Centering The Sacred
I've got the power!
Happy July! July is one of my favorite months for reasons starting with that it’s my birthday month, (woohoo!) this year is my golden birthday!! 22 on the 22nd… 2 is my lucky number. July also always meant no school and more time outside. Grad school stops for no one, and neither does work, but the spirit of freedom that July embodies continues to show her face to me.
I was listening to a podcast episode by The Emerald called ‘Let Us Sing of the Syncretic Gods of Outcasts and Wanderers’, and was immediately struck with chills. It’s information I have not considered inwardly before, but it was… familiar. I had never contemplated what The Emerald just taught me before, but it felt like something I’d known for millennia, a wave of nostalgia, deja vu, for sure preconceived. Like my bones and blood and DNA knew it, but forgot to tell my brain.
The episode I highly recommend is about The Human Story, ritual and cultural tradition, and our connection to home or place. What is our home in this world? What is supposed to feel like home to us? It got me thinking about Connection. My connection to place and home, my connection to trust, my intuition, my connection to my body, to right and wrong, to what is true.
The matter of the fact is that things are always in evolution. I am always in evolution. The way I thought last year was different from how I thought now, how I went about things six months ago is different from how I go about them now. That’s just life. You learn, you grow, you change, you apply, you learn, you grow, you change, you apply.
Connection to what is true
As someone who deals with a lot of anxiety and anxious thought patterns, it is easy to fall into the trap of these thoughts and get into a spiral of negativity. I’m going to use this in the context of universal beliefs, but this messaging can fruit anywhere. I heard it recently in a workout class and was immediately turned off by it. The instructor said, “Your body is telling you to quit, let your mind be more powerful.” ICKY.
Why?
A. Your mind and body are connected.
B. We tend to listen to our minds more than our bodies, and our bodies are the entities that truly know more than we think. They don’t have the blocks that our minds do in terms of disbelief, our bodies are always believing in us. They are straight source.
C. Always listen to your body! If you are having trouble breathing or something feels off and you can’t describe it, listen. Your body cannot tell a different story other than what it is shown. Your mind can.
D. There’s a difference between pushing past mental limits and going above and beyond what you think you can do versus ignoring what your body is gently (or fiercely) reminding you of. Here comes injury, illness, and fog.
Data piece #1: Anxiety
As a spiritual someone and a lover of all things mystic, here is what is often taught: manifestation is constant, thoughts become your reality, lyrics from music can infiltrate your headspace and change your destiny, etc. (and I do believe in manifestation, just through a different lens) The rigid this=that premise happens a lot in religious or spiritual spaces, as I think it’s just our natural human desire to place definitive meaning on things so conceptual and complex, just to be at ease. But in my case, it fills me with more dread. It makes experiences and energy out of reach when in reality, you decide what has meaning and what that meaning is. You can guess and gamble all you want, that’s the beauty of it all. And if you believe that listening to a sad song will make your day worse, it will. But if you just listen to the song because Lana Del Rey is THE ultimate vibe and you’ve loved her for 12 years, then you’re just listening to a song ;)
Data piece #2: The Truth
This capitalistic colonized practice that can keep you in a fear state, centers the fear, centers the anxiety, centers the falsified tales of how things are. This is so you buy the next thing to ‘fix’ this malalignment. It’s so you doubt yourself and your intuition. It’s so you trust others before yourself. It honestly makes you easier to control. You get so distracted by these -little- things that keep you distant from yourself and home. This is not to say your religious or spiritual beliefs are wrong, if they are true to you they are true to YOU. That’s amazing. But nothing is above what your body, what your home is telling you.
Data piece #3: Centering The Sacred
So all with this inadvertent messaging, how do we clear the air? How do we center what is sacred to us? How do we come home to ourselves? It comes back to the basics. The breath, the art of ritual, finding what makes us feel safe. It is also recognizing, as specified in The Emerald, the people and worlds in our lives that keep us wandering, that keep us in a state of moving away from ourselves. Social media; how many times do you pick up your phone when you are anxious and that just makes your anxiety worse? I tend to do this a lot. I hate it. It’s the enabler of the fear and the lack. Suddenly I want a whole new wardrobe, and to move to Wyoming, and bleach my hair blonde again, and lose 15 pounds. I feel terrible about myself and it sticks for a minute because again, I am already in an anxious state.
How can we tend to ourselves like the most gorgeous wild field? How can we balance the flora and fauna of it all? The masculine and feminine? How can we find solace in home, which at the end of everything, is ourselves?
Is it maybe relearning the person you’ve lost touch with (yourself), that isn’t really your fault. With systemic racism, oppression, colonization, distrust in our ancestors, and minimizing history, all they’ve been through, is our world’s current sphere. It’s up to us to change it.
Connection To Ourselves
movement, movement, movement. I’ve been loving switching it up from the usual like a walk or dance, and I’ve been loving pilates where slow movement and breath are centered, taught by my friend Mimi. If you are a Saint Pete local, head to Body Rok now and take her class!! Finding a safe space for this is so important.
breath. Slowing down the breath more importantly. seven seconds of inhaling, five of holding, and ten of exhaling.
spending time off your phone. Even for five minutes. The other day I went to sit outside but wanted my music. I am never one to dismiss how important music is for my soul but I opted for rolling thunder and squirrel chirping instead. Think about all that you miss from the natural world on a daily basis. What messages are you missing?
spending time with friends and family. staple.
see where you cut corners. Just acknowledge it. Do you have a drink to take the edge off from a hard work day? I’m not saying this is wrong, but just notice when you turn to outside sources for inside support. Is this bringing something positive? (the answer may be yes to you)
It may be because I am a Cancerian crab, whose shell is an important feature of hers, but ultimately think about your shell and its place with you. Can you bring the peace of home with you wherever you go? If not, could it be because of the people you associate with or the messaging you’re surrounded by?
I just said to my cousin last night that if I am meant for anything in this world, it is to be a mirror for others and prioritize inner reflection and collective liberation. Even in the smallest of terms. Because I am constantly doing that work for myself. I may be quiet sometimes, but I am not afraid of feeling and simply cannot reject that feeling because feeling is knowing. That is my home. THAT is my portal.
Home is a portal to us, and we are a portal to ‘home’.
Abundant blessings ∞
-madison renee katherine
Beautifully written as always! You make me ponder and dwell in areas that may feel uncomfortable but warrant attention. I removed social media from my phone a week ago and have found it peaceful and altering. Now if I want to check it out, I have to actively choose to scroll on my iPad which I never have in me. It’s been liberating in the sense you described of just being present with the world outside of ourselves and our devices. I’d like to share a piece from a book I’m reading. It’s a page a day style. Thank you again for the words!
You may believe that living life to the fullest is seeing every country in the world and quitting your job on a whim and falling recklessly in love, but it’s really just knowing how to be where your feet are. It’s learning how to take care of yourself, how to make a home within your own skin. It’s learning how to build a simple life you are proud of. A life most fully lived is not always composed of the things that rock you awake, but those that slowly assure you it’s okay to slow down. That you don’t always have to prove yourself. That you don’t need to fight forever, or constantly want more. That it’s okay for things to be just as they are. Little by little, you will begin to see that life can only grow outward in proportion to how stable it is inward—that if the joy is not in the little things first, the big things won’t fully find us.