time. 

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