Warning! Danger!

As I stand on my balcony and look over a bustling Manhattan Street, everywhere I see movement.  Cars, buses, bikes, taxis, ambulances, people in constant motion.  Life is moving at such a fast and almost frantic pace that we even coined a phrase, “In a New York minute.”  If you ask a group of New Yorkers what annoys them the most about living in the city, inevitably someone will say, “slow walkers.”  Slow walkers are often tourists (but not always) who think that the pace in the city is more of a stroll than an intense powerwalk.  "Step aside slow walkers who think they can look at their phones and lazily meander down the sidewalk.  Step aside!" We aren’t mean, we’re just in a hurry!  

But it’s this frenetic pace of life that is dangerous for our humanity.  We do live in bodies, after all, that require rest, food, sleep and need to be paid attention to.  And as New Yorkers, it’s this slowing down and paying attention to that we really struggle with.  

I learned the lesson of paying attention to my body in a most painful way.  Excruciatingly painful.  I was training (I use that word lightly) for a 5K mud run with my daughter and some friends.  I hadn’t been much of a runner before, but really wanted to become one in a month’s time.  So, I ran up and down the hills of my then Seattle neighborhood.  I was a busy mom so I didn’t want to waste any time on warm-ups or cool downs.  "Let’s just train those lungs and get the cardio in."  Each day as I set out to run, my hips were growing tighter and tighter.  I noticed and then dismissed the discomfort.  I pushed through.  I told my body to keep going. I needed to prove that I could do this.  I had no time for stretching or strengthening.  (Did I even have core muscles after five pregnancies?)

As my body gave me warning signs that it needed attention, ice, stretching, rest, and care, I continued to ignore it. I thought that my body should do what I wanted it to do.  I had plans!  So, I ran that race and got very muddy! I finished.  And I knew something was really wrong.

My body stopped telling me to take care of myself and started screaming.  The screaming came in the form of intense and paralyzing pain. I didn't know what a sciatic nerve or a piriformis muscle even was before that time.  But oh did I know now.  The pain was crazy-making.  The recovery was slow.  I spent two months that summer unable to sit down.  I couldn’t even drive.  My life, as I knew it, came to a grinding halt as I stood upright in agonizing pain.  

The dashboard warning lights of my body had given me plenty of notice that something was not right.  My muscles needed attention and care.  I needed to listen.  Why didnt I?  Why did I let it get that bad?  (and it was REALLY bad.)

I didn’t know it then, but slowing down to listen to and care for the information that my body was giving me had never been a part of my life.  Pushing through, ignoring or even hating my body for its limits was my normal.  Where had that started in my life?  How had my relationship to my body become so punishing?  Why did I ignore myself so easily?  All of these questions slowly got answered in storywork, as I began to uncover the contempt that I had for my own humanity and slowly cultivated a loving relationship with myself.  I’m still a work in progress, but I am much more attuned to and gentle with my body.  I am so grateful for my human body and the way it lets me know what it needs.  It is me, after all.