How I discovered something called intuitive dance, and why dancing in the dark, in stilettos, changed my life. It can change yours too. Find out how.
How I discovered something called intuitive dance, and why dancing in the dark, in stilettos, changed my life. It can change yours too. Find out how.
Go to awakenyourinterior.com/resources to get your free printable journal and start listening to your body. Its also where I will drop all my favorite resources, throughout the course of this podcast, including my Spotify playlist so you can follow along during movement.
Good morning. I’m Tasha Cleaveland. Today I want to share how I discovered something called intuitive dance, and why dancing in the dark, in stilettos, changed my life.
I know how hard it can be to live in a home that doesn’t feel right. It's not your fault. You were never taught how to create a home that makes you feel alive. The key is inside you, we just need to unlock it, and this podcast is where you begin. I’m Tasha Cleaveland, welcome to the Listening Closely podcast.
Do you remember when you were a kid and people would ask what you wanted to “be” when you grew up? It’s a rather silly question really. Be. As if what we do for a living has anything to do with who we actually ARE. And you only got one answer. We looked at the kids who said multiple things like they were clueless! That’s not how life works, silly! And the ones who just said “a mom”… oh, those girls don’t know how to DREAM!” So we picked something, and sometimes added “and a mom” -like a side dish. The adults were like “awwww.” With a little smile. Was it because the adults knew how hard the duality of what we said really was? Did the moms look at us with a quiet desperation and secretly hope we would be the ones to actually succeed? Would we find the “you can have it all” unicorn?
Did they forget to tell us that motherhood might feel like invasion of the bodysnatchers? You thought being a mom was like frosting on a cake. It was just another fun layer! This life you were living used to be your own and then POP! You look around at the reality of motherhood and think… “this isn’t how I wanted it to be”. “This isn’t what I imagined.” And what’s worse is we become numb, not just to this reality, but to everything. It’s necessary, really. A bit of it at least. How else do you create and sustain life and survive months of zombie like sleeplessness? Pushing through. Not feeling it. Sacrificing for the greater good. But in the process, that little voice inside us that used to dream of so much, has been replaced by a different kind of little voice. The kind that says “mommy, he is coloring on the sofa- with a sharpie”. Your own inner voice, that used to lead you through life in this glorious body, got quieter and quieter, and now all it says is “someday.”
And you hold your breath and you wait.
Listen closely. Do you hear it? “Someday”
6 years ago I was at a Tony Robbins event and it changed the course of my life. Before the event, my husband and I discussed divorce. Tony is what brought us back together. For 13 years we had stumbled our way through our marriage and what we learned gave us clarity and renewed our passion for each other, and ourselves. On Relationship Day, Tony shares Allison Armstrong’s concepts of masks. How as women we often hide our femininity with a mask of masculinity in order to protect ourselves. And then on top of that we layer a superficial mask of femininity. Like a peanut butter m&m.
Sound familiar?
So here we are playing this game layering masks and never actually showing our true authentic selves- to anyone, including our partner. I was a feminine creature, manning up. Hiding my softness with a tough outer shell that I built up to protect my heart from disappointment. From loneliness. From postpartum depression. I didn’t even try to candy coat that sucker with a feminine shell. I was hard. I was harsh. I was controlling. I was critical of anything that wasn’t my way of doing it. What space did that leave for my husband if I was showing up as the tough masculine? No wonder date nights didn’t exist.
That realization was the shift. I was no longer willing to live like that. I was determined to uncover my feminine core.
My ah-ha moment was when Tony asked volunteers to show us what authentic femininity looked like in dance. There were some amazing dancers up there and I was like “oh, damn. Yeah, I can’t do that. Im not feminine like that at all.” I felt totally ashamed, and then he asked everyone who they thought encompassed feminine movement the best. People were shouting for the best dancers, and he was like “Nope. Look more closely.” Still they shouted for the best moves. And then he pointed to a woman dancing slowly in the back. Just a regular looking, middle aged woman. She was hidden by the women in front who were dancing for the attention, rocking out like backup dancers in a music video.
But here was this woman, slowly swirling her hips with her hands tangled in her hair in what looked like the most exquisite state of bliss. She moved as if no one else was in the room. She flowed with an indescribable beauty that filled my body with joy from 150 feet away. It was in that moment that my inner voice shouted “I want to feel like THAT.” I didn’t know how she got there or what she had, but I wanted it so badly. I yearned for that feeling on such a deep level. An ache that spoke to the deepest parts of my soul. It was as if for the first time in 10 years, I finally, took a breath.
