The Light We Carry

The Light We Carry is a set of practices to help you stay calm, optimistic, and confident in an unpredictable world, based on Michelle Obama’s life experiences as a woman, mother, lawyer, daughter, leader, and the former First Lady of the United States.

When Barack first told Michelle he wanted to run for president, she was apprehensive. Obama knew her husband would make a great leader, but she loved the life they had created for themselves in Chicago: two daughters, solid careers, and a stable relationship. A presidential campaign would upend all of this.

The debate with her “fearful mind,” as she calls it, raged. Eventually, Obama learned there are two kinds of fear:

Protective fear, which is rational and actually protects you from real threats — like the instinct to crouch down when you hear a suspicious noise in the woods, which might keep you from being eaten by a bear. Restrictive fear, which is irrational and only limits your potential — like being so afraid you’ll get bad comments on the first article you publish online that you never end up posting it in the first place.

Initially, Obama thought her fear was protective. “I’m protecting the life we have built from public scrutiny, potential reputation damage, and financial jeopardy.”

Eventually, however, she realized her fear was restrictive. She was afraid of change, but she had changed many times in the past — and usually for the better! Becoming a parent, for example, was a scary decision, but in the end, it turned into a positive experience.

Once she better understood her fear, Obama could act in spite of it. She agreed to Barack running for president, and two years later, they made history.

Sometimes, fear is obvious. When you’re applying for your first job out of college, the fear of failure will stare you right in the face. But it’s not only during big life decisions, when we can plainly feel fear affecting us, that this emotion hinders us from fulfilling our potential. Misunderstanding change is another obstacle to living authentically, Obama suggests, which ultimately boils down to fear. Let’s say Sarah wants to become a world-famous graffiti artist. She starts documenting her projects through Reels and Stories on Instagram and, within just six months, gains 4,000 followers. That’s huge! But because she keeps looking at Banksy’s Instagram with 12 million followers, she constantly feels so far away from world-fame that she eventually quits. Fear quietly sabotaged Sarah. Her misunderstanding of change only opened the door for fear to make Sarah feel she is not good enough. Instead of taking pride in what she had achieved, fear got Sarah to focus on her shortcomings and the long…