If My Body Could Speak..
I’m sitting on a worn down cushion, inside a stranger’s kitchen, with four women I met just 16 minutes prior. A writing workshop nestled in the corner of a freshly painted white casita, on a jungle hillside in Lake Atitlán, Guatemala. The stranger sets a piece of wrinkled paper in front of us with ten different prompts to choose from, a stream of consciousness exercise. The instructions are to follow our intuition, respond to whichever prompt speaks to us most glaringly, the one to which we can’t say no. My hungry eyes scan the sheet, desperate to write and to express and to share before number 6 jumps at me off the page.
“If my body could speak…” IF my body could speak? But she is always speaking, it is me that is not always listening.
My body speaks in the rushed beating of her heart as she climbs up a hill. She speaks in the way she lifts her shoulders when she’s stressed, the throbbing in her head when I try to make her smaller, try to discipline her. My body speaks with the ache in her chest during a heart break and with the catch in her breath from the excitement of a first kiss. She speaks in anxious jitters when I undervalue her, hate her, open her to people who do not deserve her. My body speaks in the creaking of her joints but also in joyful, full lungs during a breath of fresh air. She speaks in the softening of her jaw as she shares stories with strangers and friends and strangers that turn into friends. My body speaks when she picks up a pen and creates art. She speaks as she opens her eyes each morning and picks herself back up over and over again.
My body travels me all around the world and brings me up mountains to bask in all the vistas. She feels the soft warmth of a thick blanket when the air outside is crisp. She reads books I love and chooses to put down books that I don’t. She hugs people and smiles at strangers and asks questions. My body remembers the smell of her grandmothers skin and dives into the ocean to feel salty water moving through her hair. She sings mantras under the stars and lays in hammocks and discovers colorful cafes. She eats cookies and giggles with five year olds and is moved by the sun rise and the sun set day after day after day.
My body pleads with me to protect her, to co create with her. She reminds me she is my friend, my confidant, my support system. She emphasizes that my job is to be the receiver of information, the action taker, the one standing guard.
My body is always speaking. It is not a matter of IF, but rather WHEN she is speaking, do I have the courage to truly listen?
