For most of my life I felt totally disconnected from my body. There was me and there was the body I lived in and they were two totally separate beings with separate needs and desires. My body (to my displeasure) needed things like food or sleep and I (so lofty and above all of that) needed things like art. Although I could not see it, all of my decisions were filtered through this belief. I made no time for caring for my body and was frustrated when I had to take time out of my day to tend to it.
During this time, I was often hyper irritable and became impatient with people around me for reasons I could not quite put my finger on. I felt restless, maybe all the time. Even a full day of activity never convinced me I was alive and well. I rarely felt motivation or drive to do anything. I did not understand how other people could go to school, or show up to work, or go on a run without whining about it for hours beforehand.
I had a therapist at the time who often asked me about my body. The focus of our sessions became learning how to sit in what my body was experiencing, regardless of how uncomfortable the feeling was. I began to meditate everyday to practice this. In the beginning, I often felt that I should stop meditating that instant, or something in me would probably, most likely explode. Miraculously, nothing ever exploded. It always eventually morphed into something less urgent and easier to feel.
Over years of practice, I began to notice some things that feel obvious now but did not for a long time. Before I became ravenous, I felt a little distracted and slow. The days I went on long walks, I felt far less restless than on the days I stayed in. It became clear, my body was not something that just housed me. Everything my body went through, I did too. Even my motivation changed. For years, I ignored my body’s attempts to get my attention. Now that I had slowed down enough to listen, I realized so many things needed to change, but especially my relationship to work and my relationships with people around me. I went about the hard work of changing them, and my body was there for that too.
When I first thought about becoming a massage therapist, I had never actually had a professional massage before, but I was thinking about all of this. I was thinking about finding ways to help myself and others feel more embodied. Now, massage has become a part of this practice for me. A way to reintegrate or reacquaint myself with my body. Another way to practice feeling what it is trying to tell me. Being a massage therapist gives me a daily opportunity to slow down, check in, and stay present. I hope that I am giving the people I work with this same opportunity. These days, I am so grateful to be in a body and I recognize the privilege it is to feel that way. I thank god or chance or whoever or whatever that I can listen to pop music, dance in crowded rooms, laugh in movie theaters, etc. etc.