Calling All Creeps

Come, love. Sit down with me. This is for you...

When it seems like there's no where to put your love
When your desire becomes a splinter in your heel that you cannot remove no matter the tweezers
When you just keep walking, pain and all, beginning to limp from longing so deeply

When what you prefer giving and what they prefer receiving doesn't exactly line up
When you have no fucking clue what it is that you're meant to give
When you can't control your energy in ways other than outbursts of desperation or denial

When you're the only one at the party buttoned up, or wearing flannel, or ready to kiss with as much as a hint
When you're never invited to the party
When you always choose to stay home

When you're popping xanex in the bathroom to kill the edge
When you just can't shake your judgement
When you can't understand why everyone's judging

When you get the best gift of your life and then have nothing for the giver but a thank you that he won't even receive
When you know the truth will most definitely break something--like the inertia of your body or the frozen fear of your voice
When you'd rather lie than go through the pain of restoring a shattered life
When you decide to let things break, and no one likes your recklessness

When you begin to see yourself in everyone and everything
When you can call yourself what you really are, without pretending that you are not
When your big bold life begins to topple over the edge of normal and into the realm of whole
And when you let yourself worry that this--this expansive way of being alive--makes you even stranger than before when you had no where to put your love

What if your belonging doesn't depend on someone else's word or approval?
What if there's no one coming to comfort you--I mean down-to-the-bones comfort--but your own tired self?
What if you are the so fucking special and also the creep, the weird-o?

We are all so very vulnerable. No one immune. No one getting to play hookie in the health room during the math exam. Not forever, anyway.

We all eventually have to sit for that test--the one that exposes how little we know, the one that makes us feel like beginners again, the one that softens our ego and teaches us to ask for help, or say nothing at all and just be with our own tender limitations.

We are all creeps. All weird-o's. And there is someone out there, someone so fucking special meant to make your creep stand tall like hairs on your back. Meant to remind you of your fragility. Meant to point you to your strength by illuminating your wobbly parts.

Sit for your test. Struggle to let someone see your vulnerability. Over and over and over again.

Passing's not the point.

You're learning. Perhaps, if nothing else, how to let go of the need to get everything right, to know all the ways of the all the worlds, to always have an answer.

You're learning how to be a creep, and therefore, relatable. You're learning how to be a weird-o, and therefore, low-pressure for everyone else. You're learning how to be one of many drowning in the pool of desire for a perfect body, a perfect soul.

And this, this makes you more known, more normal, more human than you ever thought you'd be. It makes you just like me, just like her, just like him. It makes you one of us in this big, messy, beautiful human family that's trying to learn love despite our differences; that's trying play and grow up and stay young and feel free and feel safe all at the same time.

We see ourselves in you.

We all have our days (or months, or years) wondering, What the hell am I doing here?

We're all in this together.

~~~~~

If you're longing for a space to reveal your whole self, zero judgement, just deep love + compassion for your journey, may you know that the strange ones are some of my favorite people out there, and I'd love to support you. My June calendar is calling in five more clients. Head over to my coaching page to see if it might be a good time for us to work together.

mad love,
rachael

Cycles of Creatitivity and Stillness

"Humans, like other animals, are shaped by the places they inhabit, both individually and collectively. Our bodily rhythms, our moods, cycles of creativity and stillness, even our thoughts are readily engaged and influenced by seasonal patterns in the land. Yet our organic attunement to the local earth is thwarted by our ever-increasing intercourse with our own signs. Transfixed by our technologies, we short-circuit the sensorial reciprocity between our breathing bodies and the bodily terrain. Human awareness folds in upon itself, and the senses – once the crucial site of our engagement with the wild and animate earth – become mere adjuncts of an isolate and abstract mind bent on overcoming an organic reality that now seems disturbingly aloof and arbitrary."

-David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous

~~~~~~

I've been laying in the tall grasses behind our house a lot lately. Dancing in the thunderstorms, too. Long walks, while tired in the soon-summer heat, are keeping me humble. And I'm generally less interested in socializing, checking e-mail, going out, doing Bikram yoga, or working at the coffee shop than my often high-speed style.

