Happy spring.
It's been longer than planned since my last note. Such is the way of life. I'm glad to be reaching out to you again.
These days as I go for walks, I find myself beaming when signs of spring greet my senses; my eyes brighten at cherry blossoms, my body sighs in pleasure when smelling daphne, my ears perk up with delight from hearing birds singing. One day, a brown, crusty leaf still hanging on a branch after all the winter storms finally lost its grip and floated to the ground in front of my face. I cringed at the sight, as it brought me back several months to the coming of winter. I admit, I have a bias toward beginnings, renewal, and new growth. But donât we all? Many cultures celebrate births and new stages of life with abundant joy and hopeâand rightly so. These moments are like seedsâthe densest form of aliveness and possibility.
As much as birth and rebirth is worthy of our attention, death too calls to us as a vital part of our world. All things livingâbeings, relationships, ecosystems, and beyondâhave cycles that involve destruction, which allows elements to be released, composted, and transformed into fertile ground to birth the new. I appreciate how in Hinduismâs TrimĆ«rti (trinity of supreme deities), Shiva, the god of destruction, sits alongside Brahma, the god of creation, and Vishnu, the god of preservationâthree equally essential roles. In my own familyâs cultural practice, I remember with deep gratitude how the rituals in my grandmotherâs Catholic funeral process carried me through the grieving process, helping me say goodbye to her material self while still feeling her spirit alongside me.
In somatics, the process of embodied transformation involves practicing and embodying new ways of being, but importantly it also requires releasing old patterns that no longer serve us in order to make spaceâto create fertile soilâfor the new to take root. Like the cycles of nature, one cannot occur without the other. Yet sometimes these old patterns have been with us for good reasonâthey kept us safe, gave us a sense of belonging, and preserved our dignityâso they arenât going to leave us easily. That process takes a lot of tenderness, compassion, and love. It might be aided by ritual, spiritual practice, art, dance, music, and other practices.
Entering into this new season, I feel questions percolating: How might we cultivate more skillfulness around honoring destruction and death in cycles of life? How might that change our relationship with patterns, relationships, and systems that no longer serve us? What would be possible if we all found ways to be doulas to the parts of us and our society that yearn to be transformed?
I welcome with gratitude your reflections, questions, and thoughts.
Warmly,
Em Wright
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