It is more than that, and we are more than a body that needs to be controlled, manipulated, and overridden. I will not participate in the story of that kind of relationship; extraction, control, dominance, and thinking we know what is best when our body has 100’s of millions of years of wisdom confined within it.

In this class we begin by laying the foundation of truths we must understand before we build anything else on top of this basis.

1. How our body stores information and from what it gathers it’s information

2. How the nervous system uses that information

3. The impact of that information on the web of our expression (Body, Mind, Spirit, Expression)

4. The choices the body makes MAKE SENSE. They are not something to override, manipulate, or shift in discomfort away from. They are there to be explored, understood, listened to, and alchemized to align with our divine (authentic) self expression.

On Friday we will continue this conversation by exploring what arises at the crossroads of our ANIMAL Nature, HUMAN Consciousness, & DIVINE Essence.

Read more

I hear the disgust in her voice as she repeats it.

I look up and see confusion on her face.

“What do you make of that?”

She asks me. I am always appreciative as a projector when I am given the invitation to share the clear knowing that comes through me in response to things such as this. And things come rolling in as I take in her shared words.

Something my beautiful husband has imbued into me is to consider the straw man version of a statement and also its steel man version.

In other words:

• how can this be made to be diminished in it’s nature? Straw Man

• how can this be made to make sense, and hold validity? Steel Man

I hold the sentiment.

If you are depressed it’s because you’re thinking too much about yourself.

My brain jumps through a few quick notes:

1. The statement is made as a matter of fact.

2. It is very simplified and holds no nuance.

3. What does it sound like if I say it in a few different arrangements?

   1. Thinking too much about yourself leads to depression

   2. When you are depressed you can be sure you are thinking of yourself too much.

   3. Being too much in your head, isolated away from anything happening beyond you plays a role in depression.

4. This statement feels like one sentence plucked out of an entire conversation and used out of context. Rage baiting? I wonder to myself.

I hold it all.

I think about my training in nervous system strategy & regulation.

I think about my experience of depression in my own body and in the body’s of people I have tended to in love.

I think about our social engagement network and that a key feature in states of primal disconnection (depression) is that our social engagement networks in our body are not innervated; in other words their is no breath of life flowing through them.

I think about the role of shame and judgment in states of depression; how they show up with pitchforks and short, no-nuance, matter of fact statements that contribute to the swirling darkness. Statements kind of like this one.

I think about the role of safety when it comes to seeking connection and how a system can lose its ability to sense safety at all (temporarily but potentially for an extended period of time).

I think about how a system, when thrusted into primal states of being and in states of survival, shifts into hyperawareness of self for reasons of survival, hyper vigilance, high alertness. We disconnect from anything happening beyond the immediacy where threat would arise from. This is not an accident. It is a purposeful distinction of this state of being.

“Depression” is a survival response.

It is the body’s way of shutting down and shutting out anything that might contribute to deeper overwhelm. It is a strategy to give pause to a body and spirit on fire, in fear, in overwhelm. It is a way for the body to preserve energy for that crucial moment when it can safely flee or fight off the threat. If that fire, that fear, that overwhelm is unable to complete and the person is not welcomed back into the land of the fully living by loving people, safe environments, unshaming witnesses, then the body returns and extends its stay in that primal survival strategy.

This has been studied in rats, birds, dogs, that I know of. High states of stress will often put a being into a state of shut down so deep that it appears dead. This is useful because predators often don’t want to eat something already dead. It is like the hail mary of survival strategies. Threat can be thwarted this way. But if that threat is repeated. This is where it get’s tricky. Repetition of high stress not only will put the organism back into a state of feigning death. The being having the experience will stay in that death feigning experience for longer. And every time it is repeated it stays longer and longer and longer. It is witnessed in us. In people. In those of us who were miss-attuned to too many times.

When we are in that state, our social engagement system goes into power saving mode. Along with many other systems like the endocrine system, the immune system, and the digestive system to name a few. Because when your body believes it needs to survive, it decides what systems are most important and in this state knows that it is most important to conserve energy for when the timing is right.

If you are depressed it’s because you’re thinking too much about yourself.

No. That’s not quite it.

But when we are in states such as this, we are wired to prioritize our experience because the system is wanting to find resolution and walk the journey back to the land of the living where it has access to it’s own life force energy and that which lives beyond itself.

The only thing is that we live in a culture that diagnosis this state, pathologises it, misunderstands its purpose, its messages, and its needs. We don’t live in a culture that knows how to hold a being when it has left it’s body experience for very meaningful reasons. We don’t know how to hold grief, fear, loss, pain, disappointment, violence, or the victimized. We say things like “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” and we grip that statement so tight hoping that if we grip it hard enough it makes it true.

It’s not.

We look away and leave each other to our own devices to crawl out of holes we fell into along the way.

Many cultures; some lost, some not, surround the person who is struggling to access their life force. It is understood that this state is holy, sacred, and deserving of a very special kind of care, attention, grace, and protocol.

Many cultures use prayer, dance, song, touch, and connection to welcome their members back from the land void of sensation.

Many modes of thought suggest soft environments that invite safe, tender, & purposeful connection with people and tasks are an antidote for a soul stuck in disconnection from the outside world.

The thing is, only you can fully know why you have lost connection to your life force (why you are “depressed”). And even though maybe someone with authority said so, it’s not because of some broken chemical interactivity in your brain. The chemicals in your brain are different in this kind of survival state. But why are you in survival state? It’s not because you’re thinking too much about yourself. Your history holds the story.

That being said, this statement so void of nuance, so void of the story of your heart suggests something important: that you must consciously re-enter the land beyond your pain, your suffering, your hole. Supporting yourself back into the land of the fully alive will take expanding your consciousness beyond the experience you’re having and reminding your system that safety is there for you. That love is there for you. That purpose is there for you. That life is there for you.

You must consciously seek, find, and RECEIVE the safety, love, and purpose that lies beyond the confines of your pain. You must jumpstart the circuitry and allow the reconnection to your life force energy to have a shot at finding flow again.

