When Fear Is Rational, Choose Resilience
This year, my fear doesn’t feel abstract but specific, political, and most of all embodied. I am angry, scared, and I’m no longer interested in softening that truth for the sake of sounding neutral.
I am afraid that democracy is slipping closer and closer toward authoritarianism. I see leaders dismantling the guardrails that once felt sturdy, and they are doing it in plain sight. I am afraid that wealth and power have concentrated so intensely among a small group of white men that the laws are becoming optional for them and rigid for everyone else. When the highest court in our land grants extraordinary protections to one individual to reign, it doesn’t feel like balance; it feels like permission. “Reign” is the language of kings and unchecked rulers, and it has no place in the United States of America.
Rhetoric and party politics don’t unsettle me as much as the actions leaders are taking. I am watching the normalization of state violence and the murdering of innocent citizens while accountability evaporates. I’m seeing immigrants detained and families torn apart in ways that feel more like abduction than due process. It is the quiet creep of white nationalist ideology into positions of authority and the message that some lives matter less and some men answer to no one that continually spikes my adrenaline. These are not dramatic metaphors to me but lived fears.
As someone trained in psychology, I know that fear can either distort our perception or inform it, and anger can signal that something sacred is under threat. When systems that are meant to protect human rights begin to erode them, the nervous system responds. I feel my body responding in a negative way, along with my friends, family, and coworkers. I see it in their exhaustion, I hear it in their guarded voices, and I feel the heaviness that comes from feeling powerless against powerful forces. The heaviness is frustration and anger, followed by hopelessness when people begin to believe their voices don’t matter.
History has shown us how fragile democratic systems can be, but it has also shown us that humans possess an extraordinary capacity for resilience when they anchor themselves in meaning. The Holocaust psychiatrist Viktor Frankl survived by finding meaning in the suffering he endured. He didn’t deny the brutality he and millions suffered, nor did he sanitize oppression. What he observed was that even when circumstances stripped of fairness and humanity, individuals retained one irreducible freedom: the ability to choose their stance. The idea that people have a choice in how they respond to unimaginable circumstances holds a tremendous amount of strength.
Frankl’s theory doesn’t erase injustice, fix corruption, or undo harm; however, it does preserve agency. I cannot control court rulings, single-handedly dismantle concentrated wealth and power, rewrite immigration policy, or guarantee free elections. My anger tells me that I value justice and freedom, but my grief tells me I value human life. What I can do is choose who I become in response to fear. I can choose to stay informed without surrendering to despair. I can choose to vote, to speak, to organize, to support leaders and policies aligned with dignity and equity. I can choose to resist dehumanization in my own language and relationships and to care fiercely about democracy rather than withdrawing from it. Choice doesn’t eliminate fear; it gives it direction.
Resilience, for me, is engagement with clarity. It is refusing to let authoritarian energy dictate my character. It is refusing to let Aryan ideology define the moral center of this country, and it is choosing participation over paralysis. On days when resilience is small, it may mean calling a representative, donating to organizations protecting civil liberties, or supporting immigrant families in tangible ways. It looks like having difficult conversations instead of staying silent and grounding myself in community, so the fear and anger don’t isolate me. I don’t know exactly what lies ahead, but I do know that surrendering to helplessness ensures nothing changes.
As long as we retain the capacity to choose integrity, align with our values, and stand for human dignity, authoritarianism has not fully taken root in us. For now, this is where I find hope, and from that hope, my resilience grows.
