You have permission to be…

unresolved

rageful

grieving

depleted

confused

empty

lost

You have permission TO BE.

If there is anything we can rely on the human species for, it is our drive to find answers, heal, and grow. That is why the digital space is filled to the brim with solutions, coaches, courses, “gurus.”

We’re all looking to resolve the discomfort of our humanness.

This leads to an infectious subconscious belief that every bit of your experience needs to be fixed.

It doesn’t.

Your scattered, broken, numb, heavy, tangled up pieces need your presence. Because even if solution is part of the equation, you must know, intimately, what you’re working with first.

Do you know your grief? Have you sat it down for tea?

Do you know the voice of your rage? Have you let it shatter your niceness?

Can you find compassion for your confusion? Can you let it sit beside your knowingness and let them inform each other?

The kicker is: you may not die a perfectly resolved human.

Thank god.

May you leave this life having lived thoroughly. Not perfectly. THOROUGHLY.

That is my wish for you and I.

You have permission to be.

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I think one of the primary epidemics of our time is our insatiability.

We are a saturated society. Rarely do we allow ourselves to take the position of gratitude and contentedness. Our aching hands, already full with a bounty that surpasses necessity, reach evermore.

I think part of this comes from our starved ability to sit in ambiguity.

We suffocate our tolerance for uncertainty through constant consumption of content, products, news, courses, etc.

I find myself in this same intolerance all the time. I am quick to Google any curiosity that arises. My reasoning is frequently “why not?” The information is available. Might as well use it.

But the “why not” is becoming more and more evident to me.

We can ask AI and the internet anything. We have a degree of certainty perpetually at our fingertips, which isn’t a shameful thing in and of itself. Our access to information is incredible. It is also detrimental when our reliance on it leaves no space for true satisfaction or worse, wonder.

When we have surpassed satiation into complete saturation, there is less space for curiosity, creativity, connectivity, and a feeling of actual wholeness. We know the next time we feel void of an answer, cure, or inspiration, we can turn to the external; we starve our ability to turn inward for the very same things.

Do we not feel heavy and constipated with the noise of the material world? Do we not feel weighed down by the loss of our childlike wonder?

Perhaps the void of our innocence is what urges the consumption. Perhaps we are seeking the childlike gaze in everything we consume. Staring listlessly at our screens, awaiting a spark that alivens the child within, unaware we are dampening our own flame.

I do not wish to demonize the evolution of how we draw creativity from each other. That is the beauty of the vast interconnection we share through media. It is miraculous to me that I can hear music from an emerging artist from across the world in the confines of my phone screen that sparks an idea for a song of my own, or touches an emotion within that I have not been able to touch myself.

That. is. magic.

My concern lies in the unconscious engagement so many of us are drowning in. We do not even know we are saturated because it is so normal to be.

My request (to you and myself) is to resist the urge to seek an immediate answer when curiosity emerges. Allow yourself to sit with the discomfort and spaciousness of not knowing.

Emerge from the grip of your screen and allow yourself to receive the world through childlike eyes. Get curious about the life of the tree in your yard, what the wind may be whispering to you, and remember how small you are in the grand scheme of the universe.

Clear out a few items you haven’t used in years and despite endless self-convincing, likely never will.

Put your phone on Do Not Disturb.

Sit with your breath.

Stare at the ceiling.

Move your body.

Empty yourself, like the squeeze of a sponge…

Saturation —> Satiation —> Satisfaction

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For a moment, I felt the loving gaze of my future Self.
Much kinder than the gaze I hold now.

I paused. I softened.
My ears opened as whispers of wisdom rolled off her tongue.

You are blind to the fullness of the world you are building; the one that houses the wisdom being fostered. And your blindness shall remain, for if you see it with perfect clarity, the hunger that builds will fade into false satiation, and you will not keep building.

You claim to fear the unknown, but it is what fuels the flame of evolution.
Yes, curious one, the unknown is your friend. It does not flinch at your picking and prodding. It does not care about your attempts to cast it aside. It is what secretly fuels your flame.

I am not here to tell you everything will be okay. I am not here to stroke your hair and bring your a warm cup of certainty. I am here to you remind you…

You will not always be who you are now.

Love her. This You that you are now.
Feed her. Dance with her. Be curious about her.
For even I am a temporary mould. Even I am at the will of your every move, the grandeur of your free will, the magic of your curious evolution.

Absolutely none of it is forever. I pray you savor it, instead of pick it apart.

Click play on voiceover above then click here: Retreat by Chelsea McGough
(for simultaneous listening of voiceover & song, listen on desktop. otherwise, play song while reading)

I tread gently through the wasteland.
Stalled tears, stale breath.
The air feels thin. Ground barren and dry.

Something pricks at my feet.
There’s something begging to be felt here.
But I can’t find it.

A brush of my hand. Focused gaze.
I can’t find it.

What happened to the map?
There was a map, right?
Where’s the damn map?

I knew this land once.
I didn’t always need a map.
But where’s the fucking map?

Another prick.
Blood.
What is it? Where is it?

The ground rumbles, creaks, and cracks.
It’s down there…
all the way
down there.

Hand reaches to no avail.
Eyes penetrate to no depth.

You must fall.

No.

You must fall.

How?

Just… fall.

When?

Just fall.

Why?

The crack seals.
Stalled tears, stale breath.
There’s something begging to be felt here.

I can’t reach it.
I can’t see it.
I can’t touch it.
I can’t map it.
I can’t feel it.

I’ll dig it up.
Shovel to dirt.
Muscle and bone.
I will fucking dig it up.

Shovel to unrelenting, unmoving dirt.
Calloused hands tire.
Mind strays.
Heart winces.

