Squish

"I just do not want to look at my computer screen right now."

Leo, Jen, and I have been coworking from home since about March.

When Jen or I hear Leo say something like this, we always offer the same thing.

"Let me squish you before you go back to work."

He laid on his back on the floor-mattress that serves as our living room couch, and I laid my belly along his with my face on his chest. We breathed together, I held his arms, held under his neck and head, pressed my hands to his chest. I used it as a stretching exercise to counteract my own computer time.

After about five focused minutes of this, we transitioned naturally back to what life was asking of us.

Somatic practices, nervous-system coregulation, these are not things for use in workshops and "containers." These are regular nourishment for peaceful daily life.

It makes all the difference, loving touch and pressure from other human bodies when our bodies are saying "enough! I need something else!"

These are not practices for emergencies, these are elements of life as common and necessary as clean drinking water.

We do not fill up on these practices, these are practices of daily maintenance.

Ideally they are practices we do with other loving bodies in a space.

But they are practices we can do alone, or with bodies on the internet or the phone, even with pre-recorded sources.

You may do it alone, but it is no triumph and no standard of success to do it all alone. You were not designed to do it always alone, and if you don't know how to do it, it's because you were not taught by other people who were not taught by other people.

You were not only not taught, you were taught in opposite ways. You were taught to judge and condemn your nature and your needs. You were taught to revile your nourishment, to dismiss your ease and your comfort. You were taught the preciousness of effort, sacrifice, and suffering. You were taught to be an individual. You were taught to silo your desire for touch into romance and sex, and taught these are scarce and rife with risk and meaning, inappropriate for public display.

These teachings do not serve you, were never designed to serve you. These teachings serve those who wish to harvest your life force according to their own aims, to keep you hungry to buy what you were always meant to simply have.

The body is here and now, and somatic practices are always here, every now.

Emotions live in the body.

Talking them out is the least efficient way.

Feel how you feel.

Feel how you feel while they feel how they feel.

Feel how you feel together.

Feel how your body wants to move and be touched, and approve of it, give yourself permission, follow through.

It is as simple as that, and only I can stand for me receiving it. Only I can know and choose exactly what my body needs. Only I can assemble and curate an environment for myself which is redundant with this nourishment.

If you want to curate a Village that serves your animal body, let's talk.