The power of yes in a dark world

Henry Ossawa Taylor, The Annunciation, 1898

In a strange (or not) turn of events that I didn’t see coming even six months ago, I’ve been doing some actual practices for Lent this year. It’s definitely been a bumpy road.

And I wonder if Lent without serious bumps in the road is actually Lent? (If a tree falls in the forest sort of question.)

Regardless, I have had a good many days when I have wondered why I was doing any of the reading or Lent journaling that I was doing. I wondered if there was a point. I wondered if I even believed anything anymore (I mean, I have gone through a long cycle of pessimism and atheism recently. Longer than ever before in my life). And I certainly keep wondering about the role of a religion that centers a man and makes very little space for women at all.

Darkness

I’ve been wondering that, though, since I was about 11 and went to the city library’s religions of the world section and kept pulling books off the shelves, desperate to find a religious system that didn’t center any kind of human figure or that did not anthropomorphize their god head. Alas, this seems to be something humans are incapable of, and the best we can hope for is that the gods/goddesses are built around the best of our own inclinations.

Too often, of course, this is not the case. A minister I follow on Bluesky said it best, “A god that needs violent men in order to succeed is a god invented by violent men.”

So yeah, I have been working through some dark night of the soul shit, for sure, but what’s new? As often in my life that I’ve felt deep devotion and connection to faith, there’s been just as much time when I’ve felt the opposite.

For me, currently, I keep coming back to Pope Leo and his strong and direct calls for a stop to all things that maga believes in and is putting out into the world. I go back to Oscar Romero and all of the Latin Americans who developed the ideas of liberation theology.

And I go back to Mary, Guadalupe in particular. (Did you know she’s the only one who is represented as pregnant? She’s wearing a Aztec pregnancy belt.)

I go back to this idea that she was asked to do this incredibly dangerous and risky thing so that we might know a different kind of world … or that we might be given a vision of a different world: one that’s not built on violence and power but on compassion and inclusivity. (I have a lot to say about that but I want to get closer to my point here and you know my heart.)

So I am, for the moment, not in that dark space — or I should say, not in a totally dark space. There is a window that is open and there is some light coming in. I am also actively lighting candles.

I am, for the moment, focused on the best parts of this thing that somehow is a piece of the puzzle of my mental well being and has been since I was small.

Light

I keep thinking about why I can’t get that same thing from, for example, personal development and self help sorts of writing. Why can’t I get it from all of the art and literature I love? What is it about theological discourse in particular that brings me solace and hope?

For me, I do not deny the dark parts, but the light… when I’m willing to engage with the mystical voices from the past (those well developed voices like Merton, Day, Francis and on and on the list could go)… when I am willing to release the hold that current day dark versions can impose, I can get to the core that is beauty and is the best of us.

When I’m reading Merton, there are times when I think he could see into the future, but it’s actually that he could so clearly see the present and the past that he could see the patterns, and the patterns, when it comes to humans, are always the same.

Not only could he see those patterns and clearly articulate them, he could articulate the type of candle we would need to light in ourselves to banish the dark and to go on with our work.

There was no naivete left in Merton when it came to this intertwining of dark and light in all humans. He just carried hope more stubbornly than I am sometimes capable.

He speaks directly to some part of me that is lacking (as we are all lacking in some way) and he doesn’t make me feel shame or even that I have to “fix” it. He shows me my weaknesses and convinces me time and again that I can be stronger in other ways. He believes our weaknesses are part of who we are and those parts are actually usable if we embrace them.

Newness

One of the things that has thrown me out of the dark and has me headed toward my own inner light again is a passage from my daily Merton readings.

He’s talking about how some people, regardless of chronological age, are living as if they are “old.” They live with old ideas, old memories, always looking backward, and are convinced nothing new is possible.

Then he says this:

“The new (human) lives in a world that is always being created and renewed. S/He lives in this realm of renewal and creation. S/He lives in LIFE. The old (human) lives without life. S/He lives in death.”

