Alysa Liu

Friends,

Outstanding 2026 Olympian, skater Alysa Liu, was especially noted for her decision and ability to apparently control the performance pressure and anxiety that challenged so many of the other participants. Her beautiful, joyful, free-flowing, physics-defying free skate suggested this was true, and she could simply let her body and soul offer her remarkable display of grace and skill. Alysa Liu’s graciousness, whether based in her years of experience, or her carefree personality, sets a model for the rest of us to also aspire to try to approach life as unburdened as possible by anxiety and stress while at the same time expecting our character and experience will guide us to success in these often frightful days. Apparently her discernment about how she would handle the anxiety and stress of the expectations of her success were ultimately an important part of her success.

Living without anxiety and stress is “easier said than done," of course. I personally take anti-anxiety medication because I need help in overcoming a life-long level of anxiety. And in addition to the medication, it helps that as I have become older it is easier to be more relaxed and less perturbed by all the events and challenges in my life and all the harsh realities around me and in the world. I have slowly learned to try to distinguish what really matters to me or what level of concern and responsibility I need to assume. In the words of Reinhold Niebuhr's “Serenity Prayer": "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference” 

I attribute much of my success in my early and professional life to how I was so deeply concerned and anxious about injustice, and how I often felt compelled to engage and organize against it. So I developed the skills and the contacts to make it possible for me to successfully do that, but I also lived with the reality of so much of my work was full of anxiety and frustratingly slow or unsuccessful. I was often overcome with anger, confusion and didn’t take the time to look at myself and ask what was really mine to do. I think of Gandhi taking months to plan and to educate his followers  He had to assess his own level of commitment and the commitment of his followers before he could proceed. 

I now realize how important careful discernment is needed today to set a course to resist and redirect the impact of the Trump administration. I realize my most satisfying and least anxious memories of civic engagement were times when I was most realistic and faithful in a discernment process before I could act. That was especially true for our recent process in our "Civility First…So We Can Work Together" campaign that needed a completely different approach to addressing a problem beyond our past experience. Instead of marches, sit-ins, and teach-ins we needed to learn from those who had supported Trump, and our eight year experience was able to establish the goals we had set for ourselves. I hope a similar process of discernment will now take place as we continue to face the threat of unchecked  and unaccountable momentum of the MAGA movement, and the courageous example of the people of Minneapolis has established a base for inspiring millions more to also resist and build an alternative community.

The past year of the second Trump administration has felt so full of anxiety, anger, frustration and even despair over what to do. But then an “ice out” springtime in Minneapolis, the “no king’s” demonstrations, and the thawing of Trump’s hold on the Supreme Court  have given us reason to believe our government can and will change when our people are committed to the solidarity and commitment needed to do so. I have the feeling that, like Gandhi waiting to decide on the salt march, it has taken our collective nation time to experience that we now realize what can be done to resist and how to do it.

The political, social, emotional and spiritual equivalent to Alysa Liu’s confidence and grace in the face of anxiety and stress is for our nation to learn how to apply personal and structural nonviolence in our lives. I hope I am not too naive to believe we as a nation have the necessary resistance and will be successful in establishing alternatives to the authoritarianism that is threatening us. And I am also not so naive to think that it will not also necessitate sacrifice, risk, and perhaps suffering such as the good people of Minneapolis have endured these past months. But what an inspiration they are. 

Blessed be and peace,

Tom