6 years later I still dance. It wasn’t always easy, but it changed my life and enriched how I help others. In that room in the dark, I swirl, I stir, I dig. I lay bare on that hard floor my vulnerability and truth. And my sisters hear, they feel, and they share right back. Without saying a word. We see it. We feel it. It is because of them, because of that practice that I can feel people and understand what brings them joy even more deeply, just by listening and looking closely. They can show me pictures of rooms they love, tell me what they like in it and I can identify the common threads of their unique style recipe. And then, I help them create it. To live in their joy. And that, lets me live in mine.
Since quarantine finding time for myself has been hard. In person class is canceled. Time feels squeezed in all directions. I know what I need to do, and yet I have let the demands and adjustment to everyone at home take its toll and I put myself last on the list, again. “Im gonna try and move today”, is mom speak for “Im gonna see if I can save some time for myself”, which as we know, rarely happens. There is no saving space in momhood . Its not like a line that your BFF is holding your spot in. You gotta show up for yourself.
The truth is, right now we are putting ourselves last. Last like, picked last in gym class, last. The invisible kind of last. The kind that hurts. So let’s do it together.
One of the most important steps in getting back into your body, and creating a life you love, is starting to pay attention to what matters. Tony says “Where focus goes, energy flows.” And if you are a “Law of Attraction” or “The Secret” fan, it’s the same idea. What you spend more time focusing on, you bring more into your life. Whether its by attraction or intention and seeking out more, it doesn’t really matter if it works, right?
When I was in college I had a journal that I wrote in every night until I ran out of pages. Subsequent attempts didn’t have the same magic. After Tony Robbins I did a gratitude journal for my husband also filling every page. Those two journals were the only ones in my whole life that I ever finished. I have about 10 incomplete ones hiding under my bed.
Recently I decided to hack the process. Why were those two so successful and none of the half filled journals were? So I broke down what worked and expanded on it to include what I need right now. For one, I love spiral binding. I like flipping it all the way open and folding it over. And second, I don’t like a whole blank page. I don’t know what to say. So I put the pieces together and created one. It’s a basic checklist to track my self care, (like did I drink water?) and filling in blank prompts for what I need more attention on. It’s simple. Mad Libs, check the box simple. I know that if it isn’t easy and in bite sized pieces, I won’t be able to make it part of my daily rhythm. And, I have made it available to you for free, to journal along with me each night. Just go to my website at awakenyourinterior.com/resources to download it. Go on. Go get it.
Alright. Here’s what I noticed from my journal entry yesterday:
My best moment and my ah-ha moment: Yesterday I had a long overdue conversation with my husband. The kind of conversation that you think you “cant have” and then you realize you cant keep waiting for things to change on their own, and you just do it. It was about intimacy and my needs that I felt were going un noticed. And you know what? Having that hard conversation is SO much better than sitting silently and holding your breath. It really, really is.
Ready to move? I promise this will be easy. You can totally do it. No stilettos today.
Here’s what you need:
-comfy clothes you might wear to yoga class, or you know, pajamas.
-space with enough room to stretch your arms out in all directions. (You can even use your bed if that’s all the space you’ve got. )
-I love sitting on a soft fuzzy blanket, it helps me drop into my body faster.
-you can use a yoga mat under the blanket if you have hard flooring,
-another device to play the song on while you keep me in your ear
Go ahead and pause while you get set up. I will wait right here for you. Hurry back though, cause someones gonna want something from you if you are gone too long.
Let’s try breathing today? Oxygen sounds fun, right?
The song for today is:
“Waking up Slow” Piano version, by Gabrielle Aplin.
I love this song because I feel my body unfurling as it expands and evolves. It as if it is telling my body, “now. now, you can breathe.” Let’s see what it does in your body.
(Movement focus: breath)
Soulwork for today:
The goal for today is to notice when you are holding your breath. That is all. Just notice it. Imagine you have a giant butterfly net and you are simply catching the moment and looking at it from above. See if you can catch it twice today. If you can catch more, great! If you can’t catch any, practice again tomorrow. Your only goal is to notice and tonight, jot down anything you observed from that moment. An easy example is I often notice I wasn’t breathing when I sit down to eat. Because eating forces us to breath. Interesting, right? Or if my kids start fighting, because my body freezes before action. Ok, your turn.
Until tomorrow. Lots of love.