The Gift of Touch.

When I was 23 years old, I lost my best friend and partner in life.  He passed away at 27 years of age.  Life as I knew it, had crumbled and I was learning how to navigate a new way of living, without.  It was the summer before my last semester in college.  I had moved 3 times that summer.  Judged for what I did.  Judged for what I didn’t. With barely any money to even pay for flowers for his funeral, let alone for my bills during the shock of his death. It was a real humble pie serving, needless to say.

If I could crawl in a rock (as most days I wanted), it would help me stomach a little more each day (or, so I thought).  Of course, I held my breath and powered through, but let’s be honest, I could not have gotten through that valley (and dark knight of my soul) without the support of so many people.  

And although, it took me many years to adjust to a new way of living, something changed in me the day I got my first massage.  Receiving was a foreign concept to me (I was bred to be a doer and a giver), something Universe challenged me in that walk, humbly I have acclimated to the process (without much of a fight these days).  This particular gift was from one of my sisters, who gifted me the “gift of touch”... it reminded me, just as the day of his death: naked, vulnerable, impressionable, I was at the mercy of Universe.  Wherever I blew, I couldn’t change anything and yet could feel everything.  But that’s life, right? A lot of times, we forget we’re all coming from somewhere… and if hurt, then in auto-pilot “defense mode”, we guard up. For me, at that time in my life, I had no fight in me. It wasn’t that I gave up, I just realized, I need not swim against the crashing waves.

For once (many times over, now) I gave in. As the therapist began to apply creme on my back… The knots of judgement and anxiety began to slowly unravel in my belly and tears began to stream down.  At that time in my life, I did not have the words or knowledge of what that massage did for me, but all I knew is that it made life a little lighter for me.

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Present day Gao, would have taken the time to talk to Gao (then) about the importance of touch. How we don’t realize that we store emotions and memories in our bodies as unnecessarily files (because we may not have the capacity to process them at that moment). How touch and movement allows these hoarded files to move on and how they do not identify who we are becoming.

Emotional release (the outburst of tears or what I like to say “the exorcist moment of uncontrollable water works from the eyes”) is a natural response when we give the body permission to sit and listen (this does not mean that you will have emotional releases every session), but that it comes with the territory of coming to your body. There are recent studies on the phenomena of animals and PTSD, although nature has been used as a great observation and inspiration (since the beginning of time), one can see the process of fight or flight and how it takes a toll on the body (in this case an impala): shock, recollection and shaking off of trauma are essential in an animals instinct (just like morning stretching :) ). We humans forget, that waiting in traffic, meeting deadlines, striving for other’s approval and standards, keeping up with the Richardsons are a FEW examples of the stressors we put on ourselves, with no resources of shaking that shit off (literally, pardon my potty mouth) and we don’t realize the zombies we become to ourselves and others.

Yes, I know.. all from one massage. The gift of giving one the opportunity and permission to be in the body, is priceless and such a lifetime of work. Take it from me 10 years later (after my first paid massage) and yet, still getting to know this masterpiece (my body) creator has given me to steward.

When was it the last time you were touched… no expectations (not fulfilling someone else’s needs or maybe expecting something in return)??

Just a thought.