moving toward freedom

Stop fidgeting. Settle down. Sit up straight. Hold still. Don’t be silly. What will other people think? You look weird. People like us don’t do things like that.

How many times have we heard admonishments like these?

We’ve been taught from an early age well into our adulthood that certain ways of being are acceptable, maybe even enviable – and others are forbidden. Even before we recognized it, we began to internalize and then mimic or reject the holding patterns and openness of our caregivers and peers.

Given how rarely we’ve been encouraged and supported to attune to and consciously honor our bodies, it’s no surprise to me that so many of us find ourselves with bodies who often feel cranky and hard to move. Our postures and movement patterns shape how we know ourselves, including how we react to our circumstances and what we see as possible. We quite literally come to hold ourselves as a certain kind of person.

At some point though, some of us begin to chafe against these conditioned patterns of holding and imposed constraints. We start to notice something undeniable within us longing to move in new and fresh ways – to open in sometimes frightening ways – to migrate toward something that feels more life affirming.

What if our habitual compliance with the external demands of who we hold ourselves to be could change for us? What if we could find circumstances that enable us to honor our internal longings to move more authentically? What if we could learn to listen closely to the small, quiet indications that some aspects of our body feel drawn to move in unfamiliar ways – ways that feel true and liberating?

If this evokes some appeal for you, please take a few moments to find a comfortable posture and invite a smooth and even breath.

After a few moments, bring a gentle curious attention to the sensations in the bottom of your feet. See if you can name quietly to yourself the sensations you feel in terms of pressure, temperature, or vibration. Notice how those sensations vary in different parts of your foot. Between right and left.

Notice what changes, if anything, in your experience as you do this. See if you can allow your emotional life to rest into the foundation of your feet. See if you can let your mental process ride the gentle rise and fall of your diaphragm.

If you find yourself able to attune to your experience in these ways, be curious about whether you can detect any specific urges to move. Perhaps you notice a desire to gently sway like a young tree in a gentle wind. Or to roll your right shoulder up and back and around. Or to shake out your fingers, hands, and wrists in a gentle, playful way. Perhaps you notice a desire to jump or dance or shout. Whatever desires to move that you notice, can you allow yourself to try them out and see how they feel?

Here is a song that makes this same invitation in another octave.

What has this exploration been like for you? What, if anything, would you like to carry with you after this?