— Thomas Merton, March 18, 1959

And it hit me like a rock between my eyes: that in my despair, I live in death.

YES

Which brings me back to Mary.

Many many years ago... early in the heyday of blogging... I decided to do the word of the year that had just become a thing and I chose the word YES because of my Guadalupe devotion.

I ended up sticking to that word for many years because of what it was doing to my life. It changed my life in ways I can’t begin to list. My devotion to that word, to the idea of Mary, pushed me out of my comfort zone, made me choose the new over the old, and made me see that vitality and abundance of my own creativity.

The word is part of how I ended up dancing again, how I got my ass on a buss and went far away for trainings, and how I eventually opened my own bricks and mortar studio (which a lot of you might remember was called Girl on Fire… for Guadalupe).

I kept thinking about getting YES as a tattoo, but I eventually got the Dickinson quote on my wrist: “I dwell in possibility.” When I first got that, it felt like a yes.

But it’s not totally. It doesn’t have the powerful momentum, the PUSH, of YES. It does not have the birthing power of yes.

I need to add yes back into that equation. I can get stuck in possibility. The dwelling aspect can become so comfortable that it, too, becomes old.

So I’ve decided to re-devote myself to YES. Maybe you need to do something similar.

What is calling to you? What do you need to say yes to in your life right now?

This writing feels somewhat incomplete to me, but then we’re not at the end of Lent yet, and each day (even today as I edit), I can sense that the journaling I’m doing is leading me somewhere important — not any kind of end destination but perhaps a well lit place in which I can feel my devoted self again. That would be enough. For now.

"Toxic empathy" and the need for spiritual practices

We are just over the halfway mark in the 40 days of Lent, and so it seems about right that I feel lost in the dark right now. Things feel like … sludge.

Luckily I understand that now is the time to push. Not to quit. To keep going. Regardless of how it’s feeling.

Our feelings cannot be our motivations or we’ll never do anything challenging enough to really evolve in any important way.

(Talking to myself there because oy…)

So I keep doing the things: I keep reading the books and I keep filling out the journals.

In the meantime, as I struggle, the grass is greening and the lilacs have tiny, tight, purple bud clusters and baby leaves. The hyacinths in our front bed have tight buds also and you can tell their colors already.

Things are happening. The earth is awakening whether I am lost in the dark or not.

I will catch up. Eventually.

A moment of wakefulness

I was feeling all of this as extra heavy weight the other day, and I went outside to sit on the stoop and do some midday reading. It was quite warm and the sun was out.

People in just t-shirts were happily walking their dogs The birds were singing.

And when I tilted my face to the sun filled sky, I could feel the warmth in my bones. Something I crave all winter.

I started to read and felt that familiar, “What’s the damn point?” nagging at me from the part of me that too easily gives into despair and apathy. (The part of me that I wrote about over on Substack as my inner Frodo.)

From down the block, I could hear a bike coming and I could tell it was pulling something because it sounded so rickety.

I looked up as a man rode by. Things looked rough for him. And I just about burst into tears.

I went back to my book and immediately read this line:

“Bonaventure reminds us that the human person is the temple of God where the spirit dwells.”

— From Franciscan Prayer, Ilia Delio, OSF

And that just floored me: to read that just as that man rode past me… a man whom this ugly administration would gladly allow to disappear. A man this administration does not see any reason to help. (And so many like him or near to like him whom they see as undeserving.)

In the ugliness of evangelical Christianity, this man must be doing something wrong and his life is a sign of some sort of judgement. My feelings for his dignity, my conviction that he is as deserving of all good things as anyone else would be seen by them as “toxic empathy.”

Fuck that.

Our current culture is demented.

That man on that bike (and all humans who suffer or struggle) are the responsibility of all of us.

My point

To most of you, my point is obvious.

