imagine this: you are listening to portishead, sitting in the midst (i imagine the midst much like a mist - a slightly veiled image) of uncoiling from the dark and murky depths of an inner winter - perhaps buried in the slowly warming soil, establishing your roots, learning to compost, cycling through emotions, refining responses - and someone suddenly switches the music to some terribly trebly pop song and tells you, “now be a flower and bloom!”
things might feel a little twisted.
this happened for me recently. rather than listening to my body’s desire to stay where she was, at home, wrapped up, nurturing herself, i went to a dance led by somebody else. within this space was the freedom to move however i chose, but something about the environment was not quite right.
and as i’ve learned over the years, environment is everything. when your internal environment is free of the influence of others’ persuasion, everything is a bit easier. but once auras start interacting, the waters can get murky.
what happened was not ill-intended, it was simply not what i wanted. as i was leading myself through my own journey in space, i felt a series of nudges from others wanting to lead me out of my process and into a communal dance. i just wasn’t into it. i was in the middle of resolving something. an inner ceremony. i have new language for this phenomenon, though it is quite a familiar sensation whose remnants trace to many of the relationships i’ve found myself in over the years. the texture is less prickly now, though. the difference is that i am aware of my agency. i used to believe everyone else was controlling me. i had not yet discovered my ability to self-lead.
here is the lesson i’ve learned perhaps most deeply through this lifetime: it’s never been about them, the ones “leading.” my experience always depends on how i show up for myself. how attuned i am to my own needs. how i choose to direct my energy. through which mediums i move and express. how i value and share my creative essence, which is, effectively, everything i am and can be.
it’s also about who and what i allow into the space that is me. yes. boundaries. does it support me to enter another vortex, or do i need to stay with my individual process? i control my experience. sometimes the cosmic dance between god and goddess happens within. sometimes a handsome human man is the perfect partner to support my mission.
it’s not always clear in the moment, which is the next best step. often we need to pause first. notice. breathe. separate from the emotion that winds us into the patterns of movement we are used to.
when i say “movement,” i mean on the micro and macro level. the way we navigate life as a whole. how we eat, sleep, walk, talk, breathe, think, feel, fuck, relate with everyone and everything.
the way you do one thing is the way you do everything. think about that. notice where it appears most obviously.
or, if you prefer: as above, so below. look deeper within and you may start to see everything through a new lens.
the mind is stubborn, though. rigid. fixed. so fucking linear. sometimes we need a different approach. a way to change the mind from the inside.
personally, i believe everyone can benefit from this approach - from the physical movement of energy as the foundation upon which to build a stable internal system.
i spent years doing belief work. reading all the “right” books. trying to rewire my mind. letting “teachers” tell me they were healing me (thereby robbing me of my agency - implying i needed to be fixed and i needed them to do it for me).
through all of this, i never put the work into action, at least not with any degree of stability. there was a missing connection - the one between mind and body. the interpretation of sensation. i was ignoring that twisted sense, the one that happens when others are trying to pull something from me. my power. my agency. my commitment to the resolution of my own process.
i’m highly sensitive. very intuitive. but i always resisted what i felt!
i had learned to believe there was something wrong with feeling all these different kinds of “ick,” and heavy and avoidant. i believed i was just supposed to stay away from it. to bury the wild emotions my body was presenting me with that were actually trying to tell me something… important.