PS. Walking the path out of extended stays of disconnection to your life force (healing depression) takes more than social engagement. There is a lot here to understand, including understanding why your body is choosing this strategy & learning to communicate, love, tend to, and work with it. This essay is only touching on a small piece of the puzzle. States such as these take a great deal of care, love, grace, & consistency to untangle our spirits from.

If you want to understand more, let’s explore together. I appreciate being asked questions and exploring with my fellow seekers. For every question asked unlocks something within us that is thankful to be let out.

Leave a comment

COMING UP

Somatic Movement Meditation is back on the schedule after a month of living in the ashes. We begin again on November 2nd with a focus on learning to speak the language of our primal nature. In stepping into all that we are as humans we must understand the ancient animal ways embedded in our bodies. Wisdom awaits us there, if only we are willing to seek it.

Subscribe now

It is in every way the full weight of itself.

Fast. Whiplash. Waking up and not remembering kind-of-thing.

Suddenly remembering and trying to fall back asleep for a little longer.

We are brought to our senses.

It’s the safest place to be really in a lot of ways right now.

Our senses.

I pass by our altar, her picture holding our son. flowers blooming, gardenia from the garden. Lilies. Her favorite. Opening.

I smell them. I think of her. I weep as I pass on and into the kitchen.

As I walk in my nose is flooded once more but this time with the smell of olive parmesan sourdough baking in the oven. I close my eyes and take a deep breath. Eliminating one sense for the increased intensity of another. I see her face and hear the echo of her joy & pleasure when I started baking bread for us all regularly. “Do it up how you do it; it’s so good.”

When I close my eyes and settle into that glorious smell, I then suddenly hear the fountain in my garden. Trickling. Soft. Steady. It always was. But just now I arrive fully enough to receive the sound that it is offering me.

I think about her joy when she brought home the Koi’ that have since been steadily growing in that fountain. They wait for her… me now… to feed them in the morning. Accustomed to our shadow, they dance and swirl in their fishy way right at the surface where we all get to watch in joy. In grief.

I take a deep breath.

I look at my son sitting in a chair enjoying a book. That sight. I smile. I feel the way a heart can reach beyond itself. Beyond the body it resides within.

Another deep breath.

Nap time approaches, I grab my boy and place him in his stroller. We go for a walk. I feel the strange sense that the moisture has left the air. I can feel its absence on my hands. My lips. In my nasal passages as I breathe. A new season has finally landed even though the temps still suggest otherwise.

Too little too long.

Too much too fast.

I think about the various definitions of psychological trauma.

I think we sit in the too much too fast category right now.

I think about that and then I thank my body for bringing me the information I need from my surroundings in the beautiful way it does. In present time. It brings me the things needed to maintain ground beneath my feet. Through its ability to sense. To be in relationship with. To breathe in. To feel. To know the experience of other beings & objects beyond itself.

I think about the impact of an experience on a body. A Being. A Spirit. How the experience immediately enters into the filtration system of the body and becomes something else entirely. A history overlaid on the present moment. An entire system within, that has very specific ways of understanding life, shifting and coloring the lens.

This week and ongoing I am watching the way we each are experiencing the same reality that becomes a very different reality the moment it touches our cells.

I watch one pull inward.

One weeps and turns towards connection.

One pours energy into Doing.

One becomes tired and weary.

One cleans.

I watch myself become quiet. A longing creeping in to lay on the floor. Belly down. A longing to go still. To not move. To let every corridor in my mind empty. I also notice myself reaching for others. For connection. Ensuring I am only alone for the “right” amount of time.

Too much too fast.

It becomes easy in a way to keep the pace. To keep running. To not slow down. Easy in that the choice would make perfect sense. Keep going before too much of reality lands.

Not easy in the way that the body remembers the lost language of grief. In the way that the lost language beckons us towards it. Threatening the new way of things. Running, that is.

My body sends signals when I feel the pull to run.

She gets tired. Her mind begins to go blank. She can’t hold conversations. She says things in a weird way and then tries to be more clear and still can’t quite get the full expression right.

She requests for me to stop. Slow. Still. Smell. See. Weep. Weep. Weep.

I feel my heart racing and my hands holding the kind of energy that hands do right before they begin to tremble. Not trembling though. Right before. Not visible to anyone else.

To everyone else I believe it looks like a steady body and a blank stare.

But then I remember that I am in a body.

I remember that I am in a body.

And I come back to her.

I come back to my senses.

I talk to mom; “Fuck, mama. I can’t believe that you’re not here anymore.”

I remember what I know of trauma.

That a body knows how to process the present moment quite well.

And so once more I bring my full awareness to the present moment.

To my hands pulling the petals of the shriveling marigolds off so that they might be used for dying silk some day.

To my feet and the experience of my wool rug fully cupping my soles.

To my lap where my son sits with his book.

To my skin where the sun touches in a gentle way; finally not harsh enough to send me running.

To the warmth of my hair on my shoulders.

To the rays of light pouring into my kitchen window.

To the feeling of crawling into my cozy bed.

To the containment of a hug from my grieving husband.

To hold both realities is to be human.

To span realms is to be human.

To love & grieve at once is to be human.

To plant seeds and remains is to be human.

To talk to our dead is to be human.

I love you, mama.
I miss you.
I wish you were here.
I can’t believe it that you’re not.

“I’ve been feeling so tired but wired. Slowing down feels really hard and I just manage to get to a good spot on a Sunday then I’m back at it at work again. Noticing my sleep is really disturbed too. Nothing crazy but for me, it’s a big change. My dreams feel intense and I almost feel like I don’t reach that deep rest.”

My client relayed this to me during our session together. I asked her if anxiety was paired with these new experiences she was having; it often is. What I’m immediately hearing is that her body is getting stuck in strong currents of primal survival activation. Anxiety, agitation, head aches, migraines, IBS, body pain, impatience, irregular heart rate, tired but unable to relax, mental rumination; all of these experiences (and others) can arise and compound when our body is not permitted to rest by our internal survival architecture.

When our vessel gets stuck on in this way, we are primed to see threat as the thread woven through all things. Rest is not what the body is craving in this experience. It is craving resolution.