An internal meditation something like stacking link-n-logs is being called forth. A way to piece together all the wild experiences I've had over the past few months. A new vision. I know not from a place in my mind, but from a feeling in my body. It's telling me to rest. To be quiet. To be still. To do nothing until something is coming all the way through me.

I'm listening, deeply. It's Saturday night and I'm home snuggling up against the possibility of a painting or a poem or a nice long rest. No particular pressures. Just space. Just stillness. Not even a song in the background plays to distract me. Just the quiet hum of the refrigerator and the memory of the birds singing before bedtime. (That's the way they roll, ya know, singing like crazy people before bedtime and then as soon as the sun truly disappears and the sky turns deep deep blue--sleep. The birds know how to go to sleep with the sun.)

The Earth is undergoing a great change these days, moving from a wild rebirthing drenched in diversity, to the sweltering stimulus of a hot hot summer. It's so easy to just keep going in a particular mode without pausing, without laying in the grass to check your own pulse against the pulse of the Earth, without seeing or listening for desires from the inside, out.

But what if you did? What if you stopped, turned off your phone, closed your lap top, left the ear plugs at home for a day, and just listened? Listened with your whole body? Not for something in particular, but for anything that's there.

That's my invitation to you sweet friends, if you want it. An hour, an afternoon, a day--machine-free--body returning to the body of the Earth, there to see what secrets she has to tell you. Because she's full of them, and she's always willing to tell. Grab a blanket. A journal if you'd like. Feel free to jot down her wisdom. She won't mind. She'll just be glad to have you for a visit.

Being with the Brave Blues

It's okay to not know what to say
Usually, the Brave Blues require less words than we think
Less words, more presence
More bare feet on the cool grass
Soft touches on shivering arms
Subtle tears face-to-face that read
I love you for your courage, sister
Yes yes yes

No, we don't need to know what to say
to be with someone's Brave Blues

But there are a few things that I'm learning
from experience
feel a bit less supportive, less loving
even when they don't mean to

They sound something like this:
1. Are you sure you want to expose your blues?
2. Are you sure you're strong enough to be so brave?
3. You're better off processing in private.
4. The world doesn't know how to be with your... shit.
5. Keep your skeletons in the closet.
6. Think about your reputation.
7. And your family, for god's sake.

Anne Lamott recently tweeted something that made the rounds
She said,
You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should've behaved better.

There are a lot of messages out there about what you should do:
Tell your story
Share your truth
Be vulnerable
Be brave

Sometimes, the same people who encourage you with these short nuggets of advice
are the first to respond with skeptical review:
You've gone too far
Maybe you should re-think your courage
Think about your career, your image

This is a positive and powerful process for me
My career, my image, is a direct reflection of that process
And my capacity to be with people in their processes

I am not afraid to be a full human
I am not afraid of our expansive experiences on Earth
Even when I hate them
Even when I resist them
Even when I want to erase them
Here we are
Here we are

The hardest part about beginning to tell my story
is not that it happened
or even that I'm retracing it--
But that my here we are mentality is radical and confronting to some
And that confrontation gets projected back on me
But it's okay
Like I said, here we are

We can learn the task of listening
I can be a better teacher
I can say
It's okay if you're scared of my story or my raw expression
I don't blame you
Most people never speak
You rarely have to hear it

And then I can also say
There is no pressure to tell your story
If you have one
Sometimes, we tell it when we're ready
Sometimes, we tell to only one
To a small circle
A professional
A journal
Sometimes, we never tell
Either way, I judge not
I trust you
I trust your process

And then finally
Thank you for even showing up to hear my story
I tell it simply because so much is untold
And I don't think we can heal
what we do not know

I say "we" because I do not hold the lot of my trauma alone
I am part of a wounded body of people who are untrained
in talking about the dark sides of sex and power

That body is all of us
We all suffer in the shadows of our unhealed collective
And that's okay
Here we are
But I know we could also be there--
Some place a little more healed
A little more okay with our wholeness

So I will not wait to be all healed up
Before talking about rape or sex or power
I will not wait to be an expert, polished, or eternally wise
Because it's the practice, the process, for me--that heals, that garners wisdom

