How to Be in Your Body

Where do you feel stress in your body? Stop for a moment, close your eyes, and just feel. What sensations are present? Where do you feel the fear, the grief, the loss?

Do you feel it at all?

Coping mechanisms are often simply numbing behaviors. The pandemic is a collective loss—we are all grieving canceled trips, birthday parties, and hugs. We have all lost so much in the past few weeks. And if we sit still long enough, we will feel that loss. And it won’t be comfortable.

So we numb. We binge Netflix. We eat Doritos for dinner. We have a couple more glasses of wine than usual. Or at least this is my list.

I mean—and feel—no shame in this list. It’s quick comfort in an uncomfortable time. But it’s not sustainable.

My favorite coping mechanism, however, is work. And I’ve felt this lately. When the Stay Home orders were issued I dug in. I added more to my plate. I advertised an online workshop and figured out how to broadcast and sell it, while my patient care continued almost as busy as usual. I went to bed thinking about it and I woke up with Instagram posts rattling in my head. I told myself it was “good” because I need to keep my business running. But this is not sustainable. It took me 6 weeks of overdrive to realize that this is me grasping at whatever I can find to stay out of my body. I wanted to ignore the tightness that settles in my chest, and the flutter in my solar plexus.

Can you relate?

I mentioned to a friend on Friday that I was looking forward to finishing Saturday’s workshop so I could feel back in my body, and she beautifully replied:

“I would ask you, how could you get back into our body BEFORE the workshop? What kind of difference could that make for both you and the participants?”

I took a breath. Then I listed off 5 things right away that I could do. Then I did them.

I closed my computer.

I turned on some music and danced in the kitchen.

I re-potted all my houseplants.

I knelt barefoot in the grass and dug my hands in the dirt.

I took a bath.

I came home to my body.

So I ask you the same: How can you get back into your body? What kind of difference would that make for you? For your family, your colleagues or your children?

Take a breath. Make a list of 5 things. And keep that list somewhere visible so you can remember. Because when we are in our body we are home.

Image credit: @onbeinginyourbody