Weaving yourself back together
Grab a cuppa for this Sunday soul session with Sez
Hello you,
I recently turned to weaving. I bought an old picture frame, kicked out the painting from inside of it, and hammered 50 small iron nails into both the bottom and the top of the frame.
I have no idea what I’m doing. And it’s completely counter-habit to not turn immediately to a website or a social media feed to guide me on how to make this new hobby look perfect. Apart from an old book I found in a charity shop that shows me how to thread a basic weave, I am just letting myself intuitively work at it for the purposelessness of it all.
As I rediscover that forgotten simplicity of over and under, over and under… I feel like I am too, weaving myself back together.
Every thread that needs cutting, I name it a fear. Every too-loose row that needs adjusting, I name it a story. Every time I step back and see the gaps, I imagine how much beauty can be filled around them, making them less important.
Through these past three months of stripping myself back to the whites of my bones, I’ve not been able to write much. The very act of diving into my head conflicts with an even deeper need I have to leave experiences wordless. The art of returning myself right now feels like trying to make a tug boat do a U-turn, mid-throttle…
And so with this gap of time when I would usually write, my body, full of conflict and not knowing where to put all its feelings, I’ve turned towards the familiarity of my own hands for guidance.
The arms, hands, and fingers - extensions of the Heart - are remarkable things. Giving, taking, offering, holding, withdrawing, comforting, letting go. How much I wish to learn from them.
In order to learn, however, I realize that I must trust. Trust that my body knows what to turn to when I don’t.
Strip our bodies of comfort, safety, craving, and habit, and we will find them quite capable of holding on to what’s left that’s right and good and whole.
Freshly soaked hands, scrubbed hands, are soft and supple. They reach only for what feeds the Heart. And what provides a Heart in disarray is rhythm.
Those overs and unders, those finger pokes followed by seed, those knead and presses, those eyes following the page from left to right, those quiet footsteps on the forest floor in the early hours, those dips and strokes, those inhales and exhales…
We are all capable of turning to a very simple pattern when healing. It’s methodical, primordial, rhythmical, and yet one of the hardest things to do for the mind. Because it wants meaning and complexity. It wants to be the DJ of the beat we dance to.
Letting go of the mind while returning to yourself is not just something to be aware of - but a practice to commit to as if your life depended on it.
The intentional discarding of our self-identified ‘healer’s mind’ (who wants to fix us, get us back into productivity, return us back to ‘happy and normal’) is to allow a much more potent energy in to help us. This energy is rooted in the natural world and therefore us. It is slowness and simplicity. It is deep, rhythmical patterns that exist within the intelligent universe and therefore in every cell in our body.
The word, rhythm is rooted in the Greek word, rhythmos, meaning, measured flow of the soul.
Our flow state is not governed by controlled chaos but by slow, intentional, and surrendered order, by moon and tide, by steady beat and vibration - that simplicity is what we must bring back into our lives when everything comes off the loom, surrendering to the reliable undercurrents that take us beyond the turbulent waters of life.
We must sip our tea, and tend to our wounds as if we were turning the earth on its axis - trusting what our bodies intuitively turn to when it has nothing left to hold on to. This is why we must never waste a depression, never let a period of intense anxiety go to the dogs. They are all here to feed you - to bring you back to the rhythm.
Through the physical, we can connect to the spiritual. So put your ache out there so healing can be cultivated in here. Make a new purposeless, unguided practice with the intention to bake, to repair, to rewild, to hand-make yourself through extensions and messengers of the Heart…
because when we feel too wounded on the inside, we can heal from the outside-in too.
Just a note:
Whatever you are going through right now, just know that I am with you. I see you and extend myself forward to meet you wherever you are, with everything I am. Sometimes it feels like we are supported on the good days but then painfully alone when we find ourselves offroad. This is why I created this space, for myself and others, to root ourselves in the truth of how supported we all are while we experience the beauty and challenges of being a human and a being. You are always invited to reply personally to me if there is something you feel overwhelmed by - and also if there is something you feel deeply in love with right now. They are often part of the same cycle.
Love Sez
Your words are so soothing to my body and soul…and quiet my mind so I can let go and trust something deeper. Thank you. Thank you. Thank You!💙
Beautiful. Thank you for that lovely writing. Those words brought comfort to me just now