The work I’m doing for Lent is important because it is the necessary work of allowing our hearts to be broken by this broken world.

Because every time we allow that brokenness, the heart expands in its capacity to sit with and witness the pain of the world.

And one thing we need more of: People who can sit with the pain of others and not be overwhelmed by it or, like for too many, to be repulsed by it.

I never said this was easy...

And I’m talking to myself there as much as I’m talking to anyone reading this.

Even in the best of times (and I would say we weren’t aware how good the times were before the whole Drumpf era began)… even in the best of times, I’ve never said any of this was easy.

I have tried to be clear: even doing this thing I love more than any other thing I do, even getting my ass into my tights and putting on music and breathing and waiting and allowing for movement to arise, even that is not always easy.

There are days when it is easier, for sure, but most days it is anything but.

And living in this political hellscape has brought depression down upon my head again in ways I never thought would be possible.

So here I am, as if I am at the beginning again, except I don’t have the beginner excitement and curiosity I had the first time around, because, well, that’s just not possible.

I’ve been exploring and creating and teaching this stuff for over 17 years now. I’m not a novice anymore, and though I try to reenter beginner mind, it’s difficult, and it’s especially difficult as we are triggered every day, multiple times a day, by the evil of this administration.

But I’m trying. I’m failing but I keep trying.

I’m trying to find that enthusiasm again. I’m trying to find the joy and the awe and the whimsy.

I fail and I try; I fail and I try; and right now, that’s the best I have.

Recently I made a discovery about a shadow part of myself that I’m not totally proud of and I’m hoping that now that I know it’s there, I can stop failing quite so much. Seeing it is the first step, so go check out my most recent Substack post. And if you haven’t, subscribe because that would be awesome.

"Breathe and wait" meets its perfect time of year

I’ve been yelling/teaching/prompting “breathe and wait” in classes since the earliest days of Girl on Fire Movement Studio (RIP beautiful studio). Now I tend not to say it enough (and I’ll be changing that). But also? I myself do not always really hear it even as it comes out of my own damn mouth.

And of course, this prompt is not just for movement class but it’s meant to — via movement classes — become so engrained in us that it leads in our wider lives.

Right now? This season of anticipation (advent, the coming solstice, all of it…) and this season of endings (calendars might be made up but they’re based on real things like the sun’s travels and the moon’s cycles)… it seems like the perfect season to really practice breathe and wait in our daily lives and rituals.

Instead of hustling more or seeing how much you can get done in these last days of this year (and how do we continue to hear that advice from the whole coaching community still???)… instead of hustling, let’s just stop.

Let’s breathe and wait.

Breathe and wait to see what peace we can find in these quiet darker days.

Breathe and wait to discern what’s working in our lives — from relationships to routines to work to practices of all kinds.

Breathe and wait.

Pause. Observe. Feel. Listen. Just wait.

Breathe and wait is always followed by allow but we’ll let that off to the side for now.

I felt myself going into hustle mode about halfway through November. I was freaking out about projects I didn’t accomplish this year and I was looking for ways to squeeze them in and luckily I noticed and I stopped.

These last days as we wind down are just not the time for that.

I’m going to focus on connection, rest, and simmering.

I’ll be breathing and waiting as I:

• Get back into paper based journaling and planners and what a joy this has been. Slowing down enough to write slowly instead of hammering away at a computer has been both difficult and delightful.

• Read more and more and more. And read more deeply. I’m planning a personal curriculum for the winter semester and I’ll be writing about that some time soon.

• Turn on twinkle lights and light candles and stretch in the evening on the floor with cats milling about.

• Dream about what’s possible without laying down any really solid plans.

• Connect to my loves and my inner circle of peeps.

What about you?

More steps to recovering my healthy brain: my algorithms

I’ve been taking a lot more steps beyond all of my movement to recover my healthier brain. So I’ll be writing about this much more over the coming months.

