“Hey… I need support right now and I don’t have anyone else to turn to. I don’t know what to do. I’ve been crying since last night and I feel so lost and stuck. Every step forward brings 20 steps backwards. I have so many ideas and so much I want to create and I can’t and it hurts so bad. I’m trying to take care of myself and give myself grace and be gentle but then something else happens. I’m creating space to listen to what I need and I don’t know what else to do. It’s like my heart and soul know and are longing and urging, but my body and brain are saying no. And they are fighting. And I don’t know what to do about it. It hurts so fucking bad.”

 

 

I sent this message to my coach last week in the middle of a 24 hour breakdown.

 

I couldn’t stop crying.

 

The recognition I had come to through the message kept echoing in my mind on repeat:

“My heart and soul know what to do, but my body and brain aren’t working, they are fighting and it hurts so fucking bad.”

 

 

The ceaseless crying prevented me from attempting to do anything that day, until I had to pick my son up from school. I had to stop to get gas, but the tears didn’t stop. As I finished pumping, I looked up through wet, swollen eyes to see a man in his mid 50s in his work coveralls standing at the pump across from me looking at me. He offered a kind, gentle smile.

 

I felt the hypervigilance melt from my being. This was the protective mechanism that had been attempting to keep me safe, a symptom of the complex-ptsd I have been healing from since leaving my abusive relationship last year. This state of emergency was, at all times, obsessively scanning my surroundings for danger.

 

More tears, more softening.

 

I walked into the gas station to pay with no energy to look at or say anything to the woman at the register other than “debit please,” and walked out without saying anything else.

 

The more the tears fell, the more I melted, the less energy I had to try to pull myself together for the people I was coming across. I showed up to my son’s school and couldn’t be bothered to wipe the tears off my face or clean up the snotty mess in my nose.

 

I had finally reached liberation… not giving a fuck.

 

Dear Goddess how sweet that state of not giving a fuck felt after living in a state of fear, obsessive analyzing, compulsive holding and chronic tension for so long.

 

Things started to shift from here.

 

Two days later I had a tooth that had been causing me excruciating pain for the last 3 months extracted under sedation. This tooth and everything wrapped around it had amped up the anxiety and hypervigilance that had hijacked my system tenfold. And as much as I lean heavily on natural medicine, I was really looking forward to being put to sleep for a couple of hours.

 

The next couple of days I had full permission to rest and do nothing. Permission that I needed badly. Permission to binge watch Schitt’s Creek all weekend (medicine for my heart and soul.)

 

Within this softening, enough pressure was let off that I was able to step out of the “fight” between my body and soul to witness it with a tiny bit of self-compassion.

 

Sunday was my birthday and I woke up feeling angry, down and blah. I really didn’t want to, nor did I have the energy to do all of the socializing that was planned for the day. So I gave myself permission to show up to all of the interactions exactly as I was feeling.

 

“I am allowed to be blah. I am allowed to not make eye contact. I’m allowed to feel awkward. I’m allowed to not participate in conversation. I’m allowed to not laugh at the thing that everyone is laughing at that I find offensive.”

 

No shame, no self-judgement, no putting on masks, no faking it.

 

It was an active moment-to-moment practice, but I did it. And I noticed as the day went on I naturally felt better and had more capacity and the dialogue of my inner allowing changed.

 

“I am allowed to be seen. I am allowed to open my heart. I am allowed to laugh. I am allowed to share my experience. I am allowed to contribute to the conversation.”

 

It wasn’t linear and it went back and forth, but it reminded me of something I wrote last year:

“Sometimes you have to say no to make space for the true yes to arise.”

 

I spent the entire next day giving myself permission to be exactly as I was and to do exactly what I wanted and had the capacity to do. By the end of the day, more space had been created and I was able to hear my inner dialogue on repeat (rather than being trapped IN it) that was screaming all the reasons why I didn’t feel ok.

 

I recognized where I am resisting being where I am and where I am pushing and forcing myself to be somewhere else – to feel a certain way, to be a certain point in my healing. I was and am ready to claim, honour and embrace the places where I wasn’t and still am not ok. So I sat down and wrote two full pages of the things I am not ok with. Things within me, things outside of me, people, places, situations, scenarios, feelings, beliefs, individual and collective, isolated and systemic. This is how it started:

 

“When people ask me how I’m doing, I’m not ok answering that I’m not ok.

I’m not ok, but a part of me cannot handle the added pain of rejection, judgement, isolation, or awkwardness from another or of feeling the other person’s need to help me feel better. I need to feel ok not being ok, and all of those things validate the part of me that believes that it’s NOT ok to not be ok.

I cannot heal or become whole without owning, honouring and embracing my not-ok-ness.

I now reclaim my not-ok-ness.”

 

This was a practice in melting the shame and fear that was and is wrapped around my tender wounds.

 

We cannot access the places within us that are needing our loving attention while they are shrouded in shame and fear, which act as a cloak that separates us from these things and keeps them hidden in the dark.

If you feel that there are some things in your life, within and without, that you are trying to rush, bypass, manipulate, change, suppress, avoid, throw away, feel ashamed or fearful of perhaps this practice may be helpful for you (please ensure you have some sort of resource or support if needed).

Unshaming and Reclaiming Practice of Self-Intimacy

*set aside some time in your day to do this to completion

 

Write this statement and fill in the blanks (as many times as you need to, there may be a lot or just a couple).

 

****************************************************

 

A RECLAMATION

 

I cannot heal or become whole without owning, honouring and embracing my not-ok-ness.

I now reclaim my not-ok-ness.

 

I am not ok that…

I am not ok with…

I am not ok when…

 

(It might feel good to go to a mirror and gaze in your eyes as you say this following part out loud, or just simply state it out loud.)

 

I now reclaim my not-ok-ness.

(Your name) I still love, honour and accept you in your not-ok-ness.

(Your name) your not-ok-ness does not make you any less worthy of love and belonging.

 

I am healing.

I am whole.

I am loved.

 

(Your name) I see you, I hear you, I love you, I am here with you.

 

****************************************************

When you have completed, it might feel good to place your hands somewhere on your body that feels loving and supportive and grounding, maybe even wrapping yourself in a hug.

 

Think of this practice as you taking off some layers of protective clothing. You may feel raw and vulnerable. Take some time to create healthy experience of gentle protection and being held. Have a bath, wrap yourself in a blanket and curl up in a ball while listening to some soothing music, get cozy and have a warm tea, do a meditation or yoga nidra that helps to regulate your sysem. Don’t skip this part, it is important.

 

Pay attention to what comes up over the next day or two, emotions, thoughts, people, it all matters. Come back here and check in and share as much or little of your experience as feels ok.

 

 

Beautiful friends, thank you for taking the time to hang out here on my web portal of love and healing.

 

Be gentle with yourselves.

We are all so worthy of this level of self-love, self-care and self-intimacy. From each of us, it will only ripple out to the world around us, inviting more beings into love, care and intimacy.

 

I’m here for the good work.

How about you?