I’ll wait for it.
Sacrum to earth.
Ear to wind.

The breeze never comes.
The earth never whispers.

I’ll leave.
I have better things to do.

I pivot.

The ground pricks.

I turn to face the wasteland.
Unbarred.

A wail ruptures from the earth, up my spine
Collapse.
Face to earth, back to sky.
Heart to bellows.

A vicious rain pours.
The wind screams.
The earth swallows me.

I find the wailer hidden deep beneath the earth.
Her forgiving tone draws stalled tears to the brim of my eyes,
descending jaw and throat.
Her presence, dripped in patience, deepens the draw of my breath.

The wasteland rejuvenates through your surrender.
Alchemy restores barren soil.
The map reveals when the search ends.
Direction is found when the “how” descends.

His presence held me gently as I said,

“There’s gotta be a whimsical girly out there who wants to be my friend.”

This induced a quiet sob. The longing for real-time, same-place, warm-blooded friendship is aching in my chest.

Maybe I can chalk it up to age, the busyness of adulthood, a natural shift in shared dynamics, or something “not to be so upset about,” but my long distance friendships are starting to feel more and more distant these days.

Hello, Grief, my old friend.

When these shifts arise, I never really know what to do.

Do I fight for it? Do I express a desire to hear from them more?

Or is that too clingy… should I just grow up and let them do their thing?

Do I keep reaching out, so I can feel like I tried? Or is that useless and draining and a recipe for resentment?

Do I say nothing? Let it potentially dissolve? Does that mean I’m careless or self-involved? Will that land me alone when I’m 85?

I’m realizing none of these are right or wrong; they’re all circumstantial and equally viable revealers of truth.

Having moved to a new city this year, with an entrance into my busiest chapter of adulthood thus far, leisure time is sparse and generally spent nurturing the planted seeds of my relationship or letting my brain recover from homework, client sessions, and work. This has created a massive “I don’t have time” narrative in regards to finding friendship in this new city.

Maybe it’s a little bit of an excuse, but I think it’s a damn valid one.

Though, my relationship is the prefect example of the magically humorous workings of the Universe.

I swore I didn’t have time for a boyfriend. NO WAY could I tend to the early stages of a relationship with everything I have on my plate!!!!

Yeah, maybe not the wrong one. But one that’s aligned will not ask you to pile any higher; it will help you bear the load.

A few months into my time here, and that relationship literally rounded the corner, catching me by complete surprise.

I think finding friendship will be the same.

My roommate, as cute as she is, swore I should try the dating apps. I said no. I trust I will meet my person out in the real world. I was right.

She swears I should try Bumble BFF. I say no. I trust I will find my people in the real world. And I think I will be right.

Those apps feel like meddling with God’s plan to me. Maybe that’s a bit dramatic, but the way my life has unfolded thus far, I know I can trust I will always be in the right place at the right time.

These words are written as consolation to the part of me that sobbed in the coffee shop this morning (and maybe to any of you who relate to this ache)…

Things do work out. You are always in the right place at the right time. There are plenty of humans out there who will want to be your friend, and so many who are already so glad that they are.

These words from Joseff McKenneth Goodwin’s video hit me like a freight train yesterday. If you read my dreamwork article “Yubaba and the Dress of Expectation”, you know that I’ve been carrying a heavy load that is seeped in responsibility, desire, and an undertone of grief.

The responsibility of grad school and a clinical internship. The desire to be an impactful counselor. The responsibility that comes with actually being one.

The desire to maintain momentum as a creative entrepreneur. The responsibility I feel to participate in the artistic renaissance my mentor speaks about.

The responsibility of and desire to be a good partner.

The desire to be a “good daughter” from the lens of a seemingly outdated internal perception that I’ve projected onto my parents (they’re proud of me, and I haven’t let myself believe that).

The desire to move forth as a yoga teacher, and to pour into my students, no matter how sparse my teaching may be in this chapter.

Grief from the loss of loved ones and the dissolution of previous chapters, versions of self, connections, hopes, and dreams.

There is weight. There is density. And there’s a part of me that has been seeking some sense of relief, but, as Goodwin said… that’s not actually the goal.

I just want to feel like I can exist in proportionality. Which includes continuing to hold some of this weight.

And, perhaps how I am reading this weight is what has me short of breath and bogged down.

I have been perceiving many of the things on my plate as a burden rather than a training ground of becoming that I have chosen.

I have chosen ALL of this. No one forced me to go back to school. No one forced me to teach yoga or pursue creative entrepreneurship. I chose all of this because I genuinely desire to make a difference in the collective experience, and I am fortunate enough to see multiple viable pathways for this desired impact.

Where I have felt particularly stuck recently is in how I’ve been reading the teachings of my mentor. In the artist collective I’m in, my mentor is, what he calls, a “dharma artist doula” who helps artists learn how to get out of their own way and learn how to play the money game. He believes artists deserve to get paid, and I couldn’t agree more.

We live in a world tormented by soul-sucking 9-5’s. It makes me nauseas to think about how much creative potential could be sitting in the cubicles of a corporate office filled with humans who have been conditioned to believe that being an artist is a futile venture of financial struggle and strife.

Much of what I’ve learned in the artist community is how to get out of my own way and let my art feed the world (and feed me). This mindset has helped me embody the identity of an artist, and it has helped me birth one of my most meaningful creations.

However, I’ve been approaching my art from the lens of “if I don’t pursue this with all of my energy and start making money off of my art then I’m not really an artist and I’m making excuses.”

This is suffocating and inhibiting my art from feeding me, which means it likely won’t feed others in the way I want it to.