Here is what I suggested to her:

1. Create a “coming down” practice: During the work week we can get stuck ON. I remember working in a factory as a fashion product developer (wow. A different life ago). I would go home at night, numb out to food and tv and then go to sleep and have extremely vivid work stress dreams. They were always dreams of me completing whatever tasks I had not finished at work that day. They were so realistic that the next day I would have to check my work to see if I had actually completed it or just dreamt that I had. HA! I also had so much body tension that I threw out my neck WHILE SLEEPING & chipped a tooth from clenching my teeth so hard while I slept. yikes.

   
   Getting stuck ON is no joke & is overtime very detrimental to our health for so many obvious and non-obvious reasons.

   A coming down practice can be any practice that helps your body come out of a sympathetic charged active state & down into a more parasympathetic relaxed, calm state.

   Things that are NOT come down practices: watching TV, scrolling social media, and dare I say reading. These things help you not experience what you’re experiencing but the moment you come back into your body (likely when you lay down to sleep at night) you will be dropped back into the high charge that still needs support in processing. In essence, leaving your body is not going to help you come down.
   
   Here is what will help you come down: an evening walk around sunset time, showering/taking a bath, journaling, self touch, soft connection with others (including your animals), watching the sunset (this is also helpful for circadian rhythm syncing), any movement practice (yoga, stretching, dancing, etc.), soft creating (painting, cooking, writing, knitting, etc.), sitting around a fire (even some candles would do), singing at the top of your lungs (on your way home from work perhaps). In essence, things that bring you into presence and that register to your primal body that it is safe, secure, and out of the stressful environment.

2. Create delineated transitions between work & rest: I am a witchy woman and in the language of the witch, I call this time, ritual time. The intention is to create really clear transitions between work & rest. Think things that send signals to your body that it is safe & reasonable for it to switch gears. This can be done very simply by doing things like changing from work clothers, hair, & face to home clothes, hair, & face. Ladies, it’s that bra off moment (if you wear those). It can be a dimming of the lights, candles being lit, soft music playing. Romance yourself. Set the mood.

   Once you do, pause for at least 2-5 minutes & take it in. Relish in stillness for just a few moments. Orient yourself to what is there FOR you, for your pleasure, joy, and relaxation. Let your body receive the goodness of the “come down” ritual. Take it all the way in through your senses & notice how your body receives these subtle signals of nourishment, goodness, & slowing down.
   
   It can be even simpler for the mama’s and ultra busy; when you get in bed at night, pause and FEEL your body meet the bed, the pillows, the blankets. Meet the silence or quietness with presence. Feel the goodness of your spine not having gravity pull on it. These transitional periods are most importantly marked by PRESENCE with yourself, the moment, your body, & your senses. They help the mind to slow down. If your mind is being extra stubborn, offer it something tangible to hold it’s awareness on, bring your thoughts back to mindfully witnessing your senses, AND explore how movement might be helpful in easing a chronically ON brain. Movement helps utilize the excess energy that is running your busy mind endlessly.

3. Explore variations of non sleep deep rest (NSDR): There are so many variations of NSDR. In essence it is any practice that nourishes you in similar ways that sleep does. A quieting of mind, a slowing down or stilling of body, a sensory break. This can include things like meditation, yoga nidra (the OG NSDR), somatic meditation, laying in a hammock (my personal favorite), snuggling with a lover or pet, nature gazing, laying in a field on a blanket with snacks (also a personal fave). NSDR is marked by a decrease in sensory stimulation. Make a list of your own! The benefits of NSDR can be achieved in as little as 5 minutes. You don’t have to fret about a short amount of time. Got a limited amount of time? Set a timer so you can lean all the way in for those 5-10-15 minutes.

   ---

Try these things out and see what they offer you. Make them your own and expand on them. Find the right recipe for yourself. I’d love to know how it goes.

“If you see that the Kingdom is spread upon the earth while others do not see it, the end of the world has come for you. For the world as it was for you has indeed ended. You see the world’s radiant joy and you say yes to it all and you do not say no to it all. There, one identifies the dynamism of life in all things.” – Joseph Campbell

I remember when I first realized that being triggered was a doorway opening into my subconscious mind. That sacred landscape, only accessible through back alley pathways for those really looking for it.

I don’t know if you’re into human design (you should be), but as a projector with 1 / 3 lines I crave the underworld. The world within that is beneath conscious awareness. The world that requires you to shift consciousness to access it. I yearn for it and spent much of my maidenhood studying that landscape within myself.

I remember when I realized that the activation of a survival response; or that inner tsunami wave that is tripped by the drop of a pebble in the ocean, was my body showing me something of crucial importance.

Something unspoken

Unhealed.

Unacknowledged.

Disowned.

In need.

Unprotected.

Unexpressed.

I was in a yoga class that melded yoga asana and yogic philosophy. My kind of dream space.

I realized then and there that the activation that appeared as some sort of intense fight or flee within me; if I looked carefully enough through the keyhole sized window into the core of it, was actually a puzzle piece of my soul asking to be lovingly put, with care & attention, back into place.

Being triggered is not a dark marker worthy of being placed on the person, place, or thing that triggered you. It is a flag on the moon, a small broken branch along the path revealing holy ground within yourself.

When you enter into that holy ground, what is revealed are many beautiful objects left askew. Beautiful pieces of your Self. Pieces of your love, your wants, your needs, your heart, your desires, ambitions, fears, potentiality, wonderment, joy, belonging, expectations, wounds, longings, curiosities, values, all out of place. Still there, just not where they belong. Thrown about likely by others, but left likely by you. Un-tended to. Unacknowledged, unknown, dishonored. Things worthy of reverence, honor, & adoration. Dusty & forgotten.

All with one desire; to be dusted off and put back into their rightful place. As if a sacred artifact.

When we become triggered though, there is a main path. Usually a very wide, clearly marked, & obvious path forward. It requires blind following without question and with minimal thought. Your body takes you. Your mind follows. Your life force becomes hijacked as the main energy source used to follow the path.

