Embracing the Nature of Being

What is your true nature on the spectrum of productivity and stillness? There are the people who are doers. They like to get things done in an efficient way. They are successful, motivated, and driven. No time is wasted, they are creating projects and have projects waiting to be created. They always have plans for the weekend, their calendars are full. Then there are, what I will call the be-ers. Those of us who like to sit next to the window, wrapped in a soft plush blanket, and watch the rainfall for hours. We get lost in our imaginations and could watch the breeze move the leaves on the trees for the entire afternoon. This is my story of embracing the be-er and what that means for me.

Today is the second day of my spring cycle, the follicular phase when estrogen levels begin to rise. I woke up feeling ready to return to my morning walks in this birth of a new cycle. On the walk, I felt joy watching the cormorants wake up and stretch their wings, the bright green parakeets fly overhead squawking, and the monkeys howl like lions. I felt alive and awake. When I came back home I had a few client calls and then went for a swim. I wondered what I would blog about today and noticed a feeling of slight overwhelm by this goal of posting every day and starting a new podcast. Then I realized, I don’t want to do anything. That is just me. I am a be-er rather than a do-er.

I talked with one of my clients this morning about my love of being in the sensations of the body. She told me about her busy life and how she always feels like she needs to be doing something. I know a lot of people like this. My mom is a doer and almost all of my closest friends are doers. I think the reason why I attract these women is that they go out and do things, so they find me. All of my friends who are be-ers are at home enjoying being with themselves. They don’t go out much. They are sensitive and they feel a lot, so they need a lot of downtime. They are self-care Queens. That is me and it took me years to come to terms with it.

I never fit into our culture in the United States but I tried. It is competitive, busy, and worth is based on what you can produce and how much money you have. It is a culture of scarcity. There is always more to do and never enough time. For me, this led to deep shame and unworthiness because I could never measure up and I didn’t want to. Someone like me, who likes to be, is considered lazy by some people’s standards. When I became a massage therapist and began to do my work to feel my body intentionally, I realized how only focusing on doing can be detrimental to a person’s health, relationships, and self-esteem.

When we are only focused on doing, we miss out on feeling our feelings. We miss out on feeling the feelings of our loved ones. We get sick because we don’t have the skills to listen to our body's messages. We question our intuition and find ourselves making mistake after mistake and then searching for the right self-talk language to support us through these painful processes. Self-talk is extremely important, but we also have to learn the language of the body so that we can act from the heart rather than from a well-thought-out plan that we still end up feeling unsure of. And then always wondering, what if.

As I continued in my work to love and accept myself deeply while enjoying the sensations in my body, I embraced my nature of being. I have the gift of being able to feel my body rather easily from the inside. As a gymnast, I came to the sport with natural talent. I had impeccable body awareness making it easier for me to learn difficult skills. I never had any major injuries because I knew when to stop and I didn’t push my body to the limit. I didn’t realize I was listening, I just did what I felt.

So I come to this topic knowing it is easier for me to feel. But it hasn’t all been easy. I had to learn how to feel my feelings and emotions and then process them. Anger would fly out of me from 0 to 80. I could become violent at the drop of a hat, and used substances to cope. Crying didn’t come easy, or at all. I had to learn how to cry by finding tools to open my heart’s vulnerability. My all-time favorite, which works every time is Disney. I am a sucker for those modern-day kids' movies. My favorites are Raya and the Last Dragon and Coco. Seriously, I just love them, they bring me the greatest tears of joy.

But let’s get back to the point. There is no right or wrong way to live. Maybe you are a doer and are incredibly successful but are sick of being in your masculine and are aching to be held and felt in your feminine. Or maybe you are be-er, enjoying the moments of your imagination, the warmth of your comfortable home, and the presence you feel when the rain begins to fall. But you know you need a little more of a push to go exercise and move your body, or go out on a date, or do a little more to get your business flowing. We are all making our way back to the middle, to that balance of having a little bit of both.

Now I am working my way back to the middle towards doing more for my business, my clients, my nonclients, and potential clients. But the outlook is rooted in the feminine. I explore the balance between the two by being while creating. I ask myself, what can be created from the heart and offered to the world? In this way, I can continue to embrace my being, while going deeper into creativity. To be clear, I am not saying that there is anything wrong with being a doer, the emphasis is on continuing to embrace my true nature and loving what is.

So for the reader, I ask you, which category do you fit into and how can you embrace your true nature while also going deeper to find the balance between the two?