On vacation. Yoga this morning on the beach in the Florida Keys. The yoga instructor calmly exhorting us to, “Stay in your Bodies…”
Powerful statement. The words from Wednesday circled back to me sometime later after that beautiful practice.
It was powerful to hear her encourage us to stay in our bodies specifically as she guided us into yoga poses that required more intention because we would need to use more of our body strength and flexibility and even the endurance of our muscles to be lengthened and stretched out in those poses for sequences with supportive breathing. Not shallow breaths. We needed deep whole ones.
Thursday morning this caused me to think about what it means to truly stay in one’s body, especially in moments where it would feel easier to become fragmented, disjointed and disembodied. We can compartmentalize very easily as humans and maybe some of that could even be a safety mechanism to protect us for a season from being completely overwhelmed and overtaken by the circumstances of life that can so easily come, crash and destroy the plans that we have built. The waves and winds of unanticipated destruction, disappointment, ache, longing and uncertainty do come. For all of us.
You can compartmentalize things sometimes and just live in your head. You can compartmentalize things and stay disconnected from your heart. You can even compartmentalize things in such a way that even though you might be functioning in your body you’re not even connected to yourself to feel, to understand and to know what’s actually happening in, through and around you.
Compartmentalizing can be done temporarily but it’s not designed to be the everyday way you get up and meet the world. It’s a mini bandage that’s not equipped to heal what’s broken, bleeding and wounded.
Which is why the yoga teacher’s words yesterday that I’ve been leaning into are so very powerful. It IS a choice to stay in your body. It’s a choice to stay connected to your muscles, to listen to your heart as it beats. To breathe in and out, in and out, in and out and with each inhale and exhale in those breaths to feel them, to listen to them as you also listen to your body and what it is telling you it can and cannot do.
Staying in our bodies I feel also means listening to our bodies to respect and honor what our limitations might be and where we might need to reside in a pose of ease that is non-performative while we gather the courage to heal, the restoration, the peace and the rest that is needed in that season and in that moment. This is true for yoga and how we live daily and the choices we make with ourselves, at work, in our relationships and more.
Stay in your body.
Choose a pose of ease to recover.
What does staying in your body cause you to think about for yourself?
How would you like to be more intentional to connect with your full self and feel all of your muscles and all the parts of you that are wired and sinewed together by God’s grace and creative organization that make you who you are to live in the life that he’s giving you right now?
What are your limitations? Physically, spiritually, emotionally, relationally, mentally, financially? How do you need to honor these limitations?
I’ve told friends recently that our bodies are vehicles that our souls have the opportunity to live in. These are the very blessed ways that we get to experience life on the Earth and the functionality of having a body is so very important because if we didn’t need them we wouldn’t have them.
We would live and exist in a very different way. But there is something very precious and sacred about God creating bodies for human beings to live in and to experience this world with. Which naturally leads me to consider, “How am I cultivating care in my body?”
As I think about my body as my vehicle and approach my next birthday this summer, I continue to set the intention to cultivate a practice in my life of honoring my body, understanding my body, stewarding my body, and living well in deeply connected ways for my body.
It isn’t an elevation of my body as being the most important part of my living. My body is one piece of an integrated, congruent experience that I’ve chosen to have for myself that prioritizes my spiritual, mental, relational, emotional, and physical health and well-being as priorities I tend to on a daily basis.
With this in mind, being a woman who invests in living an embodied life for myself is one of the most important decisions I’ve ever made. I entered into that shift with intention at the end of 2017 + beginning of 2018 and I haven’t looked back. Making that decision has changed the game completely for me. The ways that I’m showing up in the world honor myself. I’m keeping with a steady rhythm of living an integrated, connected and whole life.
For this I am thankful.
The gratitude is real.