The path highlights what to say, what to do, how to act, what weapons to draw, & how to wield them. It suggests the right timing to ensure one’s own survival, likely at the cost of whatever happens to fall in the way. The path is usually old, outdated, and does not accommodate new understandings of the landscape surrounding it.

But there are less traversed pathways off of this main one.

Ones that whisper. Ones only detectible by the senses of a slow moving being. There are signs; not in the form of sign posts but in the form of broken twigs, condensed moss, misty air, and that soft inner sense that something is off.

It pulls you towards it gently.

To feel its pull you have to be WILLING to feel it.

You have to be committed to finding it.

You have to detach yourself from the dopaminergic desire to run full speed down the obvious pathway with your weapons drawn and your survival energy flooding your system.

You have to take with you the understanding that there is more here for you than the main path & choose to identify as the archetype of Pathfinder to the Soul. Embody it.

That pathway opening itself to you is a gift.

Sensing the opening and walking through it takes skill and a keen eye.

Walking through the threshold is a mark of high honor.

Receiving what is there for you in the dark is a holy ceremony.

The ceremony requires your curiosity, your devotion, your humility.

These are some of the ingredients of a mature soul.

Own them.

And when you feel that activation enliven your entire being and you feel the energy of the obvious path forward unfold. Stop. And ask a few of these questions:

What happened?

• What is taking place that has me feeling activated

• What from my past is this reminding me of?

• What is absolutely true and real right now (not assumptions)?

* Where am I?

• How far down the main pathway have I gone?

• What level of activation am I at?

• When have I felt this way before?

* What do the main path sign posts say?

• What do I want to do?

• What do I want to say?

• What weapons are drawn?

• Is my goal to inflict pain or to resolve conflict?

• What have I done with this type of trigger in the past?

* What else is here?

• What emotions are present beneath the main emotion?

• What is the ideal outcome?

• What do I wish would’ve happened instead?

* What am I expecting & attempting to intercept?

• What assumptions am I making?

• What do I think will happen if I don’t follow the main path?

• What are my fears?

What are the ingredients of this & previous similar experiences?

• What were some key pieces that hurt from the original wounds?

• Are these ingredients present in this new experience?

* What do I need right now for resolution?

• Emotional Comfort? Acknowledgement? Physical Comfort? Confirmation that you are loved? An apology? Ownership? To be known and understood? Some time to reconnect to your senses?

* How can I love myself through this?

• What kind of mobilization do I need in order to come back to my center?

• What kind of care do I need from my deeper self?

• What kind of physical nourishment might I need for my brain to work optimally? (water/food).

What is here for me to know about myself?

• What is the hurt that needs tending to?

• What kind of tending did it need then & does it need that now?

• What needs and desires might crave to be met?

• What part within needs to be welcomed & loved back into the whole?

• Is there a part of me that wants to be known?

• What from my past keeps coming up in my present to be resolved?

These questions are the ones of curiosity and devotion. They signal to the inner realm that you are ready to evolve beyond your wounded consciousness. That you are ready to reclaim your wholeness. That your eyes have been cleared enough to see that you are more than a victim of your circumstance; you are also the curator of your life.

This is holy work.

Your triggers are more than they appear.

Will you seek the path to your soul?

Before we can access that, we must understand the various layers of consciousness that we pull from as we move through life. Primal states o…

Read more

1. Emotions as Messengers: what are the messages?

2. Integration of Emotions: From mind to body & back.

3. Emotions as a pathway to Self Actualization

And today, Emotions as a Mechanism for Deeper relating.

The thing is, when we know ourselves with crystal clarity, know how to show up for ourse…

Read more

The term Self-actualization is most recognized from Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. In these it i…

Read more

This week a student asked me during a Somatic Experiencing Class what was so special about vibrational breathing. “It feels really good. Why?” (vibrational breathing is when we hum, voo, ohm, or haaaaa, audibly on the exhale creating a vibration in the face, chest, throat, & belly.) The two main reasons why this is so beneficial for our body & mind is:

1. When we use our vocal chords to create sound, we cause a vibration that penetrates our cranial nerves (1-12; 10 being your vagus nerve). The vibration stimulates your cranial nerves & innervates those nerve pathways. I like to think of it as a little splash of cold refreshing water to the peripheral nervous system. This tends to have the effect of being really calming, regulating, grounding, & presencing, increasing our presence with our bodies & environment. It also tends to increase our sense-ability; because these cranial nerves are largely in charge of our sensory organs (eyes, nose, mouth, ears), our ability to sense our environment may increase, we notice more sounds, see more vibrantly, & feel our environment more fully as it connects with our bodies. These nerves are also in charge of our digestion & so can send signals to your body that it is safe & prepared to properly digest the nutrients you gave it.

2. When we use a vibrational breath on the exhale, we naturally increase the length of our exhale. Not only does the vibration have an impact on our nervous system, this elongated exhale increases the time in which we spend in a parasympathetic state from breath to breath. When we breathe, with every inhale & exhale we are pendulating from the sympathetic nervous system (think mobilizing, activating, up-regulating) to the parasympathetic nervous system (think slowing down, rest, de-activating, down regulating). On the inhale our sympathetic nervous system is stimulated, our heart rate increases, our vagal break releases just a smidge; theres almost a feeling of “UP” taking place when we breathe in. Take a deep inhale, feel that energy ever so slightly rise? On the exhale, our NS swings to parasympathetic activation, our heart rate slows, our vagal break increases just a smidge, and there is a slight feeling of “DOWN” taking place. Take a full & long exhale out, do you feel that settling feeling?

   When we are in states of stress, we tend to breathe more shallow, higher up in our chest, and the exhales are short, shallow, and quick. We need this activation to mobilize in order to address & create change to whatever might be stressing us out. When we have fuller, deeper, more complete exhales, we are alerting our system that there is nothing threatening that we have to mobilize in response to. Our body, NS, & mind can relax into the present moment.

Try this practice before bed even taking extra time in the space between the bottom of your exhale & the start of a new inhale. How does it feel for you? What do you notice?

