Receiving Touch

To find and to receive touch as a form of nourishment against the mindlessness, the carelessness and the neglect we impose on our body is no ordinary find.

I neglected my body. I ignored my body. I was careless with my body.
I tried to fit it into the narrowness that I was made to believe about myself. The contours of my body altered as it was caving in. I held so much within me, yet my body was hollow.

I always had what it took to offer my body to others - in service, in love, in work, in presence. But I didn't have it in me to offer it what it needed. 'I can't nourish you at this moment' was a dialog that lasted for months.

And yet, something in me knew I needed to seek touch. A kind other than what I was allowing it. Something to trigger the senses back into connection. Something to remind me, to confront myself, to make me fall back into this being as a whole, and not as severed parts.

A vigorous massage.
A bloodied piercing - even pain can feel glorious to a numbed-out body.
A friend quietly finding possibility within the wounds through henna.

Your whole body is voice. Find someone who can find that voice in the moments you can't.