Soulful Activism: Courage to Feel Everything

Friday, 11 July 2025 Written by Semele Xerri Views: 6107

Stillness can feel unbearable. Facing what we’re actually feeling or hearing in the moment feels like too much.

But when we avoid it, we miss the truth waiting just beneath the surface – the pain, the sorrow, the fear of uncertainty. And yet, that’s exactly where healing, and soulful activism, begins.

So much of today’s human suffering stems from our resistance to sitting with discomfort. You can see it everywhere in the constant push toward the next high, the next achievement, the next distraction. It shows up in the rage and vicious backlash when someone’s beliefs are questioned or contradicted.

In 2016, these same questions were stirring in me and I gave them voice in a poem inspired by Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

If you prefer to listen, play the video below. Otherwise, read on.

Watch the video

To be or not to be
In trying so hard not to be
That which I wish to avoid,
All I have known and felt as
Hurtful
Painful
Isolating
Challenging
Unloving
Unpopular
I can deflect.
I can forget to be –
I can neglect to be –
All that I am.
Was this Hamlet’s perplexity?
Do I live a life of not being,
Rather than of being?
That IS a question.
For one is spent on denial,
Repression and suppression,
Perpetual fight or flight.
It is a reactive No,
A living death.
The other roots in acceptance,
Open-ness and feeling,
Continual ebb and flow.
It is a passionate Yes
To life and rebirth.

Let me take a brief, meaningful detour. I recently reshared a Facebook post from 2016 that feels just as relevant now as it did then; much like the poem. Both were written nine years ago, and here we are in 2025: a universal nine year in numerology. A year of endings, completions, and deep reflection. It’s a time to release what no longer serves, to clear space for the renewal and possibility of the cycle to come.

There’s something quietly powerful about that alignment. With hindsight I know that while I’d recognised this truth with my head back in 2016, it’s taken the past nine years to fully experience it with the rest of me. And the learning continues.

Later on in this famous soliloquy, Hamlet says:

“To die, to sleep –
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished.”

Yes, he’s speaking about death, and even suicide, as an escape. But there’s another layer here that speaks just as powerfully to our own times: the seductive lure of sleep. Close your eyes to the injustice, the cruelty, the power-hungry destruction dressed up as progress or protection. Numb out. Stay asleep. Don’t wake your soul to the raw, painful, beautiful truth of life in all its multidimensional, interconnected depth. Because if you did truly wake up… you’d have to act.

And that’s exactly what this moment in history is asking of us.

Soulful activism

To move through the upheaval already unfolding, we need to stay flexible. We need to meet the unknown with openness. We need the courage to see differently, feel deeply, and live in a new way. That kind of shift only happens when we’re fully embodied – grounded in our physical selves and present to the full spectrum of feeling.

This is what it means to be truly alive. To embrace both life and death as sacred aspects of the human journey.

The more you practise staying present with your experience – physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually – the more you tap into an inner steadiness. A quiet strength that doesn’t waver, no matter what storms rage within or without. That’s the peace you bring with you, into every conversation, each encounter, all choice.

Peaceful presence isn’t passive. It’s a quiet, steady force that ripples outward; disarming conflict, grounding chaos, and creating space for real change to take root. In a world wired for reaction and noise, just being present with calm awareness is a radical act. It’s soulful activism.

Exercise to embrace your feelings

Here’s a simple exercise that may be helpful for you to allow your feelings to be present. Remember – it’s the experience of fully feeling whatever’s there that’s healing.

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