When I was 19 I developed a mysterious, unrelenting pain in my upper back. I walked around with my shoulders clenched in solid knots like someone was giving them a never-ending titty twister. It hurt to stand. To sit up straight. Even to lay down. No matter what I did, I couldn’t get the tension to go away.
I visited my local chiropractor, who crowned me with title of “the tightest shoulders I’ve ever seen on someone your age!” Heavy is the head, indeed.
His diagnosis? Stress. His recommendation? To stand in an open door frame and push my chest through my arms — a remedy that’s proven momentarily relieving at most. Personally, I was more interested in getting to the root of the problem. How do I become less stressed in the first place?
“Embodiment” has been heralded in today’s self-help culture as the answer to nearly any question. I can’t log onto the internet without self-proclaimed experts gabbing on about listening to your body! feeling the sensations of your body! and connecting to your body’s wisdom! But how does one even begin to know what that means?
One fall morning in 2020, I sat down for my daily-ish meditation practice. It was a bright day in Bed-Stuy. I was 26 years old. I sat tall on my yoga mat, closed my eyes, and began the way I always did — with a full-body scan.
I started at the crown of my head.
Then I moved down to my forehead.
My cheeks.
My jaw.
My neck.
When I got to my hips, I felt an unexpected tingle. My eyelids flung open.
The call was coming from inside the house. Only, to my surprise, the house was my physical body. It was a sensation I’d never felt before. The feeling of my actual hip. For months I sat down to do body scans, yet it never occurred to me that I wasn’t actually scanning my body at all — but rather a screen in my head where I imagined my body to be.
I wouldn’t say “tapping into my body” has necessarily freed me or solved any of my problems. If anything it’s illuminated them. Drawn greater attention to greater pain. It’s a lesson I learned last year in the shower. My mind had been running wild, and I was looking to get out of my head. In an act of surrender, I stood under the running water and listened to the sensations of my body.
And you know what my body had to say? It fucking hurt.
My shoulders were tight. My forehead was pulsating. My neck was tired of holding up my head. My back felt like it was one bend away from snapping in half, and my calves were so tight that I couldn’t fully straighten my legs. Do I just live like this all the time?
No wonder I don’t come here, I thought, heat radiating from my skin. This place sucks!
But something in that moment — perhaps my own internalized internet — told me not to shy away from the pain. To not do anything to counteract it or make it feel better. To just let it be there. To just stand still and exist to the best of my ability inside this pervasive, full-body fire.
Standing in the pain didn’t make it subside. I didn’t feel relief. It didn’t go away. But after a few minutes I did begin to experience a new sensation. A separation. A duality. Like the pain and I were in relationship. Me listening to it and it listening to me. And through that relationship, I was granted a whole new level of insight into its intentions.
Take my shoulders for example. I know now that they only tighten when I feel like I’m running out of time. When I try to cram too much into a single hour, a single day, a single lifetime. They’re saying to me, “Slow down! Do less!” I think back to my chiropractor appointment 10 years ago. It wasn’t actually stress at the root of my pain. It was impatience. I can’t believe it took me this long to realize.
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A few things I’m thankful for:
- My fears, I guess
- New music :)
- Comfort and familiarity
Pop culture things I’m thinking about:
- No notes
- Maybe a couple notes but still love u girlie
- I just discovered Bluey and I think it’s the best thing I’ve ever seen
- Saw Problemista this weekend. LOVED it. So clever, creative and well done.
A random journal entry:
4.19.23
developing confidence doesn’t look like pointing at someone who seems confident and saying “i wish i had that”
A random thought:
Every day brings something different, baby. Keep going.
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Thanks for reading :) Talk again soon.