The hard truth is, with my current responsibilities as a student and intern (who also has to work), I cannot pursue my art with the velocity and force I’ve been attempting to. The kind of creative entrepreneurship I’ve been geared towards is like having another job, and… I cannot be clocked in to 5 places at once.

I fear that this sounds like a cop out. Like the very excuses my mentor warns us about.

“When will you ever have the time? When will you ever have the space?”

But my issue no longer lies in struggling to believe that I have something valuable to offer. I have no resistance to showing up in the digital realm. I have created the damn thing and am unafraid to market it and put it out to the world. It really comes down to logistics of capacity and the reality of my human limitations.

It also comes down to an indisputable hierarchy of devotion. My counseling path IS part of my dharma. And it needs me right now. So perhaps it is time to let my other artistic ventures be nutrients in the soil I am currently planted in, rather than the fruit I am trying to usher out of the ground.

There is grief in this realization. It means letting this artistic identity I’ve been clinging onto, dissolve. It means taming my unflinching urge to build something elaborate every time I get an idea. It means reckoning with the substance of the here and now. It means facing the discomfort of being fully in this chapter of clinical and academic responsibility while putting my art on a slower and quieter simmer.

Invoking patience, presence, and discernment are my tasks, and as much as I hate it right now, I know there is something deeply meaningful in this because it feels so hard.

I am currently on vacation in Colorado with my family and from the moment I landed, there has been an intense inner stirring, circulating in the background of my experience.

Fresh off my flight, I transitioned into the memorial of a friend and the embrace of a community from what feels like a different lifetime.

Overwhelm isn’t really an accurate enough word. I felt waterboarded by nostalgia; my current self trying to catch a breath in the immersion of what was, while appreciating the warmth of how known I was in the previous season of my life, feeling the distance between who I was and who I am.

The chapter I’m currently traversing is rich with responsibility and the wearing of many hats. I have landed in a life that asks me to be a version of self I am still becoming. It is quite disorienting at times. If I think about it too much, I lose my footing. It is a season of momentum that asks me to keep placing one foot in front of the other, even when I lose sight of the trail.

When I am removed from the momentum and placed in a temporary slow-down (like this vacation), I am forced to feel everything I haven’t felt while navigating this terrain. And again, I am waterboarded, but this time, by the competing noise of Grief and it’s tagalong friend, Rage, accompanied by the blaring voice of my inner critic who is always fighting for my worth to be proven by output.

Never rest.

Never being.

Naturally, I have had incredibly vivid dreams the last couple of nights.

Dreamwork has changed my life, but sometimes it is difficult to do. I know when I don’t want to sit with the content of my psyche, I must.

Dream 1: Yubaba, The Music Class, and the Fire Drill

I arrive late to a class being taught by a mean, ugly teacher who reminds me of Yubaba from the movie Spirited Away. She’s uttering gnarly sounds that are supposed to be music, but it makes me feel nauseas and afraid. All of the desks are connected to each other; individual desks, but arranged in a tight knit rectangle. As I sit down, I realize I’ve missed the entire semester. Anxiously, I say this to my peers who are seated at the desks. They assure me I can just work through the packet, I will be fine, but I really shouldn’t worry about it right now anyways because there’s about to be a fire drill. The alarm goes off, the mean teacher says “alright, let’s go.” We all stand up and follow suit out the door.

Interpretation:

The Yubaba-like teacher is my inner critic. She is harsh, demanding, and though she’s attempting to keep me connected to a steady rhythm (like music), her utterance feels cruel and disconnected with what will actually help me learn.

My peers in the dream feel equally internal and external, like the voices of my dharma artist community; friendly and less concerned about my perception of being lost and behind. They are the parts of me that know I will learn better when I release the pressure of Yubaba and work through the content on my own time.

And yet… there’s a collective interruption. A fire drill that must be attended. It’s not an emergency, but it is mandatory. Perhaps the fire drill represents the season of responsibility I am in - an interruption in the momentum I wish I could have with my creative entrepreneurship. A necessary delay. Perhaps there is curriculum in the fire drill that I will not find by rushing through Yubaba’s packet.

Dream 2: The Agony of Being Unseen & the Dress of Expectation

I’m in an argument with a friend who’s telling me I don’t do enough for her. I’m infuriated that she doesn’t understand what I’m going through. I ask her to step outside and talk to me. As I open the door, my parents are there, dressed fancily and prepared to take me to a dinner I’ve forgotten about. It starts in 30 minutes and I don’t have the dress I was supposed to wear. I postpone the conversation with my friend and leave with my parents.

My mother is yelling at me for my irresponsibility, for never doing enough. I scream-cry in frustration and agony, feeling unseen and incapable of communicating in a way she will hear me. They refuse to take me home to get my dress.

I take off, full sprint, barefoot, towards a crowd of people trying to find someone who will take me to the house to get my dress. I encounter someone I know from high school who is not my cup of tea, but who sees me in my struggle and offers help.

I arrive at the house, but it’s also the yoga studio I teach at. The studio owner is there, preparing for class. I find the dress in a closet, take it off the hanger, and as I’m about to put it on, students are arriving. I notice they are stumbling in, drunk. Two of them incoherent, one of them holding it together a bit more. I speak with the one who’s slightly more conscious and say: “You’ve been drinking, huh.” She nods, and I prepare to gently tell her she cannot attend class. Over her shoulder, I see my parents waiting and I know I need to go.

Interpretation:

The friend and my parents are the internal voices of expectation that frequently drag me to the edges of burnout while the rest of me kicks and screams and cries: I am exhausted. I cannot be all of these things. I am falling behind. I am failing. I am not enough.

The dress is my outward expression - the presentation I sense I am supposed to have. Prepared, put-together, pleasant. I do not have it with me, and it is seemingly interfering with my ability to be with my family.

