All My Flesh Gives Way to Gravity
Dear Rosies,
So it's happening, right on schedule: all of my flesh is giving way to gravity. I'm fascinated watching it pool and rearrange itself in new ways. Do you recognize this in yourself? How do you meet the body through time?
Mine is a healthy body, mostly. Still doing handstands, still doing the splits, can work and play. I am old woman strong, while the nipples and the jawline point down to Mother Earth. I watch it, and think: so it is, being an earthling. And yet these great riverine skinscapes, pulled toward the magnetic center of the planet, are foreign to my eye and self-concept.
In the daily ritual of self care, the microchanges are noticeable. Initially there was a sort of a furious attempt to stop it, to take control, then an acceptance that felt like resignation.
Now it's just: look at that, how curious. See the light and shadow on it, appreciate the way it keeps going, chugging along through joy and sorrow, dancing through this life. Neither in gripping to youth or in refusal of death, but gently releasing the attachment, the way you release a bird. Simply opening, and letting the judgements and desires for it to be different drift off, not arguing with reality.
This body has been so faithful!
I teach and practice a lot of embodiment stuff: breathing, vocalizing, shaking, yoga, energy techniques, to keep the body feeling deeply, intuition online and emotion flowing. At Rosebud we've formulated or crafted products to tend the skin with love: lymph brushing in the mornings to move what needs to move, stirring the slow fluid intelligence of the body into more motion. Gua sha on the fascia of the arms and thighs to manually assist those tiny strings binding the tissues, for greater comfort. Anointing with dry oil (with actives for scar repair and collagen support Anoint Nourishing Body Oil).
When I was writing The Nine Lives of Woman, I followed the full arc of a woman's sensual, sexual, and reproductive life, from birth through 100. In the later chapters, I found abundance in each. Abundance of beauty, sensuality, wisdom, and possibility. The body keeps going. Keeps changing. Keeps becoming.
Let our stories about these bodies (and who we are in our core essence, beyond the body) be spacious and kind, and may we meet gravity with grace.
To your radiant vitality,
Christine
Christine Marie Mason
Founder, Rosebud Woman
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