Leave a comment

POST SCRIPT: I am not personally a fan of utilizing breath to override the autonomic processes. It is a tool to use with a great deal of care and respect for your body. For example if your body is activated, before trying to disengage the activation, you’d be best to work with the activation before using breath to override it. Controlling breath is very different than working WITH your body. Controlling breath is a short term fix that is useful to offer temporary support, until you are ready to be fully WITH the underlying states of your autonomic system that might need extra care, attention, attunement, & love.

COMING UP:

This month we are exploring the nuanced relationship with our emotional landscape. The what, the how, the why, and the juice. Being in right relations with our emotions is a massive key unlocking our authentic nature & aligning ourselves for a life where thriving is on the menu.

PLUS join me and this precious community of seekers on the last Sunday of the month for our community topic discussion on this month’s topic. This is one of my favorite ways to get into this work. We go deep and get to connect in the way we were meant to; asking questions, trying things on and out, and exploring what these lessons mean for our daily lives.

Not a small …

Read more

“Why can’t we just have the conversation?”

I hear it in my mother’s voice.

She is always asking.

She asks me rhetorically.

Because I’m not the one she wants THE conversations with.

Neither is she the one I want THE conversations with.

We don’t have issues having conversations.

It’s harder for us to bare NOT having the conversation than it is to have the conversation.

We go head first.

A lot of people don’t.

I sit in my chair and in my sorrow I wonder “why?”.

It is a personal sorrow. It almost always starts there.

But it is a collective sorrow, too.

It is also a personal sorrow for the collective.

The crumbling of human relating.

The degradation of connection.

The decadence (decay) of relational responsibility.

The destruction of rupture AND repair.

Only rupture remains.

Rupture AND Repair.

Death AND Rebirth.

Strawberries AND Cream.

AND.

AND.

AND.

They go together. One follows the other. That is how it works. That is how it WORKS. It doesn’t WORK if one does not follow the other.

Death.

Rupture.

Strawberries.

What happens without the other side? What happens to relationships? What happens to humanity?

What happens without the AND?

And what is the AND after all?

What happens when we don’t make room for what comes next?

We’re fresh off the vine of Cancel Culture.

It has been years and years in the making.

Years and years of ripening a fruit that was only ever made to rot.

In this era we took our pain, let it ferment into anger; an emotion that often, not always but often, protects us from feeling the deeper roots, and left it on a dark shelf until it became blame and self righteousness. A shelf where self responsibility does not reach. We drank that cocktail down and like a relational alcohol it changed our behavior. It changed our perception. It changed our view of right and wrong, wellbeing & control, expansion & contraction, openness & avoidance. It made it harder to tell the difference. To sense gravity. To measure values. To move towards love. It changed our ability to really see each other and it made it easier to dehumanize one another.

Our differences at once were sold to us as “what makes us strong as a nation” and also what makes it ok to cut someone out of your life. It was sold to us to view differences as dangerous. We learned implicitly and also explicitly that ruptures in relationships are a sign that we aren’t a good fit. That rupture was some sort of divine sign that it wasn’t meant to be. That walking away is an act of high self worth.

We live in a society where walking away is what is viewed as the strength.

But isn’t it belonging to each other, working together, and strengthening our bonds that ACTUALLY made us strong as a species?

Those lessons on walking away from abuse and the lessons that conflated boundaries with impenetrable walls weren’t meant for the majority of us. They were intended for the fringes where narcissism, neglect, and abuse reside.

It is strength to walk away from ACTUAL abuse.

Please do not conflate what I am saying with situations that are truly causing physical, psychological, and spiritual harm.

But being held accountable, people voicing opinions at you, having disagreements, arguments, tempers flaring (without physical or emotional harm coming into question), or feeling burdened by the messy bits of relating is not abuse and not the arena that is worth stepping out of.

Theres a difference between holding the tension that comes with living lives parallel with other people and carrying the weight of abuse. We live lives parallel with other people usually on purpose. We do so because we choose to; because we love them and because there is something important there for us to foster.

Have you ever fucked around and repaired a rupture?

Have you ever fucked around and apologized when someone shared with you how you hurt them?

Have you ever been so fortunate to have someone who cares enough about you to tell you what is standing in the way of closeness?

Have you ever been so blessed as to have someone repair a rupture with you?

Have you ever been so lucky to have someone apologize to you for something they did that hurt you?

A REAL APOLOGY?

Not the kind that diverts the responsibility, turns it around and makes it the other person’s fault, or fully abdicates you from any role you played in the rupture.

A REAL

“Fuck, I’m so sorry that what I did hurt you.”

Maybe even a “I want to be able to do better next time.”

And maybe the kind of apology that makes both parties realize just HOW strong their bond actually is that they can withstand something so humbling as to take ownership of their part in the relational dynamic. Where trust is strengthened and a sense of belonging and love deepened.

Have you ever fucked around like that and realized just how amazing it is to have healthy relationships and to be apart of the shared health and wellbeing that you then get to continue to tap into and pour into in a never ending flow of love and mutual respect? Felt that strength and pride ripple through your spine when you are part of the reason why your relationships are so unflappable?

In case no one has told you yet, healthy relationships have ruptures all the time. It is not the rupture that makes a relationship not worth having. It is how ruptures are repaired and how individuals grow from it that makes or breaks bonds. (it is also the frequency of ruptures but more on this another time).

Relationships are built up in two ways:

Bonding Through Feeling Good Together

• Shared experiences of joy

• Play & silliness

• Consistency in connection

• Adventure & excitement

• Finding similarities

  
  Did I miss anything?

Bonding Through Successful Repair Together

• Facing hard conversations

• Removing obstacles that stand between two people rather than viewing each other as the obstacle.

• Approaching sensitivities with felt care & tenderness

• Curiosity in conflict & interest in the other persons experience

• Interest in each others heart and historical wounds

• Exploring dark spots within ourselves together

• Taking ownership of one’s part in conflict.