The helpful high-school acquaintance feels like the instances I’ve had of being more seen by those who don’t really know me than those who I wish understood the most.

The home/yoga studio that holds the dress is rich with the responsibility and role of leadership I have in this chapter of life. The drunk students symbolizing the straggling parts of me. I must meet them at the door. I must let them know I see them, and I must let them know they cannot participate in this way. They must enter the space of responsibility in a different way.

These dreams felt like a psychic purge. I awoke this morning feeling like everything in me finally moved. Everything was finally seen, felt, and heard.

I am holding more than I can most of the time, and it’s causing a battle-like friction inside. My inner-Yubaba demands that I keep showing up, while the rest of me screams in the agony of being unseen in the weight of it all.

It is not Yubaba who carries the weight of these responsibilities, but she does fuel my momentum; she is likely the inner presence that helps me continuously step forward even when I lose the trail.

But, I must sit with my Yubaba and ask her to ease the reigns a bit. I still bow to how she’s ushered me through some of the most challenging times of my life. She has not allowed me to lose steam, but the steam has become fumes, and when I finally slow down, I can feel how flirtatious I’ve been with burnout.

I must also sit with my kicking and screaming parts; the ones inebriated by this incessant drive to hold so many things at once, stumbling into this role of leadership and responsibility I’m in. I must remind them of the dangers of victimhood. These parts are hungry for external validation, and long to be held and told by someone else that it’s okay to put some of the weight down.

They do not need someone else to affirm this. They need me to affirm this.

The responsibilities I hold in my external life do not exceed the responsibility I hold to take good care of myself. And my dreamer has blatantly displayed the harm I am inflicting upon my inner world by not tending better to my own wellbeing.

I am Yubaba. I am the dress. I am the angry friend and unrelenting mother.

I am the inebriated students. I am the friendly peers.

I am immersed in the mandatory fire drill of my new responsibilities.

I am responsible for the wellbeing of my inner world.

I am listening.

I am feeling.

I am honoring.

I am tending.

I am here.

It is brave to walk towards our desires, knowing there is inherent risk. Many of us silently convince ourselves it isn’t worth it by prioritizing back-up plans and the assumed safe route. We place our dreams on the back burner and choose to live in illusory safety.

The unrelenting truth is: the open palms of mystery are the stage upon which our lives play out. We are never separate from the risk of living.

I recently came across the term “desire paths” which refer to the pathways made by humans repeatedly choosing an unpaved way. Apparently, one university campus studied this phenomenon and created pathways on campus to match this human desire to go off-trail.

Desire Paths could be interpreted a few ways; one being that humans want to take the “easy route.” Another interpretation that feels resonant in my heart is this:

Humans are more innately drawn to walking uncharted paths than we allow ourselves believe.

Perhaps it’s less that we prefer the easy way out, and more so that we don’t want to be told where to go or how to walk through this world. Maybe these pathways are a subconscious, behavioral acknowledgement of our desire to pave the way.

To follow a thread of desire will ask you to step into uncharted territory at some point. The vulnerability and excitement of cutting through the weeds and shadows of an untouched trail is unequivocally exciting for the boundless nature of our souls.

Let yourself feel this for a moment. Call a desire into your awareness - no matter how big or small. Feel the aliveness ignited in your body. Let it rattle your bones as you entertain the possibility of pursuing this desire. Let the possibility of failure and death function as a flame that warms and fuels your choice. Knowing that the preciousness of this pursuit is exactly what life is for.

I drafted this article yesterday, not knowing how tender this message it would land today after the death of Andy - one of the bravest path-pavers I’ve known. Before every BASE jump, Andy would hand you a dragon totem as a reminder of the unknown; a reminder to live boldly before the fire breathing mouth of mystery and leap in the direction of your dreams.

Andy’s legacy is one of joyously and buoyantly traversing the wild unknown of life. When I question taking the first step onto an unpaved path, I will return to the experience of the many times I had my feet at the ledge of a cliff, the immense freedom of leaping, and the excitement of trusting that life is beautiful because it is temporary, because it is imbued with mystery.

I will choose the Desire Path time and time again as a way of living in reciprocity with the gift of this precious human life.

Thank you, Andy, for being an unforgettable example of what it means to squeeze every ounce of life out of this existence. Rest vibrantly, my friend.

I can see my reflection on the computer screen as I type. A strikingly tender background to the formulation of my thoughts.

I see a woman learning how to return to her center and leave it less frequently. I see a woman scorned by hypervigilance and shaped by a desire to serve. I see a woman who has moved from being fed up with her own shit into a season of alchemical power.

Years of hypervigilance has led to one of the most profound realizations I’ve had in a long time.

I constantly feel like I’m walking on eggshells… and I’m the one laying them out.

Each eggshell an illusory barrier to being burdensome.

If I place them, I won’t have to suffer the discomfort of others formulating boundaries against me. If I do not disturb the peace, I will always be likeable. If I’m careful enough, I will always be seen as I wish to be seen. If I’m never inconvenient, I will always belong.

That’s the thinking at least. And this thinking has cost me. A lot. It feels like the root of chronic tension and inflammation. It feels like dis-ease.

I have tolerated, accepted, forgiven, and even admired the inconvenience others seem to unabashedly display. Whenever I encounter someone who is chronically late, loud, uncommunicative, and in the way, I naturally feel irritated but there’s also a sense of freedom that I envy.

I never let myself be an inconvenience.

But aren’t humans inherently a bit inconvenient? From birth, we are inconvenient. We are these wiggly, helpless little beings who fully rely on the care of others.

