Episode 132 - A Feminine Renaissance: From Survival to Sensuality
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Mary
Host
Hello, beautiful beings, and welcome to Come to your Senses. Welcome to a brand new month. It is the first week of October when this episode will air. It's a new season. We can feel the cool whispers of autumn starting to prickle and caress our skin.
01:06
There's lots of new beginnings happening here at Come to your Senses, some of which I'll share with you. Today. There's a new graphic which I couldn't be more excited about. I'm a secret graphic designer wannabe and we have a brand new podcast graphic which you might have noticed when you hit play on the episode today.
01:29
And new beginnings, fresh starts, new decisions this is really our theme for today is putting the power back in your hands, particularly as it relates to your body and the place that your body takes in your world through starting your own body renaissance. So let me tell you what that means. A few weeks ago I went to a renaissance exhibit and of course the art was beautiful and stunning. But my mind really just exploded when I realized the parallels between the time of the Middle Ages, the time prior to the renaissance, where life was really centered around survival, getting through the day, and then the renaissance period was this multi-century cultural phenomenon where things like art and innovation, indulgence, luxury, hedonism, sex, sensuality, gorgeous dripping fruit bowls sitting on a Tuscan table in the sun, where this absolute reverence and rapture for life itself and reverence and rapture for life experienced through the body and through the senses, is what began to take center stage in the culture. And I see so many parallels between that phenomenon and what's happening in our world today, where so many of you who listen to this podcast, so many of my clients, come with that exact language of I feel like I'm just getting through the day and every day is just about survival.
03:36
And this podcast is where you come to have an experience of seeing life through fresh eyes and where, all of a sudden, that bowl of apples on your dining room table doesn't go unnoticed at golden hour, when the honey delight is illuminating their ripeness and perhaps the fecund aroma of the fresh autumnal apple blesses your nostrils with its fragrance of fertility. Oh man, I love having a place where I could just really riff on how much I love the kaleidoscope of sensual pleasure that is opened when we slow down and come to our senses, and it's so interesting to me that the simplicity of pleasure and presence, which are our birthright, are often these luxuries that we have to remember or that we have to practice In an overmasculinized world, which is something that causes suffering for all of us. The virtues of productivity, rigidity and achievement are placed in the center of our value system by default, and a renaissance is just simply another word for a rebirth, a fresh start, a new chapter, a chapter where, rather than being programmed by autopilot, you come to your senses, in other words, regain consciousness and regain agency in what you choose to center in your life. And so to support you in that, over the next several weeks we are going to be exploring how to center the body, not just in what you do, because you might already be doing lots to care for your body through exercise or meditating or breathwork or all sorts of things, but I know that, just like everything else, once again in the structure of an overmasculinized model. It's really common for even our self-care to feel rigid and mechanical and obligatory, and so we're certainly going to talk about ways to center the body in action. But even more than what you do, what we'll be centering is your body's knowings, its intuitions, its subtle signals of what it needs and what it wants, so that you can experience less of that automatic override and more of a sense of harmony and union with the fullness of your being.
06:55
And so, as we know, a renaissance is a time period. It's not something that happens overnight. The Italian renaissance was a period of two centuries, and so, while I could talk about this topic for two centuries, really, today's episode is an introduction and an invitation to what we're going to be exploring over the next few weeks, which is the six phases of a feminine, embodied renaissance, so that you can create a relationship with more reverence, rapture and ravishment with your body. And because we learn through information but we embody through experience, I am very pleased to present that on Tuesday, october 24th, I am going to be hosting a free live event called A Renaissance of the Body. This event is happening on Zoom, so you can join from anywhere in the world. You can learn more about it if you go to the link below this episode, which is schoolofsensuallivingcom.
08:24
One of the things I am most excited about this event that I think is so unique and something I so deeply cherish about my work and the lineage of my work, is the unique way that we come home to the body through beauty. So there are a lot of ways, thank goodness, a lot of ways to learn and practice how to become more embodied. And if you are someone who comes alive in the presence of art and whose nervous system instantly resets when you walk into a room lit by candlelight, if live jazz is your form of meditation. If you feel like you see the face of God just as much in a burlesque club where you see a burlesque dancer performing and doing a striptease of the soul on stage, if that shows you the face of God just as much as something that you might see in a traditional house of worship or temple, or even more so, this event was designed for you exactly. You are my person, I am your person. Let us indulge in the ways that our souls intertwine at this very special evening of body celebration and casting a spell through the senses. So once again, if you go to schoolofsensuallivingcom, you can claim your free emerald velvet covered seat.
