Walking on a Tightrope

Anyone who really knows me, knows that I'm not really the kind of person to be out there in front of people. And yet, lately, I am - non-stop. I spend my day being in front of people and interacting with them, sometimes without even leaving my house or opening my mouth. I write this blog, I have a Facebook page, and a Fan page, I have a website, I write an e-newsletter, I answer emails, and then I stand in front of people and "teach yoga". Or, more appropriately, I lead an experience. All of these things open the opportunity for me to be judged.

I have consciously made these decisions, to put my life out there, and I've asked you all to comment. In many ways, I am honored and grateful that you have chosen to interact with me. And, at the same time, I get really sick of it! I get tired of looking at my own face plastered all over the web, of hearing my own voice, of hearing people's feedback and comments, and of all the head games that I play with myself.

I can be easily pushed off center by people's comments, regardless of whether they are positive or negative. The comments can inflate or deflate my ego. I feel myself swaying from side to side, bouncing back and forth between feelings. At times, I feel gratitude and excitement that someone has noticed me and chosen to comment. At other times, I find myself thinking, "Who the @*#$ asked you for your opinion!?" It can be a challenge to stay balanced, grounded, and rooted in my own authenticity while taking in so much from other people.

I've been saying, "I feel like I'm walking on a tightrope" for several days now, without really thinking much about it. Today, I googled "tightrope." According to Wikipedia, tightrope "acrobats maintain their balance by positioning their center of mass directly over their base of support." They align themselves with their center to maintain their balance. Yep, sounds appropriate!

So, you might ask why the heck I am doing this - putting my life out there for other people's review and comment. A wise woman once told me, "When you give yourself permission to be happy, it allows others the permission to do the same." I think that holds true for anything - replace happy with any other adjective, and see if you still agree. I believe that when we're authentic, it is easier for us to find happiness. So, I'm putting this out there, in hopes that you will all feel permission to be authentic and to find your happiness.

Since this blog is about the connection of the physical and the emotional bodies, I have to ask myself, "how does this, the feeling of walking on a tightrope, show up in my body?" Well, I'm not a very skillful tightrope walker, so its felt like grasping; like an attempt to control...sort of a pulling in, straightening up, tightening of my breath. And so, I'm practicing with expanding my breath, sinking down, and staying connected with my own center.

(Know that, as I prepare to hit the "publish post" button, I am half cringing.) Here goes nothing...

Knots in my neck, tightness in my jaw; the epic battle ground between my heart and my head.

I woke up this morning and realize that I became a goodie two shoes. I felt weighed down by obligation. For some time now, I’m not sure how long, I’ve been making decisions based on what others would see and think of me, based on what I “should” do, based on feeling obligated to people or to doing the “right” thing. Even my personal Facebook page has become a reflection of the person that I’d want my business clients and yoga students to see.

And then I realized that, by acting out of this sense of obligation, I lost a piece of me. Sometimes it can be good to shed aspects that we’ve held onto as being part of us – when these things are no longer serving us (such as stories that we tell ourselves based on fears or previous experiences). In this case, it wasn’t good. I’ve valued living authentically and being a real person (like I can be a yoga instructor, believe in eating fresh, local, organic foods, and yet really enjoy beer, bacon, and french fries) but I wasn’t doing that.

In my body, it showed up as a feeling of emotion bubbling up through my body, and my jaw clenching in an attempt to keep it squelched down. It was an all too familiar feeling. I used to get that very same feeling when I’d walk into a review at the engineering company where I used to work, when what I really wanted to be doing was teaching yoga. I would go into those reviews and feel trapped because I couldn't say what I really meant and I couldn't show who I really was. But, eventually I did – I quit, and started to teach yoga full-time.

There was an epic battle happening between my head (the “I should”s, the obligations, the damn goodie two shoes!) and my heart (the “but I don’t want to do that”, “that isn’t aligning with my values”, “that isn’t bringing me peace, ease and joy”), and my poor neck and jaw (the center of communication, and quite literally the space between my head and heart) were serving as the battle grounds! It was a sensation strong enough that it felt like the equivalent of being trapped in a room without a key to get out. There was no possible way that my body was going to allow me to go through with the “I should”s for another day. Lucky for me, I’ve been through this enough times in the past to have recognized it fairly early on, and was able to send up the white flag.

So, world, are you letting your heart or your head lead your decisions today?

Non-judgmental, Non-directive Dialogue

"The goal of life is to take everything that made you weird as a kid and get people to pay you money for it when you're older."- David Freeman

This quote reminds me of some of the reasons why I love Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy (PRYT). In PRYT sessions we use non-directive, and non-judgmental dialogue. This has always come really easily to me. It is something that I tend to do naturally in life. And, for most of my life, I've felt that it made me socially awkward. I feel like, often, people say things expecting a response and I just sit there.

Do you notice how often people feel the need to "comfort" others by saying things like "it will get better", "I know this is hard for you", or "don't feel bad"? Well, I've rarely said those thing to anyone other than a very close friend who I really believed that I knew very well. I hardly even ever say, "I'm sorry for your loss" after someone loses a loved one. I figure, who am I to judge what they are, or should be feeling?

Maybe I'm odd, but I feel robbed of my right to have emotions when someone makes comments like this to me. Often it makes whatever emotion I was feeling turn to anger - "Do you? Do you know this is hard for me? How could you possibly know that when you barely know me?"

To me, it feels much more supportive when someone really listens to what I'm saying rather than trying to think of what they are going to say next, or to spit out some canned response that they "are supposed to say". It feels supportive to have someone say, I hear that you are upset, and I'm still here supporting you....I see that you are angry, or depressed, or fearful, and I'm not going to tell you to "look at the bright side", to "focus on the positive", or to "let it go".

In essence, this is what I do in PRYT sessions. Clients share and process their thoughts and emotions, while I genuinely listen and offer them support. I do not judge what they are saying or feeling. I do not tell them how to "fix" their problems. I do not suggest that they should look at things differently, or be different.

So, how does this work in sessions? The process is actually very simple, and from a practitioner standpoint, involves two main phrases: "what's happening now?" and "tell me more." Here is an example...
Me: What's happening now?
Client: I feel (insert emotion, such as frustrated, pissed, scared...)
Me: Tell me more about feeling (above emotion)
Client: I feel (emotion) when ABC happens, because XYZ...

The client gets to really process their thoughts and feelings from beginning to end, rather than having them swept under the carpet or pushed aside. It is really simple, and yet profoundly healing. But, let's face it - it does not come naturally for most people to set aside any desire to "comfort" the person they are talking to...which brings me back to the quote with which I started.

Thanks for reading!