I’m sure most parents would argue that caring for their child is purely a gift and an honor, which I respect, and also squint an eye at because I also don’t know a single parent who hasn’t been, if even briefly, run ragged by their child, whether it’s a long night of crying, an ungodly dirty diaper, or their unwillingness to eat their dinner… they’ve been inconvenienced many times.

But just as a parent welcomes the inconvenience of their child, perhaps we can embrace the occasional inconvenience of others and our own inherent convenience… perhaps I can embrace my own.

Perhaps I can begin to gather proof that I am still lovable, can still belong, and still be liked even when I let myself soften into inconvenience.

And surely, by allowing myself to be inconvenient, I will feel the sting of someone’s disappointment eventually (that’s mostly what I’m avoiding in the first place). Perhaps I can let this build my tolerance for discomfort and foster a new kind of resilience. And perhaps I will realize that even the most intricate eggshell laying will not protect me from others viewing me through their own tinted lens that may still carry stains of annoyance, distaste, and disappointment. The lens others peer through is so far beyond my control, the eggshells begin to lose their glimmer entirely.

As I’ve written about before… we need each other. And because we need each other, we will naturally inconvenience the people we keep. Being in community, being a parent, loving a partner, having a family, and being a friend is not always convenient. Sometimes it is hard. Sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to do, like pick someone up from the airport, leave the party early, miss something we want to go to, tend to illness, and set our opinions aside. But the gift of that inconvenience is connection (which we need… did I say that already?).

And perhaps the gift of allowing myself to be occasionally inconvenient is a deeper connection with myself.

No eggshell can compare to the priclessness of that.

There’s a lot of spiritual jargon that will have you thinking that you have to be fully resolved internally in order to have the external experiences you want to have.

“If you want to experience ________ you must first find it within yourself.”

I think this takes away from two key things:

1. The natural whimsy and magic of life that will sometimes drop a blessing in your lap amidst your least internally-resolved chapters of life.

2. The irreplaceability of having new experiences through connection with others that help us rewire our inner world and solidify our sense of Self more than any amount of meditation or plant medicine will ever do alone.

I’m not saying “don’t do the inner work,” but I am saying the inner work is not where the buck stops, and sometimes it’s not even where the buck begins.

Sometimes life throws us a new partner, an enlightening conversation with a stranger, an unexpected friendship, etc., that cracks open a door to new internal perception and experience that we may not have been able to do ourselves.

My question for anyone stuck in a rabbit hole of inner work is:

Are you remembering to live?

I’m currently taking a training on the STAGES Matrix (a model of ego development that begins with childhood, but tracks evolution and integration of development through adulthood as well). There are 12 stages in the model, (1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5, etc. up to 6.5), and as one moves from one stage to another, there are confusions at each stage that must be cleared up before entering the next. Especially in our early developmental years, these confusions are cleared up by having new experiences with our caregivers.

Anyone who knows even a little bit about human development and trauma, knows that our early childhood experiences heavily influence our experiences in adulthood. And thus, our need for new experiences through connection continues into adulthood.

But, the western culture of individuality, hustle, and productivity is seeping into the way spiritual concepts are spoken about and practiced.

The truth is: we need each other, and we need to be LIVING OUR LIVES, not just working on ourselves.

Have you ever just let yourself spiritually and developmentally plateau and let life work on you instead?

How open can we really be to new experiences if we have our heads buried in self-help books, never leave our meditation cushion, and never stop the plant medicine trip?

More importantly, how can we integrate any of this inner work if we aren’t reentering the world and living in reciprocity with our environment?

I say this as someone who has fiercely sought constant evolution through the plethora of self-help books I can see out the corner of my eye on the bookshelf right now, and who also fiercely seeks evolution through relationship.

My years of cutting off non-serving friendships, burying my nose in these books, learning how to meditate, and going so inward that I convinced myself I didn’t belong in the place I had chosen to live, were jolted by an unexpected relationship.

That relationship, to this day, was one of the most formative experiences of my life. Sure, I was able to conceptualize a healthy relationship through all the books I was reading, but I needed to practice what that looked like in the 3D, beyond my inner illusions of feeling resolved.

Because the truth is, after feeling like I had figured myself out and that the solution to the rest of my problems was picking up and moving to a new city, this relationship showed me that the new experience I needed to flourish into a more authentic, centered Self was in the flesh and bones of a real, warm blooded connection, in the town I was already in, as the version of self I already was.

Flash forward to now, and I’m experiencing another formative relationship (also at the precipice of me thinking that I don’t belong where I’ve chosen to land and that there must be more for me in a new city) that is imprinting a sense of relational safety, devotion, and care that I have never experienced before and could not have cultivated all on my own.

But now, I have a somatic and mental blueprint of it. The likelihood of me being able to cultivate these experiences internally are much higher now that I’ve received the blueprint through experience. And, now that I’ve received this blueprint, I’m not going to rush off to a lonesome trail of attempting to cultivate this fully within myself, not needing anyone else to do it for me.

No. I’m okay with needing other people. I’m going to let this relationship work on me. I’m going to let this love wash over me as I live in it and through it.

After all, isn’t it a bit egotistical to think that we don’t need others? To think that we are fully self resourced? Feeding that delusion amplifies the very symptoms that bring people to spiritual work in the first place; loneliness, depression, isolation, confusion.

We need each other.

We need nature.

Go touch some grass and give someone a hug.

I giggled as I wrote the subtitle for this article.

“Day 60 of 100 Days of Writing” … more like “Unknown Number of Days of Writing Inconsistently but Trying My Best to Post 100 Pieces of Writing Anyways.”

I have voices telling me that it’s pointless to count anything towards this 100 day challenge anymore. I have been completely removed from the initial consistency of it, but I am gathering valuable information about what happens when I take a pause.

