Notes from the Swiss Alps: No. 4 — The Great Shedding

I experience anxiety.
Like, I’m experiencing it right now as I type these words.

I’ve struggled with anxiety for years — but not always. I believe some of it is inherited, cellular memory passed down from generations before — a fear of that which cannot be controlled. But since moving here, I’ve realized there’s another story too. One I’m only now beginning to see, because this small mountain village has given me permission to listen again.

No distractions. No escape routes.
Just me — and the silence.

It feels like a meteor shower inside my chest, lighting up the sky of my nervous system. The constant barrage of fiery thoughts leaves me no choice but to surrender. There’s too much coming at once, and my usual behaviors of avoidance or distraction are no longer available here.

Quick comforts, small indulgences, the constant overstimulation of “elsewhere” — none of it exists in this valley.
Even the grocery stores are simple. There are no rows of endless options calling to me from every direction.

And strangely, that’s been a blessing.

I found ghee the other day in a market in Italy and thought I was dreaming.

The buzzing I’ve always felt — that restless hum that made me feel like a huge vibrating sphere with no edges — has been shrinking. Slowly, it’s drawing inward, finding its center. My nervous system was tuned to a different frequency in California. Here, at 5,550 feet in the Swiss Alps, it beats to another rhythm entirely.

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Assimilation and Anxiety

How do we adapt to a new place?
What does it mean to truly assimilate into a new culture?

These questions swirl through my mind, and I can’t seem to catch one long enough to hold. I’m supposed to be learning German — I am learning German — yet here I am writing in English. Of course I am.

My German right now is roughly equivalent to a baby discovering its first word — messy, and mostly incomprehensible. Still, it feels like a tiny betrayal, like I’m somehow failing the place I live in. But I’m also surviving. I’m expressing. And right now, that’s enough. Actually, it’s essential.

This meteor shower of anxiety feels more like the storm that ended the dinosaurs.
Maybe this is evolution.
Maybe I’m shedding the old.

I think it’s the shedding of comfort.

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The Truth About Anxiety

I think I understand. My anxiety isn’t a fear of the future — it’s the onslaught of creation.
It’s the incredible flood of consciousness from which everything comes. It’s thought itself — raw, unfiltered, alive.

The irony, of course, is that I think this post sucks. It’s all over the place. Welcome to my inner world.

There’s already so much junk in our inboxes, and here I am writing about my anxiety. My whole philosophy is less is more — so please, if these letters don’t resonate or add something meaningful to your life, unsubscribe. Truly.
Clean out what doesn’t serve you. I mean that.

But if something in these words hits a note that makes you feel seen — welcome. I’m so happy you’re here.

I promise to always show up authentically. That means no generic newsletters or blog posts filled with fluff I don’t care about just to make a sale.
Vomit.

I did that before — following the herd — but I’m not a sheep. I’m a real human with a story, just like you.

The world doesn’t need another polished picture of perfection. It needs truth — the pain, the mess, the beauty of being real.

“Anxiety isn’t just fear — it’s creation waiting for permission to move.”

Bridgette Joy

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The Pile of Rocks

The people here are like the stones that build the valley walls — solid, enduring, part of something ancient.

Sometimes it feels like I’m standing at the base of that wall, staring up at generations of rock stacked high. I can see their strength, but I’m still figuring out where I fit.

I’m so grateful for anyone here who speaks English, even as I push myself to learn German. I try — I really do. But it’s tricky when the German I’m studying isn’t actually spoken here. Everyone understands it, sure, but what’s spoken in daily life is either, the dialect from just over the border into South Tyrol, Itlay (which sounds absolutely nothing like High German) or Romansh — the old, lyrical, fourth official language of Switzerland.

There aren’t really courses for the dialect or Romansh, so High German it is. For now, I just smile a lot, nod, and keep learning.

But there’s that wall again — the pile of rocks between who I am and who I’m becoming.

Today I dropped my glass water bottle and watched it shatter. The thud of disappointment in my chest was almost just as loud as the crash. I loved that water bottle, my love gifted it to me.

It felt symbolic somehow — a small moment of surrender. It was just a water bottle after all.

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The Frayed Thread

Does your brain ever do this?
You have the clearest thought, a perfect sentence in your head — and then the moment you try to express it, it’s gone.

It’s like the invisible thread connecting your inner world to the outer one just disappears. You chase it, trying to link the pieces back together, but sometimes it’s gone for good.

That’s why I write.
Not because I love writing — but because I need it.

Writing helps me reconnect the tangled yarn of thoughts that loop endlessly in my mind. It gives shape to the noise. It’s frustrating and beautiful all at once.

And just like that — the sun is gone again. It’s 2:40 p.m. and parts of this valley won’t see light until late morning tomorrow. Some corners won’t see sunlight for months.

Like my thoughts, they sit in darkness, waiting for their moment to be seen.

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Friendship, Boundaries, and Burnout

I’ve been thinking a lot about friendship.
This year, I’ve gone separate ways from two dear friends. I’ve always been good at hiding away — in my mind, in my home, in the safe spaces of family and solitude. But living here is teaching me that connection is survival.

I’ve never thought of myself as good at making friends, let alone keeping them. I enjoy my alone time too much. There’s fear, too — fear of being hurt, judged, or not liked.

For so long, I never asked myself, Do I actually enjoy this person’s energy?
I people-pleased my way into exhaustion. I am shedding that too.

For twelve years, I was a massage therapist. I loved my clients deeply. I listened to hundreds of stories — pain, joy, heartbreak, healing. I held it all. And no matter how many people told me to “protect my energy,” I know now that when you work that closely with people’s pain, it changes you.

Because they are you. You are them.
Our hearts literally entrain — syncing their rhythm when we connect.

Healing is not one-directional. It’s a two-way current.
And at some point, my current ran dry.

So I stepped back. My hands — my once tireless hands — were crying, no more.

People might say, “You didn’t protect yourself well enough.”
But I think I did.

I think this was the path all along — to understand myself through others, to feel the sacred exhaustion that comes from being deeply human.

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Learning to Listen

My mom always says the key to aging well is to keep moving. She’s 75 and could run circles around most people half her age.

I’ve been sitting a lot lately.
Thinking.
Listening.

I used to run more. I hear you can buy special shoes for running in the snow. Maybe I’ll try that soon — even though the thought of running through ice-cold air makes my chest tighten.

Still, maybe that’s what I need — to breathe deep into the cold, to keep moving through the discomfort.

Because that’s life, isn’t it?
A constant rhythm of holding on, letting go, and learning to flow again.

With love,

Bridgette Joy

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