a body in the slow down .
september 2022.
Thank you to everyone who has become a paid subscriber to this work. I’ll begin to share paid subscriber posts in the coming months. Although putting some offerings behind a paywall is antithetical to many things I believe in, your paid subscriptions do help me to invest in myself as an artist. If you would like to support this work, in the spirit of generosity, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.
Hello from a me who has soaked up all the lusciousness of summer and is turning an eye toward fall. During the past season, my goal was to get very in my body and to actually, truly, rest and restore.
These have both been historically difficult for me. My dharma sister Jen (hi Jen!) said to me this summer “You’ve been busy since I met you” and she’s not wrong. This is the speed at which I operate. I really love everything that I do and I’m often very tired. So, this summer I really challenged myself to as slowly as I thought I should be going, go even slower.
I entered retreat in this slowdown, a big slowdown within a slowdown.
I usually crash into retreat, working my brain and body to the last minute until I step into the retreat center. Then I proceed to fight to stay awake to meditate for half of the retreat. It’s a time. But, I’ve had the luxury of sitting two retreats this year, the second of which occurred in said slowdown. These slowdowns canceled each other out so that I had a very wakeful July retreat. And because I was not falling asleep, I was awake for every moment that I had to contend with my body.
I was nine days out from a full wisdom teeth extraction which meant, stitches half-in-half-out, flushing food out of my empty sockets after every meal so they wouldn’t get infected, and a generous amount of hyper-awareness to the four open wounds in my mouth. It was not my favorite thing, my body making itself fully known to me so loudly and presently. At the same time, it’s kind of cool to see how gross the body really is, no? It is like continuously living in that part of the meditation of the body where you think about your bile and your spleen and your sweat and your guts and your ooze and your pus and your clots. How delightfully icky our human bodies are.
Awareness of the body is the first foundation of mindfulness. It is also emphasized in a teaching I am obsessed with right now, Thirty-Three Synonyms for Nibbana, where the Buddha (surprise) offers thirty-three alternate names for Nibbana (Nirvana) and closes with the instruction that “Mindfulness directed to the body: this is called the path leading to the destination”.
However much you want to be free, is exactly how much you have to be with all of the good and the juicy, the bad and the ugly of your body. I’m reading Audre Lorde for the first time and am truly aghast. 😧 Her work is so felt and affirming, so dharmic - it really feels like a coming home. In a wide-ranging interview with her friend Adrienne Rich, she speaks about her physical survival, living with cancer and what comes from the commitment to being open.
Once you live any piece of your vision it opens you to a constant onslaught. Of necessities, of horrors, but of wonders too, of possibilities…Of wonders, absolute wonders, possibilities, like meteor showers all the time, bombardment, constant connections.
An Interview: Audre Lorde and Adrienne Rich
Yes, it is a constant onslaught to be in this body and feel everything you’re feeling like Jesus Christ. And yes, it is the path leading to the destination of taking action from a place of inner truth like Holy Moly.
Awareness of the body without rejecting it is a liberatory act.
xo Jessica
Other things found during the slow down.
Every so often, I recognize that Instagram isn’t good for me and delete the app for a month. While I am a mindful heaux, all the meditation in the world can’t fight the sedative of scrolling. So instead of the full detox, I choose one day a week that I’d like to scroll. On this day, I download the app, do my little engagement and then delete the app for the remainder of the week. It is a bit of a silly system but it is working. I can hear myself think more. I’m not thinking my thoughts through the filter of the portal so much. If you know the quote “You’re not thinking your thoughts, you’re thinking the culture’s thoughts” then you know exactly what I’m talking about. All to say that slowing down can look many different ways. Maybe make things silly and complicated if it works for you.
Sidebar: Since Instagram rewards engagement and I am decidedly, Not Engaging, I have noticed when I do share work, it is not shown to as many people as is usually the case. This is okay. I believe that the people who need to find my work will. This is also a reminder to share this newsletter if you feel so called.
Okay bye! 🤗
Work with me.
You can find me weekly at Heal Haus, monthly at Inner Fields and five days a week at Arena.
🌞