For the love of the body
There’s something profound that gets lost in the new age craze of ‘embodiment’…it is a genuine love for the body as a complex organism — a burping, crying, snoring creature of the same natural world that emboldens stink beetles and keeps ancient cacti alive.
We’ve turned ‘primal’ into innocently self-indulgent, pseudo-spiritual theatre. We growl and play pretend as a fierce four-legged creature before we’ve even brought our full attention towards that grotesque and carnal experience of being inside a body. Like, really, really inside it. To be inside not just an energetic place or delicate thought form, but inside like we’ve found ourselves unfurling beneath the bark of a tree, correlating directly with our sensation like water being passed back and forth between tea bowls. We’ve grown so focused on expression and its gift of alchemy for the deepest pain that we’ve looked right past the significance of the mundane.
You know what’s some crazy alchemy? Digestion.
We ingest the body and life force of a literal light being (like my favorite, mustard greens) and then that light being travels the length of a school bus so deep inside our bodies that we’ll never quite ‘know’ what actually occurs. It is then broken down in the soil of our intestines by various secretions and noble, nameless microorganisms. We are then given more life force of our own, and what has not found usefulness in the garden of our hidden being becomes “waste” that could, if you wish, nourish the soil that grows the very light being you first ingested.
All of this is taken for granted — forgotten — several times a day, for a lifetime.
If you did not already know this about me, now you know that I am a devotee of the body. I love to be inside! To focus my attention on the dryness, the wetness, the throbbing and pulsating. I love to sit right there at the edge of any bodily function like it’s the final note of my favorite song lingering in the ether. This tendency has been labeled many times as me being “sensitive”, though only few actually say it with a reverence for it as a profound gift.
It is through the body that I get to meet God over and over again. Or at least aim to.
Every colon cleanse, extended fast, weightlifting session, morning hike, every sexual encounter — they are all grand and humble attempts to experience divinity through my body. It’s how I chase aliveness, by embodying the hubris of even aiming for perfection at all. A lean and strong body. Highly functioning inner systems. Orgasms galore. Touch and go — the sensational and devastatingly beautiful dance of duality.
When I say I’m living in prayer, it means you can find me getting as close as I possibly can to the profanity of mucus and muscle and blood and bones. It is as much a contemplative practice as it is a deepening of my own embodiment. This is eye-to-eye contact with the divine. This is engaging with the Mystery.
LIVING AS THE PRAYER
Do you ever smell your own armpits and feel overtaken by some strange pleasure in it? It’s summer and we’re all sweating. Do more of that, please.
Also, I highly, highly recommend parasite cleansing to anyone experiencing mysterious body challenges. It’s how I reversed Hashimotos of 15 years and finally found relief from eczema. If you’re curious to learn more, my favorite resource is this page belonging to Sarah (@nutritionforhteppl). I’ve also been working with her for three years and cannot recommend her enough.
OFFERINGS
Career and Life Coaching
Though I’m often quiet about it, I’m still offering career and life guidance for becoming fully alive. In this coaching and mentorship work together we will start with career as the entry point, then expand into the full breadth of what it means to live purposefully. I’m here to help you become fully alive to the life that is eager to be lived through you. I often support people in becoming more brave, accessing new layers of faith (in themselves, life and God), developing a consistent contemplative practice, deepening discernment and cultivating artistry and play.
If you’re interested in exploring 1:1 support, here is a link to book a free discovery call.
Some recent client feedback from within a session:
“You have a way of turning everything I'm sharing — whether I think it's good or bad — into powerful questions that let me learn so much more about myself. It's like I've learned to see myself in both the first & third person at the same time. It's become a mindset I've adopted on my own since working with you, which has totally changed my life.”
Brand Design
I’m back to taking on branding clients! This is the work I’ve been quietly doing for 13 years, in which I got a degree in from a leading art school in NYC. My style and process are very artistic, oftentimes starting with hand-drawn elements and a more esoteric approach to feeling the deeper layers of artistry within you and your work or business. If you’re curious to learn more, respond to this email and I’ll guide us through a process of determining if we’re a good collaborative match.
Wishing for us all a magical summer solstice!
xo — Fi