September 18, 2020

I kinda love this picture. I love that it’s candid and that I’m laughing and that I’m trying to show the importance of ritual. I love that ritual and laughing are two of the most loving ways that human beings connect to each other.

Reading The Body Keeps The Score taught me more than I could have ever hoped to learn about the experience of being human. Bessel Van der Kolk says “Humans are meaning-making creatures, we have a tendency to create some sort of image or story.”

My goodness don’t we? We create stories and ideas of life and what it should look like, and then we actually live them out! It’s amazing. Like mind blowing.

So let’s talk about my summer one more time, shall we? This summer I wove together a story of my ideal Italian summer and I got to be the star. It was special, unexpected, stunning. There are too many human beings to thank for the unforgettable experiences I had to even begin to mention them here.

But, yet again, I’ve gotten all kinds of feedback on that story, the story I told was assumed as the only story I lived. I found myself backtracking on how good summer was for me- reminding friends of my own humanity. Duh. And then I wondered if I should have shared that story at all (again). I get it. It’s hard to make sense of the last 6 months.

A global pandemic, our lives turned upside down. In my observations, the devastation and loss of control have turned into resilience and brand new paths for so many of the people I hold nearest and dearest. Everything is changing. The truth is it always has been. Perhaps before this year we were more ordered about how we viewed change. Things were changing but we were planning it and we felt like we were in control. Now things are still changing but we are more certain than ever that we aren’t. Think about the stories you’re telling yourself, think about if they’re true. Start telling yourself beautiful stories like your life is dripping in warm honey.