wearing a snowsuit

So much learning when we can find ways to listen to our own bodies. In forgiving the ways I have constricted breath, I stumbled over my early belief that “I” live inside this body like a spirit wearing a heavy snowsuit, rigid with padding. Recognized that really “I” am present as cells and skin and lungs and bones… my being is embodied, these membranes are not just a “vehicle” or tool for my experience of life but are actually “me” in this moment. These filaments of connection – nerves, blood, muscle – remember past movements and the steady hum of change that has been “me” since my conception. There are likely aspects of my interconnected being-with-others and being-with-life that had essence before my conception and will continue after my last breath.. but “me” only happens once, I am this body coordinated by this brain, marked by these sensations and opportunities and hurts. I do not live “in” my body like a toddler overbundled. I am a naked sense organ, moving from lawn to mud puddle to bathtub, learning with each step and inhalation. That journey has brought protections, defenses, learned patterns of constriction – my snowsuit – but I am grateful for this growing sense that I can unzip it to live in more direct exposure.