our bodies: experts at letting go…7-5-22
Now I’ve been all about letting go lately…more about that later. So it was fitting for my teaching to focus on our organs of elimination: kidneys and bladder. In case you don’t know, we systematically roam all around the body in Roll, Release, Align. Fascination on a different anatomical region week by week. Shoulder’s up next. There’s a lot of talk talk talk about embodiment. This weekly approach brings it home at the most fundamental level.
Anyway, did you know your bladder is so incredibly expert at letting go that it can completely rule your day to day world? Here’s just one indication you are an unwitting slave to your bladder: is your habit to enter unknown territory and quickly locate the nearest bathroom? If I’ve captured your attention, listen up, I’ll share two simple urinary norms.
First norm: if your fluid intake is optimal—# of ounces equal to ½ your body weight—you will need to pee 5-8 times in 24 hours. It actually takes 3-4 hours for bladder to fill, but this tricky beast signals fullness at quarter tank. Hmmm.
Second norm, so easy to check: it takes 15-30 seconds for a full bladder to empty. A 10 second dribble is a slavery indication.
Pretty easy to ascertain if you fall in the range of normal. If not and you’d like to reclaim some freedom, I have physical therapy skills to assist you with that. It can be a life-changer.
These bodies. Oh my. They can be such metaphors. Wouldn’t you know this bladder fascination arose concurrent with a personal episode of letting go. I hear you. Many of you have experienced the incredible post-death duty of emptying a home. My mother-in-law lived in the same home for 56 years. Family has been sorting through a very long lifetime of memories. Random correspondence, check registers, cards, house repair bills, community service awards…all boxed willy-nilly. Collectibles of butterflies and peacocks and southwest art. Ancient magazine stacks and leather dusty books. I’ll stop with the details. All six kids and families pitched in to complete this heart-wrenching work. Hubby and I did three intense days deciding what to dump, what to give away, what to keep. Over and over and over. The house stands empty and ready to sell.
But that was not the end of this letting go saga. I came home, looked askance at my own home of forty years and could not imagine my children facing this daunting task. We have already taken three big loads to dumpster/Goodwill. There is more to go. The sense of release, of lightness, of freedom…it runs satisfyingly deep. I don’t have any intention of leaving the planet soon, but when I go, I want it to feel like I’m just slipping out. Unfettered. Free. Airy. Spacious. Empty. I still long for more but I want it in the shape of experience, love, learning, connection, wisdom. Not stuff.
Back to LA for the memorial service and then off to Esalen to assist Lucia Horan with Resource and Renew (full up). This is a fact: every day your body automatically releases everything it does not need. Feel in…what are you letting go of? Why? When you actually let go, what is the sensation, the emotion, the meaning on the other side of that release?
We don’t have to do it alone. Always so nourishing when we let go together….❤️Bella