The Courageous Work of Awareness
and the deeply personal choice of healing
I write often about awareness, acceptance, and space. I love the cadence of this three-part framework and believe deeply in its transformative power. It has changed my life. Yet lately, I've been reflecting on awareness itself and realized something important worth sharing.
Awareness sounds benign. It seems simple on the surface, but in practice, it's profoundly challenging work. There are valid reasons we might resist practicing awareness. It can be uncomfortable, even painful—especially when coupled with acceptance, allowing what we discover to exist without trying to change it.
Perhaps a more accurate description of awareness would be "practicing living with discomfort long enough to hear its wisdom." That has been my journey these past weeks: sitting with discomfort while paying attention to my feelings and noticing how they shape my actions.
What am I noticing?
I feel an almost constant weight on my chest, making deep breaths difficult as I try to stay engaged with what's happening nationally and in my community. Fear arises from deep uncertainty about both short-term events and their long-term effects on the world my children will inherit.
I catch myself seeking relief through unhealthy coping mechanisms—shutting down emotionally or mindlessly scrolling social media for fleeting dopamine hits.
I observe anxiety propelling my internal "never enough" narrative, watching as I continue accumulating responsibilities in an attempt to make things better. I sense the approaching overwhelm without translating that awareness into establishing boundaries and saying no.
My writing and launching TIMBo groups consistently fall to the bottom of my ever-growing to-do list.
In truth, I’ve felt conflicted about offering TIMBo groups partly because I know healing often gets more painful before it gets easier. Healing is hard work! When I first took TIMBo, I would spend ninety minutes practicing awareness and presence. I would finish exhausted like I'd done heavy labor and return to my family drained, receiving puzzled looks from my husband: "You just went to a yoga class, right? Why do you look worse for wear?"
That's the thing about awareness—it's painful. If it were easy, we'd practice it more often. It can be deeply uncomfortable, and I wasn't raised with the tools to stay with discomfort. I was conditioned to tune it out, turn it down, escape, avoid, and when all else failed, to beat myself up. In this new life I'm building daily, I consciously choose to face it. To stay with it. To hold the discomfort long enough to understand its origins, to witness without judgment, and when possible, to make different choices.
Sitting in the TIMBo circle, we are doing the hard work of healing. We're witnessing our pain together, doing what we thought impossible: facing internalized patterns and messages while saying, "I hear you, it hurts, and I still love you."
The choice to do this work is deeply personal. Of course, not all awareness brings pain—that's the reward. Part of my recent awareness is recognizing that I grip so tightly because there's so much to lose. This life brims with gifts! Each moment is precious, I’m grateful to have the choice to move courageously in the world and not let fear drive the bus!
On that note, If you are ready to do this work together- I'm also so excited to launch my first online TIMBo group on Wednesday mornings at 9 am starting on April 23rd. My wonderful partner Mo and I have practiced TIMBo together since 2020 and we are thrilled to offer these groups. We've set rates that we hope make this work accessible, but please don’t let the fee stop you. Reach out if the cost is prohibitive.
I invite you wholeheartedly to courageously join me! Or if you are not yet ready, that's ok too. I will have more groups in the future and the in person group in Jaffrey will be launching in the fall. There is also a Thursday evening group starting in a month by good friends who were in the cohort with me. Reach out to me to reserve your spot or for connection to the other group.
Thank you for your patience as we embark on this new journey. It feels remarkable to acknowledge this transition into facilitation and the time it took to arrive here.
With deepest gratitude,
Hannah B