I've been in a waiting game for far too long
I will let myself play in the messy territory of our
Collective naivety
Because I am Brave
Because I can be with the Blues
Because I know that healing is a long path
And I know how to walk slowly and breathe, in good company
It's time

100 Things I Never Thought I'd Tell You About Sex (The Very Tip of the Iceberg)

I wrote this two days after my first post, 100 Things I Never Thought I'd Tell You, because there was still so much left unsaid--like, a whole hemisphere (or three). The vulnerability around writing about sex (openly, explicitly, honestly) is so extreme that I understand why so few people do. But sometimes, when we begin telling our stories--when we unravel into the universe of the once hidden and disguised--we become Truth Suffragists on a mission to keep trudging forward until every last slave is free. That's where I am, friends. In a wild exploration much bigger than the 100 things below. I hope to keep unraveling here. To tell you more than I ever thought I'd have the courage to say. And to invite a space for you to do the same. I love you for being with me. Thanks.

1. We'll start at the beginning (which isn't the beginning of everything, but sometimes it feels that way).
2. When I was 13, I was raped.
3. A good friend of mine spent months on AOL Instant Messager coercing me to go with her and her then 27 year old "babysitter" for a fun experience in trying new things.
4. I lied to my parents. Probably said I was going to the movies.
5. We pulled up to the motel in his red sports car.
6. I remember the smell of his dick. The underwear I wore. The forest green silk robe I dressed myself in in the bathroom after they finished with me.
7. I had been a virgin.
8. There was nothing left undone to me after that night.
9. Sitting on the cool white toilet seat, moans in the background, I called my friend Melissa and made small talk like nothing was going on.
10. The beginning of dissociation. I didn't tell a soul about that night until 5 years later. Shame central.
11. But let's back up.
12. Because when I tell people this story so matter-of-factly they often look at me like I have a horrendous growth on my face--or terminal cancer.
13. People. I was raped. 12 years ago (and then a few more times after that).
14. I am More Common Than Cancer.
15. And definitely more common than distracting face growths.
16. There was a man who did not know what to do or where to put all that lack of power, all that had happened to him. And there was a girl who did not know how to cope with her beautiful adult body and underdeveloped emotional strength.
17. So he raped her.
18. It happened.
19. We want to villainize him. Make him a terrible person for his woundedness. I wanted to villainize myself, too. Make myself bad for my recklessness.
20. But we are all imperfect people, flawed and able to hurt others, and ourselves.
21. Regretably, that ability slips its way into sex far too often.
22. And we learn from experience not to trust the very thing that gave us life.
23. That visceral delicious act that expresses the most divine pleasure of all.
24. It becomes a power game.
25. Who can hold the most control? Who can feel the least vulnerable? Who can stay the safest?
26. When safety is our mission (because it has to be, for our health), we miss out on the ecstasy of surrender.
27. So I say this now to wake us up a little bit:

28. We are a culture that is wounded by rape.
29. Which is to say, we are culture that wounded by our grasping and lashing out for control.
30. Which is to say, we are culture thats healing and delectable joy are rooted in our practice of letting go and embracing the way things are.
31. When we argue or dismiss or diminish the inherent way of someone's being (or our own)--when we make demands on them--we are trying to arm wrestle their power, rather than play with their strengths. We are trying to beat them.
32. And when we try to beat others, or ourselves, into being something we're not, everyone loses.
33. Trust me. I've tried. On both sides.
34. But when you let out your deep needs and expression, and honor and accept what others can offer in return, or not... there's reason to feel hopeful.
35. Because you begin to see the gift.
36. The gift of someone else's entirety laid out before you.
37. Afraid, and present.
38. Wondering, Will I be good enough? 
39. Wondering, Is this body the right size, the right shape, the right smell, the right touch?
40. Wondering, Can I really give what I want to give? Can this body express such wild love?

41. True sexual surrender is what I'm after.
42. It might take a spiritual awakening.
43. It might BIRTH a spiritual awakening.