AND

The AND in Rupture AND Repair is where the work is. We can’t go straight from rupture to repair. That is not repair, that is sweeping pain under the rug along with parts of ourselves that have been splintered off from the whole1. We are not there yet as a species where we don’t accrue hurt. (Apparently Some people have fully embodied the skill of not taking things personally, but I have never met anyone who has.)

AND is the space in time made where ingredients for repair come out onto the table alongside the ingredients that led to the rupture in the first place for us to look at together.

AND is also the table where it all gets laid out. The stability that supports what is unstable.

AND is the space we create between our primal protective reactivity & our higher consciousness. Where those two internal parts can also have a conversation rather than a fight about which parts of us gets to say what.

AND is where we return to our ability to sense, feel, and attune to the human being sitting at the table with us.

AND is remembering in the heated moments who that person is to us, who we are to them, and that we actually love each other and want to figure this out.

AND can sometimes go on for a while. Meaning sometimes repair is not immediate or even quick.

AND is taking an extended amount of time to rebuild that trust that was broken in the rupture.

Sometimes AND is giving the other person or yourself space and time to breathe and come back without psychical weapons drawn.

Strength is being able to hold the tension in our bodies.

Sometimes for extended periods of time.

The tension that arises when there is distance, uncertainty, fear, confusion, shame, embarrassment, guilt, disappointment, things to be accountable for, and hurt feelings.

The tension that sits on your heart like a boulder before resolution happens.

That is strength.

Strength is not reacting to the tension from a place of fear and woundedness.

Strength is holding nuance, holding duality, holding your hurt feelings AND theirs. Loving yourself and them. Caring for your historical wounds AND theirs.

Strength is finding a path forward that is wide enough for both of you to traverse out of the fire beside each other, heads held high in pride that you figured it out.

And because I have a cynical side that is wary of the impacts of greater powers and forces working against humanity, consider who benefits from you believing that you don’t actually need “those people”. Those relationships. Those connections. Who benefits from us not loving each other. Who wins when we lose sight of the importance of true empathy.

And what do we stand to lose if we cannot rely on each other to stick around and fight for each other when things get hard?

Cuz things are fucking hard.

And maybe they are only going to get harder for a while longer.

But because the only pill I am committed to taking is the “white pill” I also think that if we recognize what we are really losing when we lose each other, and we decide instead to fortify those ties, root down into familial bonds (blood and otherwise), I do think things will start to become easier collectively. And maybe it won’t get only harder afterall.

So do your part babe.

Have the conversation.

Let them in.

Show them your heart, your hurt, your humility.

Show yourself what you are capable of.

Have the conversation before the door closes.

Love a woman who wants to have the conversations.

COMING UP:

This month we are exploring the nuanced relationship with our emotional landscape. The what, the how, the why, and the juice. Being in right relations with our emotions is a massive key unlocking our authentic nature & aligning ourselves for a life where thriving is on the menu.

PLUS join me and this precious community of seekers on the last Sunday of the month for our community topic discussion on this month’s topic: EMOTIONS. This is one of my favorite ways to get into this work. We go deep and get to connect in the way we were meant to; asking questions, trying things on and out, and exploring what these lessons mean for our daily lives.

We exit the latter experience with clarity of mind and a…

Read more

A student recently asked me how they could get the most bang for their buck when it comes to using their workout routine for nervous system regulation after or during moments of hyper-arousal, anger, or anxiety.

The first thing to understand is that while working out has ENDLESS amounts of benefit for the health & wellbeing of our body, it is not in and of itself directly useful in regulating your nervous system. It can be! But there is a way to really make it helpful in actual regulation vs. simply wearing your body out.

The other thing to understand is that we can overuse our workout routine as an end all/be all to managing our stress. And in this way it can become an unhealthy addiction that we use to leave our bodies rather than stay & aid them through times of stress.

That being said, don’t stop working out! Just be curious about what & how you’re doing it!

Here is what I would suggest when it comes to making sure your workout routine is ACTUALLY helping you regulate & not just wearing you out ⬇⬇⬇

1. When working out, practice orienting to the sensations that working out provides your body. Regardless of the routine or type of workout. Can you stay present? Can you feel which muscles are working? Which parts are stretching? Can you tune into where you feel strong? Where you feel heat building? Where your body is being

   pushed to a new limit? Practice staying fully aware of the sensations the workout is offering you.

2. When it comes to states like anxiety, stress, anger, frustration, or sadness, the best way to utilize movement as a regulating source is to invite your nervous system to be apart of how you move. Connect to the emotions you feel and ask yourself “If this energy could move me, how would it move me?” Would it fight, run, get big, hit, kick, yell? You can also ask “If I were a wild animal feeling this experience, what would I do?” This will often give you an idea of the type of primal response your body is having to the stress you’re experiencing.

   1. Once you get the answers, do these 2 things:

      1. Construct a workout routine that allows you to access those muscles or move in a similar way: feel fight energy? use your upper body! Hit a punching bag, throw a medicine ball around. Feel flee energy? use your lower body! go swim, run on the treadmill, ride a bike. Want to bite or yell? Go take a spin class and sing the songs! Play a sport that allows you to use your voice; embody your best feirce Serena Williams.

      2. Once you have a clear direction of the type of workout that would suite that state, PAUSE. Use your thoughts as bate. It’s time to bring your nervous system state online. Begin to think about whatever it is that is stressing you out. Think about it JUST LONG ENOUGH FOR YOUR BODY TO FEEL IT. Imagine it in your mind just long enough for you to feel a state shift; ie. heat rising, agitation increasing, fists clenching, a scowl forming, a tightness in your throat, defensive or related thoughts beginning. THEN MOVE FROM THAT PLACE & WITH THAT ENERGY FUELING YOUR MOVEMENT.

3. Once your workout is complete, reorient to cues of safety & aliveness.

   1. When your nervous system enters into a state of survival, it cannot leave that state until 1) it’s survival energy is utilized & 2) safety is clearly re-established through the felt sense.
      Your workout allowed you to utilize that survival energy, now do your nervous system a solid by showing it that it’s body is now fully safe & alive. Feel your heart beating, notice the things that feel good, nice, supportive, like home. See how it feels to say the words “I’m alive. I am strong. I am capable.”