10:12
And the last thing that I want to share is a quote from one of my mentors, jenna Ward, who says that most of us are living 90% of our lives from only 10% of our body, from the neck up. Our minds are amazing at compartmentalizing, projecting the future, analyzing the past, rationalizing, list making. These are the gifts of the mind, and when those gifts are offered in service to our full system of intelligence and our full being, our mind and our body really work together very harmoniously. But when we live primarily from the mind, it's kind of like when a muscle becomes overly dominant and so we get this pendulum swing over to these gnarly I'm thinking of like a veiny, just ripped muscle that you know looks a bit out of place on a body where the other muscles aren't developed and where there's a calcification in the way that the mind projects. So we start to see things only in binaries, black or white thinking, catastrophic thinking, overthinking, over analysis, projections about ourselves and others based on the past, perfectionism in order to secure a sense of belonging, and when this happens we miss out on so much, and so I am so delighted to be introducing you to this journey that we will be going on for the next few weeks. That creates a sanctuary where your body can just breathe, where the pressure to perform and to please and to produce can start to fall away, as your body and when I say your body, I don't just mean your physical body, although that's really the mainframe to use the language of technology the mainframe of our spirit and of our soul's experience here on earth but what I'm really talking about is our full being, where all of your energy gets called back into the fullness of your body and where your flesh and your divinity are melded together like a flame and candle wax. That is what we're going to be creating together as we walk through the six phases of a feminine body renaissance and I'm going to share them with you right now as a bit of a teaser, but also to kind of place a name card at the table in these different corners of your mind, so that, as we explore over the next several weeks, you'll have these chairs already laid out and you can see the fullness of the experience before we dive into each individually.
13:40
And where did these six phases come from? Well, I am someone who has had an absolute renaissance in how I relate to my body, and I have been working in the embodied arts. I've really devoted my life, my professional life, to these various expressions of the embodied arts over the last 22 years, and so in my own personal journey of going from carrying so much shame about my body it was difficult to even undress to take a shower and feeling so incredibly disconnected and like my body was an adversary and going on a really, really thorough journey of walking home and spiraling that labyrinth back inward towards myself as it relates to my body that's one component of what's fueled these stages is my own personal experience of what is necessary to have a rebirth in our relationship to our bodies. Also, watching clients in the various disciplines that I have practiced in, which include coaching, teaching, movement, being a licensed spa and body work therapist style, facilitating over 15 embodiment retreats around the world. There are these six main themes that I have seen emerge across the journey of a woman's return to her body, and so, for our gems, today I'm going to share these six phases with you, which are taking the body as beloved.
15:38
That is phase one. Phase two is sacred indulgence expanding and nurturing your capacity for pleasure and heartfelt hedonism. Phase three is blessing your body through the joy of beauty. Phase four is embracing and embodying the feminine sensual arts. Phase five is learning how to adorn your body through signature, soulful style. And phase six is cultivating your circle of savants, finding and cultivating deep connection in your friendships and relationships. So I hope you enjoy that tray of canapes that is laid out for you as a little teaser before we indulge in the main meal. Over the next few weeks, and if you are ready for the full feast, head to schoolofsensuallivingcom/ body and join us for a renaissance of the body on October 24th. It will be recorded if you can't make it live. Thank you so much for listening. I am so excited to dive into this journey with you in the next coming weeks and I will see you in our next episode. Ciao.
Earlier this week I announced my exciting new Met Ball of an event called Renaissance of The Body, where I'll be sharing with you the my six phase approach to a feminine, embodied Renaissance.
We're kicking it off with a sneak preview in today's brand new episode.
A Feminine Renaissance is…
A fresh start in how you honor the needs, wants and wisdom of your body.
Seeing your body’s limitless beauty through fresh eyes.
A devotion to the radiance that emanates from within yourself, and withdrawing from toxic teachings that fear the feminine form.
A rebirth of beauty, and its power to satisfy the hunger of the feminine soul.
Sound like something you'd like a slice of?
Today’s episode is a special one, hit play and let’s feast.
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