44. Number 44 is a breathing break. Take it with me.

45. I wasn't even expecting to tell you that rape story.
46. If I had guessed what I would've written before I wrote this, I'd say:
47. That story about my mom walking in on me masturbating in the bathtub.
48. Or maybe the first time I was fingered, wearing overalls.
49. And definitely that it's terrifying to admit that for most of my teenage years I considered myself a closet whore for one simple reason: I was horny and thought that was Wrong.
50. Oh, the work I've done undoing the stigma around sexual desire.

51. I need another breathing break.

52. Here's what I can tell you now: Start at the root and work your way up.
53. Buy the book Anatomy of the Spirit or read the first 80 pages on google.
54. Learn shit about your shakras.
55. If you don't know what a shakra is, look it up.
56. Pay attention to where you feel pain in your body.
57. There are energetic correlations to everything.
58. And it all manifests in sex.

59. Now, we haven't really talked about sex, explicitly.
60. Don't worry. It's coming.
61. But first, a little foreplay.
62. What's your favorite position?
63. Do you prefer to be dominant or submissive?
64. Lights on or off?
65. Music or no music?
66. (Answering questions on dating websites can help you reveal a lot about your preferences and boundaries).

67. Confession: THIS FOREPLAY SUCKS.
68. Because I'm not really comfortable talking about ecstatic sex on the Internet.
69. And feeling comfortable determines a LOT. (But you definitely know THAT from experience).

70. If I'm revealing anything at all in this post, I hope it's that I am not a sexpert.
71. But that I'm letting myself be as vulnerable and not-knowing as possible.
72. And from this often core-rattling place, I'm learning entire universes in days.
73. My most liberating transformations have been my coming outs.
74. My most deepening connections with others have been during their un-closetings.
75. Would you like me to go there now?
76. To trust you enough to tell you another truth?
77. The truth is, I don't trust you.
78. The truth is, I'm still clinging to my power.
79. The truth is, I don't want to be judged.
80. The truth is, I don't want to be hurt.
81. By a stranger.
82. On the Internet.
83. Or worse, a friend.

84. Susan Piver has this awesome meditation on love and heartbreak.
85. She says the only position of power in love is as the lover.
86. As in, give your love.
87. As in, give love.
88. As in, love. (The verb).
89. I hope, somehow, this is that.
90. Even though I've stopped short of telling you everything.
91. Even though I don't trust you--all you people out there... all you Universe out there... all you Self in here--all the way.
92. I trust you enough to say this much.
93. To tell you some of my wounds and some of my learnings.
94. To stand half-naked before you and let you take me in.
95. Let you know that I believe in our collective transformation.
96. Our ecstatic healing.
97. Our many sides and expressions that are seeking us, asking to be born.
98. And that if I have one task on Earth, it just might be this:
99. To say, "Your love will be safe with me."
100. And really mean it.

Honor Your Rock

"Rachael Maddox! You are awesome! You always have been. Even when you're slightly crazy. Do you know that? You should know that. I know you know that."

He tosses these words to me through the back porch door, as he swings his leg over his bicycle. His voice projects, and I know Jen can hear him through her bedroom window. She's smiling, probably, at the sound of emphatic love. My belly gets those butterflies again. The ones that tell me someone really sees me. That I'm as alive as I think I am. That my joy is not an illusion. That this life is real.

I've been thinking about this a lot lately... how we are not islands. How we do nothing alone. Not even our loneliness. How we cannot separate ourselves from all of life. How the motion of everything affects us. We try... sometimes really, really hard, to be unaffected. But it's impossible to stay that still. It's impossible to be completely hardened. That's why we feel tortured by the things we "cannot" accept. Because our bodies want to dance with the motion, but our minds are resisting the mystery and discomfort of where that dance may lead us. We're going against the flow.

I'm learning that the secret of relationships... and not just with people, but with everything around us and within us... is to follow the mystery. To stay curious about where things could go if we stayed loose and did not harden out of fear. This openness is vulnerable. It's dangerous. It could yield unwanted results. And it's also an immense declaration of Trust. The kind of Trust that sustains power, that fuels decades of togetherness, that claims confidence and births reckless joy.