   2. Take a few deep breaths. Then a full breath in and a loooooong VOO or HMMMM breath out. Do that 3-5 times. Wait for your heart rate to come back to a resting place. Thank your body for it’s brilliance. The end.

      ---

COMING UP:

This month we are exploring the nuanced relationship with our emotional landscape. The what, the how, the why, and the juice. Being in right relations with our emotions is a massive key unlocking our authentic nature & aligning ourselves for a life where thriving is on the menu.

PLUS join me and this precious community of seekers on the last Sunday of the month for our community topic discussion on this month’s topic. This is one of my favorite ways to get into this work. We go deep and get to connect in the way we were meant to; asking questions, trying things on and out, and exploring what these lessons mean for our daily lives.

There is a pathway through that allows for the most sustenance and nourishment to be received from these depths that otherwise can feel dee…

Read more

There is nourishment here in these deep dark places. This month we go deeper and deeper, start here to prime yourself for what is within you to know.

Theme: Emotions As Messen…

Read more

Becoming a mother has plopped me into a new season of life.

Obviously.

The less obvious thing though to me is that, this season’s biggest highlight has been about community. Not so much about becoming a mom, and motherhood things. Although yes, that too.

Community, mother friends, daily tending to relational ties, responding to texts, joining book clubs, making weekly plans, seeing people beyond my child and husband multiple times a week. This is what this chapter of my life is calling me forward into.

Prior to giving birth to my sons, I spent much of my life in solitude. I was devoted to self study, somatic study, and sharing what I learned from those two things. I had people I would see on a monthly occasion, but my clients, students, and husband are who I spent most of my time with. I found myself most nourished by time alone. To come into this new season and realize in a very real and embodied way that motherhood is not meant to be done alone and that actually one might lose themselves and their minds entirely if one tries, has been the biggest discovery.

I was thinking about this the other day and realized that my one biggest piece of advice for maidens and men not yet fathers is INVEST in your community BEFORE becoming a parent. Ideally invest in friends who are also entering into parenthood. And invest energy into your chosen elders, family and not.

They will save you over and over and over again simply by being there and receiving you.

In this era of my life and partially (not entirely) due to the deeply extenuating circumstances of my birth story, I have had many inner circle people fall away. A lot of them, suddenly.

Meaning, I realized that they had fallen away weeks or months after they energetically dipped because I realized I was being ghosted. Left on read. No response.

Wow. That is a unique kind of pain.

An annihilation.

A kind of abandonment that sends all sorts of primal survival alarms going off within a delicate body. A deep questioning of what went wrong? The kinds of questions that rewire neural circuitry. What did I do? Why don’t they like/love me? What is wrong with me?

In the fragility of my postpartum body & mind, I spent the first 8 months rebuilding my sense of self and sense of worthiness. I still am in recovery in those deep dark places in my psyche that threaten me from the shadows. I had to come back to who it was I knew myself as and decide for myself whether or not she, who I am, is someone I could love.

I am, turns out.

Thank you God, for helping me remember.

Thank you Family, for helping me remember.

Thank you, my friends, for helping me remember.

Thank you Husband, for helping me remember.

Being ghosted is a unique kind of behavior we now do to each other.

And it has become so normal that we have a name for it and most everyone knows it by that name.

Ghost:

1. the soul of a dead person

2. a memory, usually of something or someone bad

Ghosting:

1. A colloquial term for the practice of suddenly ending all communication and avoiding contact with another person without any apparent warning or explanation and ignoring any subsequent attempts to communicate.

   ---

To be ghosted is to become, in the minds of a person whom you intended to or previously had connections with, dead. Disembodied, a memory. While you are in fact still very much alive. To meet your own death in the hearts of people you like, love, or otherwise care about and maybe hoped or thought might care about you too while still being very much alive is a kind of torment that shifts a person’s sense of self.

Most of us doing the ghosting don’t think about it that hard. We feel the diminishment of someone’s presence in our lives. We feel relieved by that in some way of course. We move on & we do our best to not think about that person again to the best of our abilities and to not come in contact with the inner guidance systems guilt so that we don’t begin to question our lack of human decency (whoops getting a little spicy).

But those of us being ghosted, while maybe not thinking about it in these terms, definitely feel it in these terms. And are definitely wracked by it in body & spirit. The body experience is some swirl of two flavors: intense existential self questioning & the kind of survival energy arousal that comes from abandonment and challenges of belonging. We perform mental gymnastics to make it make sense, to come to some terms that soften the blow and hopefully allow us to move on without too much scar tissue ruining future connections or rendering us insecure in the face of connection.

I have seen these outcomes in such minuscule relations as those who’ve only gone on a few dates, I have seen and felt it in short term friendships, I have seen it in longterm friendships, and these same outcomes when family members are doing the ghosting. Meaning no matter the depth or breadth of connection, the wound can hit a very primal root running down deep into our psyches & nervous systems.

Being ghosted touches on and often innervates primal neuronetworks sensitive to abandonment and non-belonging. To lose connection with someone was one less tether to a community whose whole purpose is safety in numbers. To lose connection and be uncertain as to why, eliminates a person’s ability to make sense of and grow from the loss. It leaves a person reeling, confused, angry, and can impact the way they connect in the future due to the loss of safety and certainty to their validity as a person, and worthiness of being properly connected to. Fear can creep in and this insecurity can ultimately diminish one’s access to their authentic expression.

Their Authentic Self.

We begin to wonder what parts of us are unacceptable and turn our own backs on those parts, deeming them unlovable from the outside in. “Mustn’t allow that part to see the light of love again just in case it is what made us lose belonging last time.”

As a mama; and I don’t know why it took becoming a mother to open my eyes in this way, maybe because my heart has been blasted open in unimaginable ways in every direction of love and pain and grief and bliss, but as a mama now I sense every living being differently. I feel their heart, their longing, their inner child. And I see that I live in them and they live in me. That we are so similar and that we all desire love, acceptance, safety, & belonging. For many of us that desire can come out sideways sometimes but nonetheless we all share in that desire (except for maybe the ACTUAL antisocials. But maybe even them. And no Becky, you are not an antisocial because of your in-desire to leave your house).

