What's Alive Inside You?

The longing to be visible, to be witnessed, to be held

Narration

She looked at the room around her, mind full of cotton as if it were ready to burst through her eye sockets. She couldn’t take in another single piece of information and so she sat, almost catatonic, on the couch while her baby slept soundly at her breast. Why did she find it so difficult to put it all down? To be with herself and her thoughts? Why was she always tempted to look outward to see what other people were doing, instead of inward at her own longings, inklings, passions?

She took a deep breath; shoulders rose and fell to the floor with the heaviness of release. She takes one last look at her email, at the newsletter waiting for her from the creative coach she virtually connected with a month ago. It had been sitting there, unopened, because she just couldn’t put aside the time to give it the space it deserved—give herself the space she deserved.

Strength and Determination is the prompt for her creative practice. Ha. It’s almost laughable that she would open it this day when she was doing her best, yet failing, to feel strong and determined. She could see something beautiful just barely visible on the horizon, something imperfect and real, but tears flowed down her cheeks as she realized she was afraid she’d never reach that point.

She closed her eyes and felt the wave of fear restrict her chest and tingle in her arms. She had learned that to fight fear was to invite anxiety, and so she sat with it instead and asked it what it needed.

Create some space, it began. Stop looking to everyone else for answers in your own life. You won’t find them there. Move inward. Let what’s inside come out.

Take one small step by one small step into the unknown, it implored. You may need to recalibrate, but keep going. If you don’t see anyone ahead of you, that doesn’t mean you’re going the wrong way.

Trust yourself, it said gently. You have what you need to start this journey, and the wisdom to discover the rest along the way. You can’t bypass the hard parts, but you can choose to show up anyway.

The fear swirled from her chest, down her arms, and out through her fingertips, leaving a trail of peace and gentle knowing in its wake. In that moment, anything, and everything, was possible.

Reflection

I’ve been writing this newsletter nearly every week for just over a year now. When I first started, I wasn’t sure what purpose it held, other than as a container for the words that wanted to spill out in the wee hours of the morning. I also hated the way my brain felt like it was full of cotton every time I scrolled through content. It was like I just no longer had room to take in any more information—like I was no longer even really real. I needed to get the cotton out; I needed to create more than I consumed.

As I read “How to do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy” by Jenny Odell, I was struck by the call for us to reclaim our attention from the spaces where companies profit from keeping us distracted, and how vital this is in creating a life that feels meaningful and well-lived. She talks about how it’s not necessarily about disconnecting from these spaces altogether, but rather a regular practice of shutting them off for a time so that we can turn inward to our own longings and creativity and gifts.

This is what writing looks like for me right now—notice the little nest I set up with tea, snacks, tablet, and my copy of How to Do Nothing =)

I really struggle to do this at times. Social media and streaming shows is, at best, neutral in terms of energy exchange (and is definitely what I need some days to just shut off); at worst, however, it sends me down a spiral of feeling like I don’t have enough and makes it difficult to tune in to what’s happening in my body, clear away the noise, and find my inner knowing. I tell myself that I don’t have the energy to give to anything else, but I also know that to some degree this justification keeps me stuck in patterns that are depleting me (or, at least, not filling me), and are not providing me with any sense of meaning.

The other day, while Jason took the kids out, I felt sheepish for using that time to write here and make some plans for future newsletters. Surely I should be doing something, anything, more valuable or productive than that? But, I’m slowly recognizing that making visible to others, or even just to myself, what’s alive inside of me is vital to my wellbeing. This is creativity at its heart, and it’s the gateway to meaning-making, to soul expansion, to transformation, to connection with the thread that ties us all to each other.

The nourishment I feel is something I just can’t possibly receive by passively taking in content. The conversations I’ve had with folks who read my newsletter has been so beautiful and encouraging, which I hope goes both ways; the feeling when my community band strikes a perfect harmony can only be felt when I am a participant; and the opportunities that have been presented to me as I dare to speak a vision out loud, one that is still being birthed, has been a reminder that I can show up bravely, even when I don’t know what the outcome will be.

I can ALWAYS find a way to fill my day with something productive. That’s what our society would like us to do, because the goal of capitalism is profit, and profit only comes from production. But us humans, we’re not meant for that. We are so much more than that…YOU are so much more than that. You are ephemeral and real; you are a combination of heartache and joy, grief and gratitude, peace and chaos; you are story and song and dance in a living body tuned to the pulse of the earth in your chest. There is something inside you that longs to be visible, to be witnessed, to be held. Will you bring it to life?

Invitation

I recommend taking some time to come to your center before answering these questions: physical activity, meditation, mindful awareness, listening and singing to music, etc—anything that feels good in your body.

• Imagine that you were sent to a secluded cabin in the forest for a week with no responsibilities or emails or worry about money. After getting a good 9 hours’ sleep each night, what do you imagine yourself doing? What would you create? What would you give freely to others? What skills would you take the time to cultivate? What would be challenging, yet nourishing?

• What does it look like to make intentional space for those things in this stage of your life? What barriers hold you back?

• What depleting patterns do you find yourself caught in? How can you take intentional steps out of the pattern?

• Do you find yourself believing that you need to always be productive with your time? What happens when you believe that?

My friends, how will you tune out the noise for a while, tune in to your inner knowing, and make visible what’s alive inside you? I’d love to know!