There is someone in my life who has taught me universes about this practice. His name is Brian. He's a love warrior and a master of the Declaration of Trust. He loves me unconditionally, sometimes so much that it hurts. He and his trust make endless space for me and my freedom. I try to practice the same for him. Even with all our imperfections, this sort of exchange is no small deal. It's not something to take for granted (even though, I sometimes do). It's something to sing for, to write about, to kiss from head to toe. So I am.

Let me say it loud and clear here and now: Brian Justin Ward you are the greatest gift I've ever received. You give me stability, a sense of sanity, a home--from which I can venture out into the world and explore. But you're more than just safe. You're also a playmate, a lover, a fellow adventurer who's up for the full experience of what it means to be alive. You're a risk taker. You don't shirk back. You lean into the fire. You do shit even when you're scared. All the time. And I see it. I see the warrior in you. The quiet one and the vibrant one and the tired one and the goofy one. I see you and I love you and I thank you. Your vulnerability blows me away. I couldn't be who I am without you. I couldn't be in this particular practice that's so rich and fulfilling. Yes--there'd be other practices, other adventures. But I'm so honored I'm on this one with you. I choose this--I choose you, over and over again.


Sweet friends out there--who or what do you want to honor today? What sustains you from the inside, out? It's so easy to think ourselves islands. But we are not. None of us. So let those relationships know... don't wait another moment. Honor them. You know just how.

100 Things I Never Thought I'd Tell You.

1. Like Keri Smith implies in this beautiful letter, anger and excitement are two sides to the same powerful coin of deep desire.
2. To tell you the things that anger me and excite me, I'd have to toss all the rules of blogging and self-employment out the window.
3. As if those "rules" are the key to what makes me lovable--what makes me marketable.
4. Now that's something I'm angry about--that in this world, to do what I love, I'm expected to come across as marketable and follow these made up rules about what sells. I Am Not A Commodity.
5. I'm a human with a passion for connecting to other humans.
6. I also love to paint.
7. I also love sex.
8. I also love sitting hand in hand with another breathing body and soaking in their physical presence.
9. I also dream of smashing my laptop one day. It's one of my biggest Mondo Beyondo's of all time.
10. But to tell you that is almost as risky as to tell you that I Think I'm Beautiful.
11. So beautiful that I can use myself as a source of inspiration when no one else is around.
12. So beautiful that I can take 100 pictures of myself in one day and not think it conceited or self-indulgent to do so.
13. I've grown less and less afraid of other people's judgements.
14. Knowing that most of our reactions to others (good and bad) are simply projections of ourselves, undercover.
15. And simply noticing when we get stirred up by someone else's way of being, is the first step to understanding how full and divine we really are.
16. I have absurdly expansive beliefs about loss and brutality that it makes it hard for me to commit to "changing the world".
17. By which I mean, I believe, in a cosmic sense, that murder is necessary--that terrors are necessary--so that the remaining lot of the human family must learn to join together and rise up through healing and solidarity.
18. I suffer when terrible things happen. And at the same time, I do not back down.
19. Everything has a breaking point.
20. Everything eventually surrenders.
21. I've found that the best way of dealing with this truth is by surrendering myself--consciously deciding to participate in the breaking, instead of fighting and resisting.
22. That said--there are times when the breaking can be postponed, or the way it expresses can look differently through resistance and fight back.
23. I'm in favor of this sort of resistance when it truly speaks to me.
24. Like resisting the breaking of my marriage, when a small change could restore it to good health.
25. Like resisting the breaking of ____ (I'm too tired to think of another example. Hello, keepin' it real.)
26. And sometimes I think that our nihilism gets so lofty that we forget that truly--we could each contribute small acts of defiance to resist the breaking of our natural world and restore it to good health.
27. But it's hard to know, collectively, if it's worth the fight--if the promise of good global health is already too far gone.
28. In those cases, may we make music, may we feast together, and may we brush each other's hair as the world crumbles around us.
29. May we at least learn love.
30. And forgiveness.
31. And how to be with the terrible reality that everything eventually breaks.
32. And that we are part of the breaking.
33. And at this point in history, we could not save ourselves.
33. We didn't have it in us.
34. It was just too much.
35. And that's okay.
36. Are you with me on this?
37. Does this sound so ridiculous?
38. Maybe my work in the world is about surrendering after it's already too late.
39. Grief.
40. After all, there is so much loss and so little we can do to stop it.
41. But so much we can do to tend to our hearts and our spirits and our bodies when we're amidst it.
42. Like write blessings.
43. Like pay for a stranger's groceries.
44. Like give someone your full attention and tell them you don't blame them for all their faults and fuck ups.
45. Who's perfect?
46. Maybe our imperfections--our breaking points and bastardization of health--is the master plan, after all.
47. Nature would have us believe it so.
48. Ah, but we've never been that great at listening to nature, learning from the greatest classroom of all.
49. We get caught up in our minds, in our homes, in our cubicles, in our screens.
50. We think these squares are smart and wise.
51. But our bodies don't trust them.
52. Even when our minds are hypnotized, our bodies still do their protesting.
53. They get sick, sore, tight, tired.
54. They beg for our attention, an emancipation from inertia or perpetual motion--pick your poison.
55. They scream out as a last ditch effort for freedom.
56. Wisdom is listening to your body.
57. Wisdom is hearing the call to lay yourself down in overgrown grass and watch the clouds dance in the sky.
58. Wisdom is ... pausing.
59. Breathing.
60. Closing your eyes and slowing down.
61. Right here.
62. Right now.
63. Even though your mind says, "keep reading."
64. Your body knows what it's truly seeking.
65. Stop for a moment, and listen.