I also see relating and relationships very differently. I realize now that maidenhood is an era of self centeredness in our culture. That it is a very self-ish time where we are coming into our own and have very little sense of others and what it looks like to stretch yourself to accommodate others. We pour into friendships that make sense and bring us joy and play and sometimes we miss the cues and lack the care relationships might need because we are in our own flow. This isn’t a bad thing per say. It is an era of life. Becoming a mother though highlighted my shortcomings in maidenhood, it was confronting to realize the ways I had been absorbed into my own perspective in such a way that eliminated my ability to see the perspectives of others. Becoming a mother made me realize that tending to connections was one of the most important things I could do in my life; protecting and cultivating familial bonds, strengthening friendships, showing up at doorsteps, making and keeping plans, taking phone calls. And I am now doing my best to be gracious towards my maiden friends that are in that sacred era even in those moments when I long for them to extend themselves to meet me where I am at. I am gracious because I was them. I am gracious because my friends who beat me to motherhood were gracious with me in my maiden era.

In this new era of my life I have become acutely aware of my relational fauxpas. I think about all of the people I have hurt in my life. The ones I know about anyway. The ways I have been inconsiderate with my words and actions. I think about the moments I dropped the ball and what it all might’ve been had I known better. Had our paths been more intertwined. And I think about how different of a world it would be if we weren’t so disconnected from each other. If we were more open to feeling each other. If we felt more responsibility for one another. If there was more overlap between maiden and mother and elder communities. If we were a culture with a little bit more collectivism.

I think about this. And the nature of our individualistic culture. And I feel the obliteration of its impact. And I can’t help but think about how we, as a society have gotten to a point where we can commit something so hurtful to each other so easily. To ghost a person. To render them a ghost. And how can we do it without so much as a smidge of remorse, and with wholehearted belief in the justifications we have made to ourselves for our actions against another living, breathing, feeling, being. To such a degree that maybe we don’t even consider how it feels at all. Or to such a degree that we do it and we never think about it or them again.

To not ghost takes self responsibility and courage.

Hold on, No. I will say it out loud. Let me try that again.

To not ghost takes self responsibility and courage.

I know. Big things. Big, heavy, hard things. It takes confronting something uncomfortable. Honesty. Truth. Likely hurting someone’s feelings directly maybe. By letting them in on why it’s best you part ways. But at least then they have something tangible to move forward in their lives with. They can then decide with clarity what to do moving forward, how to grow, and whether or not this affront is about them or about you.

This is an act of love.

And we all can see I think (I hope) how the world could use more love.

It could use more self responsible individuals.

It could use more courage and honesty.

This is an act of courageous love, self respect, and respect for another being given simply because they exist.

To the people who have been ghosted.

Return to those pieces in you that you can love.

Water them until more pieces of you enter into that loveable bubble.

Fertilize that soil until you remember that you are worthy and loveable entirely. Until you love yourself so much that it’s ok to let them go even when they do it in a way that lacks courage.

You are whole even without them.

You are worthy, even if they’re unable to stay.

Your worthiness is not reliant on those people choosing you.

Thank the universe; God, for showing you that there is nothing there for you.

Go pour into what has been maintained. Embrace those who have stayed.

Invest in those who have the courage to tell the truth in love.

And become one of those people.

I love you.

Love, a ghosted woman

COMING UP:

This month we are exploring the nuanced relationship with our emotional landscape. The what, the how, the why, and the juice. Being in right relations with our emotions is a massive key unlocking our authentic nature & aligning ourselves for a life where thriving is on the menu.

PLUS join me and this precious community of seekers on the last Sunday of the month for our community topic discussion on this month’s topic. This is one of my favorite ways to get into this work. We go deep and get to connect in the way we were meant to; asking questions, trying things on and out, and exploring what these lessons mean for our daily lives.

We talk about being in right relations with our emotions and what their actual purpose…

Read more

It’s Today!

In an hour we will be connecting on zoom to discuss Capacity, Resilience Building, & Aligning with our Authentic Self! I am so excited to connect live & dive in deeper to all that we have been talking about this month.

Bring answers to these questions:

1. What phase do you feel most challenged by: rising into expanded energy states or descending into contracted energy states? Why?

2. What is the most obvious way your body speaks to you regarding your capacity/energy levels?

3. If you were to live a life more in accordance with your nature, what would have to change?

Topic Discussion Outline:

• Tending to the inner landscape that allows for an expanded capacity.

  • Resources

• A sense of security is needed to allow life force to properly flow through our bodies & spirits

  • Pulling out of the community is one of the biggest losses when capacity is limited.

• SENSING Capacity

  • What is the language we must learn to be able to sense?

  • Questions worth asking regularly

    • What do I feel when I hold the vision of what my day holds?

      • Emotionally, physically

    • Where do these feelings arise within my body?

    • What do they want to do? What do they need from me in an ideal world?

    • What is the quality of my energy body right now?

      • Fast, slow, swirling, heavy, stagnant, confident, closed, etc. (this is the language of the physical & energetic body

      • If there were an elemental picture that would match my energetic body right now what would it be?

        • Raging river, soft lake, dark cave, etc.

    • What can I do to align my movement today with what I have learned?

• T-MINUS Practices to read the signs before the body has to “yell”.

• Window of Capacity

  • CONTRACTION

  • EXPANSION

  • OVERWHELM

    • DORSAL (collapse)

    • SYMPATHETIC (anxiety)

• Abiding by our nature

  • Holy Living

  • Aligning ourselves with our truth

  • Opening pathways for authentic self expression

  • Removing debris that keeps us from living within our OWN life

    ---

I will be opening the zoom call 10 minutes ’til so we can get settled in and connect a bit before discussion begins. When you’re ready to join the call click this link:

(the link is for paying subscribers. Want to get on the call?)

Subscribe now

Read more

Can we keep both feet firmly planted even as life moves in all her power around and through us? Can we do so while maintaining pr…

Read more

Read more