Hello love,
Welcome.
Slow your breathing as you settle into the darkness behind your limbs.
With each exhale,
Relax deeper and deeper into the body.
The body is constantly learning.
Our activities are wired into our minds by repetition.
When we learn something new,
The whole system interconnects.
Learning is a whole body experience.
Once learned,
A response becomes part of our automatic operating system.
The body does not differentiate between helpful and detrimental patterns.
It simply repeats what it is programmed to do.
Even after an activity has not been performed in a long time,
The body will remember it instantly when confronted with a need.
This is why they say you can never forget how to ride a bike,
And also why we are capable of springing into action and performing incredible feats in the face of an urgent need.
Along with tasks and complex activities,
The body remembers our emotional and somatic experiences.
In fact,
The body can remember things that the mind cannot.
Events ranging from our early experiences as a helpless infant,
To moments of sheer terror that the mind will blink out.
Often times,
We are not aware of what is happening in our bodies.
First because we are disconnected and numb,
And secondly,
We do not understand how these postures and poses manifest and originate.
Remember the attributes of masculinity and femininity.
We might have noticed that you sometimes exhibit the hunter qualities listed.
As a woman you have the capacity for both,
Gathering and hunting,
And both of their corresponding mindsets.
Because society values productivity,
Women have adapted to being in hunter mode.
For women,
The act of hunting,
Or doing,
Or go mode,
Requires us to be in our masculine.
The masculine world is organized around linear logic,
Time,
And efficiency.
Outcomes and productivity are its key drivers.
This high speed,
High stress world taxes our adrenal system as we push towards peak performance and peak experience.
As women,
This requires body mechanics that are not optimal for our biology.
In order to perform this way,
You have to take all the energy from the lower body,
Where it naturally lives for you,
And squeeze it up into your mind.
Pay attention to the mechanics of this when you are working.
Will you tighten your core and scrunch your eyes?
It is the movement that takes place as you gather momentum for doing and pushing.
This creates a pattern in the body.
Over time your body will carry this concentration into everything you do,
Training yourself to gather your energy and harness it upwards towards the thinking and doing centers of your body.
This can show up as headaches,
Tight shoulders,
Neck,
A lack of desire,
And being disconnected from feelings and pleasure.
The fuel for being in hunter mode and doing and pushing is testosterone.
In women,
Testosterone is produced in the ovaries and in the adrenal gland.
This means that when you produce testosterone,
You are also releasing adrenaline and stress hormones,
Causing enormous tension in your body paired with emotional stress.
Creating an emotional and physical habit of tightening and tensing while doing,
Paired with chronic stress and anxiety.
Once we are in the mindset of getting things done,
It is hard to get out of it.
Over time,
Our tissues,
Organs,
And nervous system will carry a habitual contraction and push motion into everything we do,
Instead of the spinning,
Whirling,
Opening motion that is our native disposition.
We train every part of us to squeeze our energy to our brains to perform,
And they get stuck there.
We then become disconnected from our lower body in the connection to feeling,
Intuition,
And creativity.
When we operate in a world where we must take on these attributes to succeed,
We can get stuck in these postures,
Stuck in go mode,
Working on computers and devices,
And living in our minds instead of our bodies,
Which can drain our energy,
Sap our creativity,
And stifle our spirit.
Many women lose touch with who they are by getting stuck in hunter mode and lose connection to the effortlessness of flow and feeling that is the feminine.
We get into our heads and out of our bodies.
We have lost our connection to a way of being and working that honors the body.
We park our bodies in chairs and check off to-do lists.
The constant push for achievement can deplete our resources and leave us less effective,
Less productive,
Less happy,
And less fulfilled.
You will never unravel the tensions,
Fears,
Instincts,
And drives that keep us trapped in a mental model of limitation by deploying the same energy and approach that got you there in the first place.
The counterbalancing pose is body-centered.
A woman's body is linked through reproduction and its innate cyclical nature to the earth and its cycles.
As our world proceeds through the seasons,
From the first green tips of new life peeking through the soil to the quiet,
Restfulness of winter,
A woman's body also experiences its seasons,
Both every month and over a lifetime.
The feminine body is in flux and flow,
Filling and emptying.
Our bodies contain the seeds of creation and life.
The design of our biology is to create and carry a child and to give birth.
Without even thinking about it,
Our bodies are capable of forming and nurturing a small human.
Every woman has a place in herself to mother-form,
Regardless of whether or not you've given birth to a child.
The uterus contains the cycle of transformation,
Its very own blood tide.
The uterine lining thickens,
Swells,
And then thins in a rhythmic pattern.
Our bodies change too,
Becoming more voluptuous and curvy.
Our highest energy,
Wellness,
And vitality are rooted in these biological cycles.
In order to fulfill our biological functions,
Whether we choose to have children or not,
We need energy in the lower body.
This life force not only allows us to create human life,
But is also the origin of power,
Creativity,
Nurturing,
And beauty.
The natural seed of energy in our bodies is the womb.
This sacred space is a place of deep healing and truth and the foundation of our connection to everything.
It is the place where we can uncover our deepest truths and connect to our authentic,
Divine,
And loving self.
The energy of the masculine is all about pushing,
Asserting,
And driving,
But the feminine is attractive.
Like the moon pulling on the tide,
It gathers and pulls.
If you have been used to spending your time in masculine postures,
The counter poses we will practice may feel very different and even contractory.
We will slow down and pay attention to subtle sensations.
We will move with awareness and attention.
We will listen to and honor our bodies,
Tapping into deeper intuition and wisdom.
As we trust ourselves,
We become trustworthy.
As we love ourselves,
We learn to love others.
When we stop harming ourselves,
We no longer accept harm from others.
We will learn to trust ourselves and live in our bodies,
Some of us for the very first time.
Are you still there,
Tuned into your body?
Do you feel my words resonating in your bones?
What is your body saying to you?
Listen to it.