The fear of irrelevancy starts to eat me alive.

As if my existence is only relevant if I’m actively leaving a digital footprint. As if my life beyond the screen isn’t contributing to what I offer in the digital realm whenever and however I make my return.

What I do know (and what feeds the fear) is this: building trust with an online community requires consistency, honesty, and a willingness to show up.

But what happens when life takes us on a detour? When our bandwidth is stretched too far to include our creativity? When we simply cannot hold it all?

Does the progress we’ve made diminish? Do we lose credibility and relevancy? Or is none of it really as big of a deal as my brain is trying to make it out to be?

The chapter of life I’m in is connecting me with the tenacity and grit I need to hold the life I want, and I am in a fierce building and experimenting phase.

I feel like the Universe is handing me brick after brick, seeing how I construct it all together. Not as a test, but because I have asked for an abundant life, and thus, I am receiving the elements of such a life.

But right now, I feel like I went a little nuts in ordering how many bricks I need for the cathedral I’m building. As if the Universe were Home Depot, offering a plethora of supplies for the vision I hold, and I went in and audaciously asked for every brick they had in the store.

The Universe’s job is not to ask me if I can handle all of these bricks; it simply gives what I open my arms to. And now, I must sort through it all and decipher which bricks will actually lay the most sturdy foundation.

If I look too far ahead to what I want the top layers of the cathedral to look like, I will miss the importance of building a foundation that can hold those upper layers.

If I get caught daydreaming about the stained glass windows or the soft couch I want inside, I will lose the precious attention required to build the walls that can contain these finer details.

I must do the sorting, planning, and building of the layer right before me. And some of that sorting, planning, and building has asked me to temporarily set the content-creation-brick aside to figure out where it truly fits and what shape it needs to be, rather than forcing its placement.

The process that precedes the formation and placement of this brick is the process of clarifying my role, my service, and what I can actually commit my energy to, and that is where I am now.

This part of the building process is uncomfortable because it asks for a step back, for a reevaluation of things I thought I was certain of. It asks me to slow the momentum I had built.

But a slowing of momentum is not stopping. I do not need to get stuck on this brick and I will not get stuck on this brick. I have glimpsed the cathedral, and I will build it.

Part of the artist’s discipline is choosing to pick back up, to resume momentum after a pause, to not entirely lose oneself in the questioning of who they are and where they’re going, but to recognize it as divine redirection and formation of their creative path. To be willing to admit that this very questioning may in fact amplify the magic of what they have to offer if they just. keep. building.

Can we really enjoy the present moment with the fear of loss looming over it?

If we sense time as a burglar,

stealing seconds of our joy,

fanning the flame of urgency,

can we really fill each moment to the fullest?

Wouldn’t at least one thread of our awareness

be dipped in the elixir of doom,

soaking the edges of each moment

with an almost imperceivable dread?

This is no way to experience time.

What if time were your friend?

Wouldn’t you want to let it work its magic

without inhibiting all that it can bring

through the ways it expands and contracts and snaps and rolls?

Wouldn’t you admire its inherent mystery?

Wouldn’t you want a softened relationship with it?

Of course, we are not guaranteed tomorrow.

But the fear of this possibility will eerily zap your seconds quicker than time itself ever would.

Voiceover for those who want to listen along.

“It must be me. There’s something wrong with me.”

I watch a droplet of water traverse the silver hair on his chest. A fleeting moment of internal silence as I watch it slowly navigate the safest terrain I’ve rested my head upon.

I have never felt more at home.

“Why must you ruin it, you annoying bitch.”

Can he hear me? This voice is booming, he must at least feel the shift in my inner weather.

He does.

He strokes my face.

He asks me.

He knows.

He doesn’t flinch.

He stays.

I cry.

It hurts different this time. I am just removed enough from my trauma’s telltale to feel the ache of jumping to the assumption that I am

broken

wrong

gross

disillusioned

not enough.

Holding compassion for this voice feels near impossible. It is an unintentional saboteur of love.

It is standing in my way.

GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY WAY.

Let me nestle into the haven of devotion this human is offering me.

Let the bones of my body soften under his loving gaze.

Let my wounds be sealed by the clarity of his choice.

He wants to be here. He wouldn’t want to be anywhere else, and I believe him.

So why don’t you, you torturous, wounded, vindictive, voice?

Why can’t you stop? Why can’t you just go away? Why can’t you just…

Oh.

I see now.

I am speaking the same language of your original wound.

I treat you like unwanted baggage. Heavy and in the way.

But you’re a protector. You love me. You want me to feel the safety of this devotional haven, you’re just afraid it will be taken from me, and that I will be left alone on the side of the road again.

I see now. I hear you.

I’m with you, there. On the side of the road.

That was fucked up, wasn’t it…

I’m with you. I love you.

I understand your efforts.

I will take your hand as we traverse the terrain of new love. I will stroke your face and kiss your tears as the ferocious wind of the unknown lashes your face and your throat swells and screeches with the warning of what has been.

And we will stay.

We will open.

We will soften.

We will not flinch.

We will become the safe haven of devotional trust.

I do not know what is next,

and for the first time, it feels insane to try and figure it out.

To take away the gift of the mystery

feels like scorching myself with unnecessary

and ultimately unobtainable certainty.

Too rigid to hold the magic,

certainty is suffocating.

Not knowing is breath.

Optional listening: The Cold by Exitmusic

The undertow of hopefulness carries a wisdom I’ve followed into every love story that has shaped the vessel of my heart.

From wisdom’s birds-eye view, the wounding has made everything richer.

Abandonment has lead me to the overwhelming sweetness of this moment in time. Starved by the emptiness of fantasy, the feast of being tangibly chosen is like a curated meal for the parts of me who writhed in agony after years of feeling unmet and unseen.