I had such a great experience of how much we control our algorithms this weekend. We know this, but a lot of the time we're not really owning the responsibility and we blame the platforms but they're just tools. (Please keep in mind that this isn’t about TikTok. That’s just my example.)

So my TikTok started out all fun and dance. I got it right after January 6th to deal with the stress. Over time, it become super politicized and I've been kinda drowning in that every time I go over there... but again... that's because THAT is what *I* was watching and engaging with.

Well, this weekend, I suddenly got obsessed with Journal Tok. This has been slowly seeping into my FYP (for you page/discover space) for some time, but this weekend, I stayed with the videos (and they can be longer form) and I engaged.

About the same time, some literary and philosophy academics had been hanging around my edges too so I started to really watch those. And then the witchy stuff. And some super liberal Catholic peeps.

So now?!?! My TikTok is like some fucking cozy cottage of all of my favorite things.

IT ACTUALLY SOOTHES MY NERVOUS SYSTEM. Yep.

I have more to say about those topics that I'm diving into specifically but this is a reminder that you are in charge of everything you put into your brain and body. (As Thich Nhat Hanh would say.)

I'm not suddenly taking some privileged road and not paying attention to the wider world. I still know all the things that are going on, BUT I have this little space where I can swim in dreams. (And intentionality but more on that soon.)

Artifacts as motivation

Though I’ve been really low on motivation the last two weeks due to a stupid slip back into eating gluten (and I’m starting to emerge from it but oy…), I’ve been thinking about sharing this particular idea for some time.

A lot of people write about the idea of legacy. What is the legacy you wish to leave behind you in the world? For some of our brains, that’s a pretty abstract concept that doesn’t lead to much past understanding. Meaning, for me, it doesn’t lead to action. Not so much.

But then I ran into the idea of artifacts as it relates to us personally and I can’t remember where but it stuck.

This isn’t about all the stuff in your house. I mean, I really wish more people would take Swedish Death Cleaning more seriously, because yeah, we don’t want your tchotchke and you’re basically asking others to clean up after you. (This doesn’t mean you should live with nothing but maybe, just maybe, if your house and garage and shed are packed to the gills, you could get rid of half of it. I know from experience that it won’t only NOT kill you to have an empty closet or even just some empty shelves, but it will make space in your life to breathe more deeply. For reals.)

Anyway…

What are these artifacts?

You know how on social media there are people who only ever share other people’s stuff (including fucking AI generated crap but that’s another post)? They never share any of their own thoughts, their own photos, their own art, nothing generated from their own minds and hearts.

It reminds me of a lot of those homes I just wrote about above. They are leaving behind bought stuff… nothing from their own hands or minds.

And that’s the artifacts we’re talking about: bits of you. Evidence of you having lived your life.

Not everyone is going to leave behind beautiful paintings like my husband or piles of published books like some of my friends.

But we can still leave behind bits of us… that journal you kept of the seasons? Priceless. Those pieces of art that you labored over out of pure joy? Priceless.

These are the things that matter. Not your freaking figurines.

How this can be motivating

For me, when I think about leaving behind artifacts of my life, it motivates me to make those videos (and build my YouTube so it’s full of my somatic dance principles). It motivates me to actually get writing, whether here or on socials or on the book files I have started. It motivates me to work on my teacher training manual.

It motivates me to plan the next choreography challenge. To build deeper community. To get out in the world and show my damn self.

So… thinking of the artifacts you’d like to leave behind, how could this motivate you?

The measure by which you know your true work

When I say the word work, I don’t necessarily mean your job. The two can be the same but are not always. I happen to have work that is also my job, and though some people idealize that, there are positives and negatives to both ways of being in the world.

And no matter how much you love your work, there are always parts that just suck. There are days that are exhausting. There are times when you think about quitting. That’s all normal.

With that out of the way…

What’s not normal is feeling that way all of the time. Walking around feeling nothing but drained and maybe even angry is a big red flag.

