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It’s been awhile since I last wrote. The summer has kept me busy. But more than anything, I have found my head full of noise this season. Most of the time, writing helps me make sense of that noise. But every once in a while, the reverse happens, and the noise keeps me from my writing. This happened to be one of those times.
I wish I could report that the noise went away, and that’s why I’m back at it. But it didn’t. It’s loud in this brain of mine at the moment. But I’m trying to make myself write through it.
Last night, I impromptu drove to a yoga class, desperate for someone to tell me how to move my body. I wanted to find a stillness in the midst of all the noise. Mostly, I knew I needed to be around other people but had no ability to converse. Plus, I’m still new to yoga and often find the act of learning to be a grounding experience.
At the start of class, my yoga instructor shared about an exchange she had the week before with a woman visiting Colorado Springs from Costa Rica. She told my instructor that she woke up every morning, opened her windows, and no matter what else was happening, she said yes to her life.
Yes to her garden.
Yes to her view.
Yes to her breakfast and the flowers
Yes to the sun.
Our instructor encouraged us to spend the next hour leaning into the power of yes. After weeks of little movement, my body ached and cracked with each pose. Days of dehydration caught up to me. My lack of sleep cursed at me. And the noise in my head kept calling out no (more accurately, fuck no) whenever it could.
Life doesn’t feel easy at the moment. Frozen with indecision, a deep sense of sadness, and a lot of fear, I find myself calling out no a lot right now.
No, this isn’t fair. No, I can’t pick up the phone. No, I don’t want to be patient. No, I don’t want to run in the midst of a heat wave. No, I need one more hour of sleep. No, I don’t want to make this decision. No, I want my life to turn back a year.
No, no, no.
Sometimes, I’m afraid if I focus on adding yes back into my life, I will miss what the noise is trying to communicate. There are parts of my life I need to change. Patterns I need to cut away. Energy I need to channel elsewhere. Pain I need to let myself feel, so I can release it. I know the nos are rampant because I’m out of balance (hence the decision to return to yoga).
All that is to say I felt pretty resistant to the idea of spending an hour saying yes to my life, but by the end, I felt myself surrender to it. I don’t know if I sweated away all those nos or moved them through my body, but in the last ten minutes of our practice, something melted in me. I found a way to say yes for a moment. I wrote this poem in my car before heading home, and it made me want to come back here to share it.
I don’t have anything in particular to say about this experience last night, other than I hope you find a way to say yes in your life soon, however that might look.
I’ll also leave you with a poem I keep returning to often right now called “That” by Chris Dombrowski . You will need a free membership to access it, but I believe it’s worth it. I’ve also been rereading and rewatching (as everyone should right now) anything Andrea Gibson touched. I’m still struggling to accept they are gone. I’ll share a more specific poem by them soon.
I’m not sure when I will be back with another post. I’m taking things day by day and giving myself permission to stay away from specific schedules. But I hope to be back soon.
Until there, here are other places I saw poetry this month:
Dancing while at an Alabama Shakes concert
A sip of cold water in the middle of an interview
Laying on the couch with my dogs, alone in the house
Rewatching videos of my niece, Billie
Thanks for stopping by. I’m grateful you came to visit, and I’m glad you exist.
<3
Soph
I love you so much. You are so inspiring! Holy moly, honey bunny… Just had a root canal. I’m sitting in the sun on the porch and smiling because we are related. We are family. And you are so special to me in so many ways. Thank you for sharing your inner thoughts through your poetry and especially with you reading. It is a favorite of mine. 💕💕