I bow to my wounding in gratitude for how tender and new this feels. To feel this experience radiate through my entire being is a gift that may have missed the tender grip of appreciation had it not been a missing piece all a long.

“Just one wise toe on the ground,” I whisper to my hopefulness. “But feel it all.”

There’s a spaciousness within me from all that has fallen apart. Desolation has carved me out for the fullness of what’s arrived and yet to come.

It has chiseled my awareness to keenly look uncertainty in the eye and keep one wise toe on the earth, one knowing finger on the pulse of my path, one listening ear to the heartbeat of my desire. The rest of me free to dip and dive in the titillating Now.

I have longed for a tether, forgetting I am my own. Discrediting my knowing, demonizing my wishing, drowning in the emptiness carved by my wounds, not feeling the spaciousness they’ve brought until now.

I will stretch this tender time, delve into the smallest of moments. I will pull it apart so I can be in its empty spaces. I will let my skin be flushed by the fluttering of my heart.

I will let the eyes of this lover see me through and through and through; a fearless gaze into the window of my heart. Unafraid of what he might find, knowing he cannot take, I keep the door unlocked, welcome mat out.

Come inside.

I had a dream the other night that would have sent me into a spiral of pathologization a few years ago. Luckily the language of my dreamer is far less foreign these days. Even when my dreams are frightening, with willingness and patience, I can usually see what lies beneathe the horror.

Forewarning, it’s gruesome.

I’m walking along an interstate following people I can sense that I know, but who are visually unidentifiable. There are four lanes separated by concrete barriers. We’re approaching the scene of an accident, but the vehicles are nowhere to be seen, there are only bodies and items strewn across the interstate. We’re walking slowly. There is no panic or chaos, just observance. In my periphery I can see people standing over the bodies, appearing to be helping, but there is no urgency, just observance. I’m approaching two bodies in my lane. I walk carefully to avoid stepping on them when one of them moves - almost like someone in deep sleep, they adjust, exhale, and resettle. I feel no panic, but overwhelming compassion. I think of the lives these humans had up to this point, the family members who will miss them, the grief of who they didn’t get the chance to become. As I continue walking, I get the somatic sense that this is too much to take in and I wake up.

This dream did not feel like “parts of me that are dying.” It felt like collective grief and horror being processed through my psyche. If you believe in the collective unconscious, this makes sense.

The eeriest part of this dream was the calm observation. I was not panicked. I was not shattered. I was collected, compassionate, and observant.

To be an artist, a mental health professional, and a community leader in this world amidst our current collective experience is like walking through the blood stained interstate. Honestly embodying these roles asks one to stare the horrors of the world in the eye with a ferocious desire to shine a light upon the shadows. Not to fully eradicate the shadows, but to illuminate where we are needed most. To hold its gaze long enough to heed the call of action.

I will have clients facing horrors that I cannot fix. There is desecration in this world that I cannot solve. There are shadowy nightmares of my own life that perplex me. Perhaps not everything can be, or should be, solved, fixed, or healed. Perhaps the horror is what feeds the souls of dharmic leaders. Without it, perhaps our art does not carry the same weight.

My shattered heart spills its tender insides all over the confines of my bed.

I watch helplessly as the final pieces of a wavering foundation crumble. I wail in the final breath of agony,

and the birds chirp outside.

I feel like all the air in my lungs has been squeezed from me,

and the sun shines through the clouds.

I feel like I’m dying,

and the birds keep singing.

We exist in the sacred grey at all times, living in the threshold of life and death. Nothing is as black and white as we wish it to be.

A child is born, a final breath is taken. Celebration abounds in small corners of my neighborhood as desecration stains the streets of cities all over the world.

An eternal “both, and” that begs us to loosen our grip, to sacrifice our fear of impermanence.

Sacrifice means “to make sacred” - how might we make our fear sacred?

How might we reach just beyond the agony of impermanence to see that it is what makes it all so sweet.

The bitter sting of a sweet nectar, always pressed to our lips. Most are unwilling to swallow.

Impermanence is inevitable, yet we stand firm in our denial.

No matter how many times we turn our backs, it continues to tap our shoulder, turning us to face its most brutal forms - excruciating deaths, unexpected separations.

I don’t think Impermanence wishes to only be seen this way, for it is also woven into the breath of freedom as we leave behind the confines of a life, relationship, or job that restrained our most authentic expression.

It is woven into the heartbeat of a child as they thud their way through learning to walk. It is the warm glow of fall leaves and the budding of spring flowers.

Impermanence’s gift is preciousness. Perhaps in return, we offer up our fear; a sacrificial exchange for participating in this wild, unknown life.

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Recommended listening while reading: Elegy for Peace by Felix Rösch

The dust of a wretched week is settling and the eerie stillness of desolation is affording me deeper listening.

I can hear and feel every string of my soul-chestra in a way I’ve never been able to before. Today’s tuning drew me to the forest; the birthplace of my inner chorus.

Plans abandoned, I wandered to the perfect tree. A tall, sturdy cedar, with the energy of an old, dear friend. I placed my palm to it’s trunk, leaning, giving it some of the lingering weight of my grief.

Immediately it spoke, but not with words. A shared knowing - palm to bark, breath to branches, feet to soil.

Then, a whisper:

Trust your path, pave the way. Trust your path, pave the way.

But what if I waver?

I waver, too. Don’t you see? My branches sway, fall away, and decompose. But they are not all of me. I am my trunk, my roots, my crown, and the ecosystem surrounding.

