The Most WILD Experience of My Life
Back in May, I attended a weekend retreat in the Catskills, hosted by Luis Mojica of Holistic Life Navigation.
Luis has been my somatic therapist for over 2 years, so I know his work intimately. Heading into this retreat, I expected ease, connection, joy, love and integration.
After spending the first afternoon with so many gorgeous faces and bodies and energies, learning about the somatics of joy, I couldn’t stop smiling.
I was in my element. And I was feeling it.
Later that evening, after a lovely dinner, we made pillow and blanket nests for ourselves, as we prepared for an hour-long Sound Healing practice.
I was so ready. So open. So unfurled.
A few minutes into the practice, I started feeling agitated. Anxious. Itchy. I didn’t understand what was happening. I tried my best to “track the charge” in my body, but it just kept getting bigger and Bigger and BIGGER. The harder I tried to hold it in, the more chaotic it got.
When it got to be too much for my body, I shot up straight and quickly scanned the room to see who else might be wild-eyed and vexed.
It was just me. I was the only one.
That sent me spiraling.
“What is WRONG with me?” I thought.
I could hardly breathe. My heart was racing. My mind was scrambled.
When the practice was over, I got up, put on my shoes, and drove back to my airbnb. I took a shower, stretched, moved, tapped (EFT), held myself, moved some more, tried to sleep, got up to pee every 20 minutes, but nothing "helped." I just.kept.shaking.
It didn’t feel like my run-of-the-mill anxiety/tension/stress. This had EDGES to it. It pulsated inside my body.
I wanted to crawl out of my fucking skin. I wanted to scream. And cry. And rage. And howl.
I kept saying to myself, “This is a part of me I do not yet know.”
I felt like I was about to “wolf out,” a la Enid Sinclair in The Addams Family.
It was one of the longest, most stressful nights of my life.
When morning rolled around, I dragged myself out of bed and went back to the retreat center. I ate alone and snuck into the retreat space early so I could just CHILL.
Once I settled into my spot and began tuning into my surroundings, I noticed the sound-healing music that was playing over the speakers. Within seconds, that WILD-EYED-FEELING from the night before began to RAGE inside my body. I jumped outta my seat, stumbled out of the room, sat down on a large couch, curled my legs up to my chest, and stared off into space.
I was numb.
The charge was TOO MUCH. I started shutting down.
After a few minutes, one of the body-worker-support-people came out to check on me. I was closed off, shifty, afraid. He stayed with me. Asked gentle questions. And slowly, I began to tell him what had happened. And what was still happening.
When I sheepishly told him that my body felt like it was going to WOLF OUT, he said, “That makes sense, Stasia. It was a very INTENSE full moon last night.”
EXCUSEMEWHAT?
Instantly, the raging terror that was thrashing around inside my body shifted toward curiosity. I could FEEL my body begin to soften. My shoulders relaxed, my eyes widened, my posture straightened.
My brain shifted away from thinking something was happening TO ME, to wondering if something was happening FOR ME.
Could this whole experience be ON PURPOSE? Was something POWERFUL + BENEVOLENT + WILD coming alive inside of me? Was it MORE power than I thought I deserved? Was it so untamed that my body didn’t know what to do with it?
I held these questions close all afternoon.
Later, during a break, I went into the forest and sat down by a stream to read. I opened Pema Chödrön’s book, Welcoming the Unwelcome, (I had started this book a few days earlier) and these were the very first words I read…
“If we can go beyond blame and other escapes and just feel the bleeding, raw meat quality of our vulnerability, we can enter a space where the best part of us comes out.”
I WAS SHOOK.
Could this whole thing be THE BEST PART OF ME coming out?
When I returned for dinner, one of the retreat gals told me that in her wanderings, she had found a sculpture of a wolf (a wolf!), and showed me the picture.
CHILLS ran through my body.
The synchronicities were blowing my mind.
STORY BREAK: I want to pause this story to say… this is not how I roll. I am not woo-woo. I do not believe in full moons and werewolves. And yet… THINGS WERE HAPPENING. Things my brain couldn’t explain, but my BODY was experiencing. I was oscillating between THIS IS TOO REAL TO NOT BE REAL and YOU’RE DRAWING CORRELATIONS WHERE THERE AREN’T ANY, STASIA. At one point I said to the group, “This is NOT how I am. I am not woo-woo. I do not WOLF OUT. I wear J.Crew for goodness sake!”
Later that evening, we all gathered together as a group for a touch-healing practice, where each person would have a turn laying on a massage table, while everyone in the room laid hands on our bodies. Thirty people. Sixty hands. We could say where we wanted to receive touch. And where we did NOT want to receive touch. We could say WHAT kind of touch we wanted (gentle, firm, squeezing). And we could request that folks sing, chant, hum, whatever.
As folks were doing their thing, making their requests, I felt stuck. I didn’t know what I wanted. And then, I knew. And it scared the shit out of me.
“I’d love everyone here to WOLF OUT with me. Can we all just… HOWL together? Like wolves. And can someone please hold my face. And my hands. And my feet. Really tight.”
I lay on the table, 60 hands on my body, and together we howled. I fucking howled. And I laughed. And shook. And cried. And howled some more.
That same energy from the night before ERUPTED inside my body. Except this time, I wasn’t afraid. When I got off the table, I had to leave the room. I had to MOVE. I had to jump. I had to shake. I had to EXPRESS what was alive inside of me.
I buzzed for hours.
Eventually, I slept. Not long, but I slept.
The following morning, my inner critic was LOUD.
“Are you done pretending now, Stasia? That is not who you are. You don’t do shit like this. You asked people to “wolf out” with you? Really? I hope you’re embarrassed. Get back in line, for goodness sake. Stop acting like a fool.”
It. Was. Brutal.
AND… it was okay. I’m okay.
It’s hard and scary to meet a BRAND-NEW part of you. Especially a WILD + UNTAMED part of you. A part that would have gotten you burned at the stake centuries before.
(Think about THAT for a second.)
In the past ten or so years, I’ve done a lot of work, learning to color outside the lines. Constantly shifting, changing, emerging. Becoming MORE of who I am, every day. I thought the bulk of the work was behind me. Little did I know that everything up until this weekend was getting me ready to meet Stasia, the werewolf, with passion in her eyes, and fire in her belly.
Life is trippy.
Ahh-woooooooo.
xo Stasia
PS. I run Style School 3 times a year, in February/March, May/June, and October/November. This email has nothing to do with that. And EVERYTHING to do with that. Because this would have NEVER happened if I still hated my body. You cannot HATE YOUR BODY, and TRUST ITS EXPERIENCES AND EXPRESSIONS, both at the same time. It's impossible. Style School is designed to help you build a LOVING relationship with your today-body, so if you’re interested, sign up for my emails and I’ll let you know the dates for the next session, and I’ll see you in there!
PPS. If this whole wolfing-out thing sounds EXTRA WEIRD to you, I get it. It would have sounded weird to me a few months ago. I realize now it's because I didn't believe I had access to this kind of INNER STRENGTH + POWER + WISDOM + BEAUTY. But now that I know, I can't un-know it. And that knowing includes you. You have access to this too. Maybe not now. But someday. SOMEDAY!!