alone together & not knowing together resources + guided benefactor practice

image by @richardhorne

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I wrote this for you for the moments when you feel deeply alone. If you feel alone right now or in any moment, let’s be alone together.

I wrote this for you for the moments when you feel like you just don’t know anything anymore about these times, about this world. Let’s not know together.

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For many of us, this time of quarantine and distancing is incredibly challenging whether we are by ourselves or with others. Many of the structures, the routines, and the communities that we built our lives, our well-being, and our happiness around are seemingly gone or not accessible in the ways we are used to and in the ways we prefer.

We are left to find a new way of being, to create a new foundation, while deeply mourning all that has been lost and experiencing many challenging states of being including loneliness, fear, rage, terror, depression, trauma, grief, and collapse. At a time like this, just simply getting out of bed can be enough. Taking the time you need to weep, to be, to breathe is enough.

All of this is compounded by the isolation and the not knowing many are experiencing by sheltering in place. This is true whether we are alone with only dreams of what touch or hugs feel like or whether we are with people who are dysfunctional, volatile, and dangerous in small quarters for way too many hours in a day to have any recollection of what safety, what ease, feels like.

I deeply feel for all of you right now. We don’t know how long it will be like this. We don’t know what will come next. We just have to find a way to be and to make it through each moment.

For those that are in danger in their home and are in need of support, please consider visiting the National Domestic Violence Hotline, where you can click on “Chat Now”; or text LOVEIS to 22522.

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If we have to be with not knowing right now, then the most truly helpful thing for me is not looking back and not looking forward but just being right here, right now.

Specific practices helping me:

1. Connecting to my body, to the earth, to the feeling of gravity and grounding into the earth. Allowing my body to be held by the earth, the ground, the chair, whatever I am leaning against and knowing that I don’t have to hold myself all by myself that there are external supports present.

2. Moving the body, even if it is just briefly. A bit of motion and then back to stillness. Maybe moments with more movement in the form of yoga, qigong, dance, or even just slowly walking knowing that I am walking.

3. Listening to music. Singing. Humming. These are deeply restorative practices for my nervous system and heart.

This song brings a lot of joy to me right now.

4. Allowing for the grief, the terror, the heartbreak to be present. Allowing myself to weep and deeply mourn. Resting my hand against my heart, my belly, my forehead as a form of presence and care and just allowing what’s present to be here as long as it needs to be here. Offering myself the care and nurturing I need in those moments, in each moment, and then if it’s accessible offering that care out to all the other people feeling this exact same way right now.

5. Connecting to others. Perhaps just someone who I check in daily or weekly. Perhaps a group check in or a group restorative practice together. If you don’t know of any, consider joining me in one of my offerings.

6. Remembering my worthiness and that there is nothing wrong with me or how I feel or respond to these challenging times.

Feel into this beautiful reminder by Yolo Akili:

7. Connecting to ancestors. I have been deeply leaning into the resilience, love, and wisdom of those who have come before me in my familial and spiritual lineages. They were not perfect. There is a lot that I will never know about them and where I come from due to colonialism, patriarchy, and white supremacy. And yet feeling into that felt sense of their strength and care or imagining them does wonders for my weary heart. Knowing that I can heal for and on behalf of them offers a sense of agency.

Here is a guided meditation I made that supports the visualization of our ancestors as a benefactor offering us loving care.

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What’s helping you right now? 

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Below is a short piece I wrote during a particularly challenging time earlier in the week.

image by @embody.create.heal & @transcending_trauma_with_yoga

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I am not alone. ⠀
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It isn’t always easy for me to remember this. The aspects of isolation that physically distancing can bring up in those that live alone and the stories that loneliness can tell can show up really strongly sometimes.⠀
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Yet on days like today when I get to hold space for community, where we get to meditate, move, sing and be, I know I’m not alone. ⠀
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Days like today when I can feel my ancestors so vividly. I feel my mom and grandmamas saying hello and I love you with each breath I take. I imagine they’re in their Sunday best in some heavenly place together. ⠀
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I wonder about being able to join them some day and they say hush, don’t worry about that. Enjoy where you are right now. Enjoy each moment.⠀
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If you feel alone right now or in any moment, let’s be alone together. If you don’t know how to be with not knowing this world you’re in right now, not knowing what’s to come, let’s not know together. Let’s find our way together.

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With love,

—Lissa E.

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If this was supportive, consider also checking out these other posts: Coping with The Impact of Covid-19 (a regularly updated resource list), Being with Grief and/or Healing Intergenerational Trauma.