Here’s the thing: the work you’re meant to do in this world (whether your job or not) is something that feeds the world but also feeds you back. That’s the key right there.

There are days when I think about quitting this work/job I’ve been doing for 16 years, but I know I’m where I’m supposed to be because it brings something important to my communities just as it also brings so much to me. It’s as much my own happiness and sanity as it is any student’s.

So every time I’m feeling overwhelmed or disappointed or just grouchy, I go back to that and remember myself.

I also go back to this little story I read somewhere and I cannot remember where but I think the monk in it is David Steindl-Rast.

A man was feeling really exhausted and overwhelmed by his work/job (some sort of non profit) and he was complaining to his monk friend about this.

The monk friend said something along these lines: It’s not the work that is exhausting you but the fact that you are not giving yourself wholeheartedly to it. ((whoa))

This lack of wholeheartedness can show up for me in a bunch of ways: I focus on wrong things; I don’t take care of my own practices; I try to do too much: I succumb to comparison.

Wholehearted is the opposite of hustle, right?

It’s working from your open heart. And that work always includes self care, a human pace, and a constant return to the fundamentals of your what and why.

I am my main job and same for you

I don’t know how life keeps up leveling its overwhelming nature, but here we are, 8 months into what I keep feeling like is the actual upside down world.

This past week has been one of the worst. I’m learning too much about the far far far right (even beyond magat land). And there are things my mind can’t process… it’s all so ugly and demented.

It has started to feel like there are these forces we can do nothing about. And that’s partly true. Logic does not defeat psychoses and neither does empathy defeat these levels of hate that are combined with a stupidity that almost breaks my brain.

I can finally understand why some people have just shut it all off. But that’s still not the answer: that’s a level of privilege that is destructive in its own way.

Feeling powerless, well, that’s what “they” want. And it’s the feeling that led so many of these young men to the nihilism that is fueling their violence. Feeling powerless made them susceptible to voices that aim to take advantage of them by blaming others for their powerlessness.

So staying in that feeling of powerlessness is not an ethical choice.

And there I was stuck until I talked to some treesters, of course.

I am my main job

This will all connect, I promise.

A few weeks ago, it hit me that I am my main job.

During all these years of teaching somatic dance and other movement, I go through cycles where I forget myself in the process.

This particular cycle has lasted a long time. Probably since Peony left her fur suit (and the fourth anniversary of that is this coming Sunday).

Again, a few weeks ago, it hit me that I am my main job. That I can’t teach if I’m not constantly learning. That I can’t talk if I’m not walking that talk.

So I shifted my focus and all of my own practices now come first. Other things are still getting done, but my own practices come first.

My own strength and balance and creative work come first. (Metaphor alert!)

I am only as good a teacher as I am a student and a doer.

Which brings me back to feeling powerless

After my talk with my treesters today, it hit me that, as usual, what I was learning in my movement practices is also the key to living through this upside down world and not becoming upside down myself.

(And this also goes back to things I’ve been learning from tennis, especially about focus.)

I have power. It’s just not where I want it to be or more accurately, where I think it should be. When we experience early trauma, we often take on a savior complex. We go through life not just thinking we can save others but that we should, that it’s our responsibility, and if we don’t do this, we are nothing.

But when I dismiss my own actual powers in favor of idealized ones that “could save the world,” well, I’ve denuded my actual gifts that are meant to be used by me and for others. (This goes for each and every one of us, of course.)

I have power.

You have power.

It might not appear political but life is political.

It might not even seem or feel important to you, but I guarantee you that it is, because every piece of the puzzle that is building love and empathy and caretaking matters.

Focus on my main job is key

If I focus on my practices and my work and the gifts I have and not the ones I don’t, the specific role only I can fill will be filled.

Same for you.

This is not about bypassing.

Because you know what? I think I was already bypassing by allowing the world to paralyze me, by paying so much attention to what I couldn’t do that I forgot about what I can.