Smiling at the changes in the season.
The season is changing… you are changing… I am changing… our friends are changing… and how do we feel about this… how do I accommodate change?
Or... see the challenges and manage them… see the smiles in the change and feel these as healthy and nourishing?
I am not sure about the answers to these questions… and enjoy walking alongside them... while noticing how my feelings respond to the ways I organise my experience in response to the changes in me... and in those people around me.
These feelings around change have been hanging around me recently… for a while… always… and today I noticed a red leaf from a tree lying on the path in front of me as I had an early morning walk in my local park.
The leaf looked like a smile… red lips… smiling… and I noticed my feelings… and… noticed there are smiles in the changing of the seasons.
People I love and care about drift through as I feel them come close to me… move away from me… be there… not be there… be available… be unavailable.
As they do… I look for the smiles I can notice around… me… us… we… the smiles that each of these relationships offers us. Knowing that all my relations… with people… with the seasons… with myself… have more than just smiles… they may have challenges… they may create wounds and leave scars.
Yet without my capacity for relationship… my life is severely depleted… and loses meaning.
So knowing that all change brings a variety of possibilities… for joy and distress… for pleasure and pain… what practices do I notice help me ride out theses sometimes choppy waters of change?
Somatic practices… yin yoga… refuge… qigong… guidance…. tai chi… sharing… embodied self awareness… liberation… meditation… love.
For the last few years… my approach to organising my experiences in ways that nourish me… turns from using my mind to process difficulties and calculate solutions… towards noticing my physical sensations… feeling my emotional responses within my body… tuning into what my body is offering as useful information.
Using somatic practices can create space for parts of me that are not always easy to welcome.
All they are really looking for… in order to manage their own needs for reassurance… is to be seen… to be heard… to be made welcome… here in my body… here in my conscious awareness. Aware of their right to share what they have collected over the days… weeks… months… years… and decades… living my experience… feeling my ups and downs and sideways.
This is not a seeking pain process… somatic practice for me… is always looking to move forward… towards peace… joy… quiet… active… playful… curious… careful compassion and love.
Last night I went to a Yin Yoga class… I go as often as I can to this weekly class… it had a been a couple of weeks since I was last there.
Noticing how my body responded to the postures we spent several minutes in… opened me to that somatic wisdom that shows up when I offer space and quiet attention to my body and just listen… even less in a way… just being there.
As the feelings show up… as I open my hips… breath into the back of my heart… sense into the tension in my knees... as they all find their way into ease… into opportunity… possibility… for re-pair and remembering… for being in this present moment… being with… within… my whole self… and open to how this awareness shows up.
The Yin Yoga session was led by Rosie Edmonds… a Yoga teacher… holding the space… offering gentle guidance… with lots of candles and dimmed the lights… here I felt safe and welcome… in quiet… gentle… soft… caring support.
I allowed the space… my feelings… and Rosie… to guide me through the work.
There was a moment where I thought… why I am I travelling across town on a wet dark evening… to go to this class… I know so many of the postures… could easily do this for myself at home… and as that thought floated through… I felt it pass… smiling… knowing I could come back to that later… after the class.
This morning as I notice the smiles in the changing seasons… feeling how I use somatic practice to support me in managing change… I access the feelings I get when I make the effort to join one of Rosie’s classes… the process of getting myself ready… changing my outfit… finding my mat… leaving the house… laying my lat down in the studio… sitting still and quiet as I settle into this time for me… for my body… my thoughts… my sensations.
While Rosie delicately offers us opportunities to listen to and notice what our bodies offer… how they express what they need… how they highlight tension… and can be softened… breathed into… becoming real and present… being heard… seen… loved.
So these practices… whether it be Yoga… Qigong… Somatic Coaching… Somatic Wisdom groups… help me stay in touch with this reality… my body changes each day… my friends change… my daughters change… this planet changes… these seasons change.
I may not always be comfortable when my body changes and no longer responds in the nimble and agile ways it used to.
My friends change and I may not always be comfortable with the changes they make.
My daughters change and are no longer those youngsters living in my house making me smile and teaching me how to be always present with what is… and if I can tap into my somatic response to these ever present changes… I will always find smiles in the changes around and within me.
Before I wrote this post here… I recorded and loaded a video of me sharing the same story on Youtube… (link in footer of this website).
It came out slightly different… a spontaneous word spill… so check this out if you feel this theme and have an appetite for more… similar… but… with me speaking it rather than writing it. I trust that you manage to find refuge… guidance… liberation… and smiles… during this change in the seasons.
Let me know if you feel there is scope for discussing this post… or any of my ideas around… experience of… somatic wisdom practices.
I love linking up with others who know how to… notice… acknowledge… welcome… and share… these feelings that make us alive.