You have branches too - parts of you that waver, that get taken by the winds of change, soaked by the tears of the sky, ripped by well-meaning passersby. Some of your branches may need to fall away, but look below… they feed the soil. They never really die. They play a regenerative role. They contribute to the heights you can grow.

Heights to which I must speak; do not fear the darkness enveloping your roots. There are nutrients there, lurking in the shadowy depths of the underground. This is how you remain connected.

Bravery is immersed in your roots. From the darkness, you reach the sky. The shelter of your canopy will aid many weary travelers.

Root down, stand tall, trust in the falling away. Trust your path, pave the way.

Palm to trunk, breath to branches… “Aho, Cedar.”

Aho, sweet child.

I lost a dear friend to suicide this week. A human brimming with determination, kindness, and discipline. Someone who taught me that nothing was impossible deemed his circumstances too impossible to endure.

I have no idea how to make sense of this, and perhaps there is no solid form of sense to be made, but rather moments of felt-truth that weave through debilitating waves of grief. Because I reached my own moment of insanity this week. An overloaded nervous system can convince you there is no way out. So as difficult as it is to map how someone like him took his life the way he did, I understand in a limited way.

The pain of this loss struck the jugular of grief within me. Every lingering pain I have not fully felt, flooded my system. In 72 hours, I have touched a full range of human emotions. I thought my heart had grazed every edge of my inner experience already. I was wrong. There is more. Infinitely more.

I wrote a few months ago that I think grief may be a permanent bystander to every experience we have in this human life. This feels painfully true right now, but I am also feeling the potency of grief as a teacher.

Grief is mysterious. At times it is alarmingly present; in other moments, it slithers into the breath of a giggle, almost imperceivable, yet not truly masquerading.

You think you know it’s form, it’s sensation, it’s sound, it’s smell, and in an instant, it transforms. It is equally everything you know and everything you don’t, and I don’t think it ever leaves us.

Perhaps we are born with the grief of our ancestors swirling in our DNA. Perhaps we are the alchemists of their grief and our own. Perhaps grief rides through the canal of our mother’s womb as we take our first breath, embarking on our mortal human journey.

I don’t say this to be grim or to portray grief as a dark passenger to fear, but rather to normalize it’s presence and help us remember that it is perhaps one of the most unequivocal manifestations of the mystery of life that we can actually feel, no matter how momentary and strange, no matter how senseless and formless.

One thing that has continuously been reflected to me this week by my friends is how this will strengthen my medicine as a counselor. Touching the sharp edge of grief, beyond it’s illusive presence in textbooks and training videos, will allow me to move more directly with the heart of a client’s experience. It will remind me that there is no right answer, no correct way to grieve, and how it feels for that to be true.

Equally, I am brought back to the truth of why I am pursuing this line of work. It is not to change or fix anyone, but to walk with them through their own remembering process. To shine a light on their strengths, to be with them in the crumbling, to be a lighthouse of hope when they cannot find it for themselves, and to remind them that there are gifts naturally woven into the other side of the darkness they endure.

That may sound like a lot of fluffy words for what will frequently and simply be a deep practice of meeting clients exactly where they are on a moment to moment basis, but it is the heartbeat of what I will be doing.

I will follow this heartbeat of purpose with the determination and discipline of Shea; my sweet friend. I will breathe life into his legacy by facing hardship head on, transforming impossibility into possibility. I will heed the call of potential and make it tangible. I will move with the impenetrable kindness he exuded and always remember to giggle at the absurdity of life, because laughter was a gift we frequently shared.

And as an ode to the mystery of life, I welcome grief as a teacher, in all of it’s forms. No matter how momentary and strange. No matter how unbearable and unmovable. No matter how senseless and formless.

I open my heart to living as fully as I can as a prayer for those who felt they could not.

In loving memory of Shea and in prayer for his family, friends, and community. We love you.

I listened to a podcast today that resonated so deeply, I teared up multiple times. She said that after taking some field notes from avoidants, she learned they don’t leave because something hurts, but before it hurts. This lead her to realize that, on the flip side, her nervous system is oriented towards staying in pain, frequently longer than she needs to. She said “maybe I’m a masochist” and I cackled because seriously… am I a masochist? Feels like an accurate and hilarious explanation for my repeated entanglement with men who lack any ability to meet me in the ways I need, and my willingness to overstay my welcome in expired connection.

I’ve been spending time attuning to the voice of my inner hopeless romantic and trying something new: not blaming her for my heartache. Because her desires aren’t wrong. She is not broken. Her needs are not too much. They are reasonable and beautiful, but simply stuck in the confines of a world that tells her bare minimum effort is a rarity.

This part of me is actually quite awe inspiring. She manages to stay connected to the sometimes imperceivable magic of life no matter how many times the ground crumbles beneath her. If it weren’t for this part’s persistence, I’d be a cynical masochist and that’s… way less funny.

I have a natural frustration with this part because, as much as I love her orientation to magic, she feels disconnected from reality. But that’s where Highest Wisest Natalia gets to enter the scene. This part can continue frolicking the field of romance while I steward an orientation towards the reality being presented, so her magic will be honored by the right person.

This part is easily appreciated by most men. I think she mirrors a feminine innocence they can identify with, but that requires a particular degree of willingness to admit they also carry hope in their back pocket. To my frequent demise, I am drawn towards men who have hope burning a hole in their back pocket that they continuously ignore and allow to scorn others through their unwillingness to acknowledge it.

I’m an advocate for discernment, but where is the line between wisely yielded discernment and fear-formulated rigidity?

I could spend another 15 years wishing my whimsical heart would crack open an avoidant man’s heart, but I think I’ll keep frolicking, discerning, and stewarding myself in the direction of connections that can properly honor, admire, and foster this magical orientation of mine.