66. My body is a looming thunderstorm today.
67. It has no judgement.
68. It's just waiting for something release, wild and wet and a tad bit frightening.
69. And then, a balmy quiet.
70. Rest.
71. With the rest of my life, I'd like to make peace.
72. The kind of peace that expresses itself freely, like a painting or a song that has no clue where it's going before it gets there, but feels totally alive in the process.

73. Ze Frank is a genius. For beginners, start here. For people craving comfort, start here. All guaranteed to make you laugh, maybe cry.
74. Honestly, I just want to live in a straw bail house with a room full of paints and a river near by.
75. I want an electric blue moped that I can ride 10 minutes into town where everyone knows my name, and I know theirs.
76. I want a low-maintenance healing center where a pool of awesome people run their practices and chip-in on rent and space beautification. Music at night. Coffee and wine on tap.
77. I want to see my grandmothers way more often.
78. And go home once a week to watch crappy pop TV with my parents.
79. And play dorky board games with my brother while drinking high percentage beer.
80. And smoke weed with Brian and fuck like animals.
81. And did I mention, paint? Until the sun comes up in the morning?
82. And sing my heart out with Brian on guitar?
83. And visit Jodi in Portland every 6 months?
84. And make videos that make you laugh and cry?
85. And lay down in the grass, watching the clouds dance, daily? <--This one starts today.
85.5 And when everything falls apart (because things always do) hold each other in the bed until we feel a little less terrible.
86. What happens when we declare what we really really want?
87. When we stop trying to want what we think we should want?
88. What happens when we surrender to our deepest desires?
89. When we let the rules be damned, and let our intuition and clear sight guide the way?
90. If I can raise a happy family and embrace imperfection, forgiveness and surrender, my biggest dreams will be fulfilled.
91. If I can laugh and sing and dance and paint and stretch my body in all the best ways, what more could I want?
92. Maybe I don't care about the world as much as I had hoped.
93. Or maybe my biggest gift to the world is my own fulfillment and joy.
94. That part of me that breaks free, and invites you to do the same.
95. Even though it's an uphill battle in a world with few support mechanisms for the brave-hearted and self-expressed.
96. Even though I don't blame you if it feels like too much of a trap or too impossible a feat.
97. I love you just the way you are.
98. And I--I cannot conform.
99. I must lay down in the grass and watch the birds make love.
100. I must do this without knowing the cost, the gift, or the payoff--but only the unspeakable relief of letting my body's wisdom guide my life.