The In-Between

some moments in life are like a long haul flight from point A to B. In these moments, we are far away from factors that used to control us, but we are also no where close to where we want to be. We are just passengers and it's up to the pilot if we land safely or not.

In these in-between moments we can either face them with discomfort, fear, and helplessness or delight, calm, and curiosity. These liminal spaces really test our neural strength. The brain is wired to prepare itself for potential threats and look for extremes because of the uncertainties. When we don't know what's coming, we overthink every possibility and we conjure worst-case scenarios. While we want to soar the skies we will usually find ourselves facing white-knuckled terror. At this point we fall back to three defense mechanism where we abandon our curiosity and ambition.

• Cynicism - why suffer when we can just survive? doomscrolling, passing up opportunities, making fun of hardworking people. We see transformation as a source of meaningless work, and we abandon our desire to build our dream life.

• Escapism - Retail therapy, binge watching, dream planning. We become peter pan, we confine ourselves to an island where we can break free from the burden, of our responsibilities

• Perfectionism - self-coercion, information hoarding, toxic productivity. We start working all day with no rest or time for ourselves.

These are not personality types but defensive shields that we raise in the face of uncertainty. These are quite normal and they're part of a cognitive process called compensatory control. When confronted with a stressful situation our first response is to remove the stressor and when we cannot remove it, we seek activities that restore our sense of control. Basically anything to compensate for our helplessness.

Not only are these shields quite ineffective in this day and age but they also block our growth, self-discovery, and things that make life exciting. Our freedom actually lies between stimulus and response. We need to choose movement instead of stagnation as the most difficult thing is the decision to act. Exploration instead of paralysis.