Soul Therapy

Bringing our actions and our true self into alignment

“Dancers In Blue, 1890 “ by Edgar Degas

Hello Readers!

I’m so happy to turn the calendar page to May. Are you? Our garden is just beginning to show off her potential, and the tight-fisted peony buds will bloom, like spring magic, right around Sophie’s birthday. One of my favorite May rhythms is cutting a handful of huge, cotton candy peony blooms for her bedroom, in the same ruffled edges and rosy shades my mother-in-law brought to me when I gave birth to Sophie.

The past few weeks have been exceptionally busy with good things, but I’ve noticed I’m retreating into my phone and social media a lot in the evening as an escape. I only read one book in April. One. I’m trying not to judge myself for it and simply noticing this pattern of retreat.

One of the first things to disappear during acute grief and suffering is the energy to DO. Hormonal changes at midlife can destroy what little we have in reserve. The mental energy it takes to hold it together or to feel safe enough to fall apart is exhausting. And yet, so many of us live here for years, trying to heal while life keeps coming at us.

Have you noticed this energy drain when life is hard for you?

As I’ve crossed the borderlands into greater healing, I’ve felt such euphoria at (some of) my energy returning that I find myself saying yes—perhaps more often than I should be.

Busyness is not my general state of being. I need a lot of time for quiet, contemplation, reading, writing, prayer, and dilly-dallying outside. I never felt ashamed of this when I was younger, but over time it has become a source of shame when I can’t rally and inertia becomes my only state of being. It’s a strange thing when deep pain causes one’s normal rhythm of life to mutate into something negative. Slow became less of a healthy rhythm of life for this artist’s soul, and more like being trapped in a jar of molasses. In some ways, I began to hate this part of my life—I hated the energy drain, the inability to move, to run, to work, to take purposeful action, to participate.

The past few years, between trauma recovery and recovering from a bizarre compilation of physical injuries, I focused a lot on healthy movement. Movement is medicine, and I’m living proof. But with my energies directed towards healing my body, my soul waited at the end of the queue for the energy leftovers. There wasn’t much left most of the time. Hence the endless scrolling on so many evenings.

Can you relate?

You’ve probably had seasons of life where one part of you stays stuck because another part requires an intervention. We’re all just spinning plates, and sometimes the soul care or the physical care or the relational care is the plate that falls and shatters.

When I talked to my spiritual director about this emerging pattern of denying myself the time and energy needed to do the deeper artistic work that calls to me, she said it’s time for me to engage in Soul Therapy. She suggested I treat it like Physical Therapy with regular weekly appointments with myself (this sounds suspiciously like an Artist Date) and small daily practices that honor my need to be, to think, to make.

When I choose scrolling and over-consumption of media, I’m not honoring my essential self. Soul Therapy is how I affirm my true self and bring my actions into alignment with my being. It seems simple, but I know it won’t be. Just like Physical Therapy, it’s a commitment to healing that requires a lot of intention and trust. It’s a dance where there are no giant leaps across the stage, but rather the tiny, fluttering motion of a ballerina en pointe.

A ballet instructor once said training dancers to be en pointe “is not a yes or no decision. It’s a process.” Soul therapy is a process. It is training our souls to receive what they long for—in my case it’s alignment with my deepest artistic needs. For you it may be something entirely different; perhaps you need more activity, more purposeful work, more connection, more experiences, more stimulation. Maybe, like me, you just need to curl up with a good book.

This year, I’ve been focused on taking purposeful action. This is right and good for this season, but my soul is asking for equilibrium, for doing AND being.

I’m finally listening.

A Reflective Practice

Make a list of actions, behaviors, or ways of being that feel like Soul Therapy to you.

If you get stuck, return to what made you come alive in childhood. What made you feel most like yourself?

This week, bring one of these activities/ways of being back into your life.

Look at your list and choose one thing that feels approachable and doable in your current life season, and challenge yourself to do it at least once within a week’s time.

Pay attention to how you feel in the moment and afterwards.

Did you notice resistance? Joy? Guilt? Increased energy?

What small step could you take to keep moving forward in Soul Therapy?