The scene: A spiritual retreat in Longmont, CO.
I sat in a room with twenty-one other women, propped up comfortably on a meditation pillow. Feeling particularly tender from the experience of the last two days, I’d intentionally positioned myself in front of the shared living altar we all created the night before. You know, to soak up some extra Divine juju.
The woman leading the current exercise asked to speak to the various voices of our psyches. Fear, Lack, Abundance, Protector, Controller. It was really interesting to tune into my own voices and to hear the expression of others.
Then she asked to speak to the voice of Ecstasy.
Throughout the exercise as we all shared, we had each remained seated.
My voice of Ecstasy didn’t want to sit.
I rose and let her speak,
“I’m really tired of being oppressed in Liz’s life and more collectively in the world. Liz’s friend Amber said something to her a few months ago that blew her mind. She said, ‘How good can you take it?’ And that’s when Liz realized, ‘Holy hell, I can take it reallly good, I just don’t let myself all the time.’
Soooo, I’m [Ecstasy] really fun and I’m really sensual, and I have a lot of purpose and power in Liz’s life and her work and also in her relationships with people, and it’s annoying that the world I have to operate in is really conditioned to not embrace me. So I feel like I have a big job BUT I know I can handle it.
That Fear voice sometimes is like, ‘Yo, calm down ecstasy because people can’t handle you.’ So I want to be friends with the Trust voice. I think I’m actually the real medicine. I feel like all the other voices today, they just need some of my lovin.”
So my dear women, this is my commitment to you. To trust my voice of Ecstasy. To live and lead from this place.
I will certainly not be perfect at it and making this declaration makes me nervous. Tummy rumbling-type nervous. But I’m going to water this garden like its seeds are the last living nourishment on earth and you are invited to join me.
We have the power to reconfigure culture. @LizDiAlto (Click to Tweet!)
We can take self-sacrifice off the pedestal it’s been wrongfully occupying for way too long.
As I daydream about this, here are the questions running wild in my imagination…
“What if we allow ourselves to pop the lid off our ecstasy containers?”
“What if we allow ourselves to experience the deep nourishment of satisfaction?”
I’ll leave you with a little prayer to invoke this new way of being should you feel called:
“Holy Mother, Father God,
Let us commit to unbounded ecstasy.
Help us lay down our shields crafted from duty, obligation, fear, guilt, and
lack.
Open our hearts to the healing power of joy, love and fulfillment.
Fill us with trust for our instincts, desires, and feminine wisdom.
And when the critics come or belief waivers, give us the faith to
remember that our satisfaction serves all beings.
Thank you, I love you.
Amen and so it is.”
If Danielle LaPorte and Shakira had a love-child with Mae West, it’d be Liz DiAlto. Liz is a speaker, writer and the creator of Wild Soul Movement, a sensual practice in self-discovery that combines movement, mantra, and meditation. Her mission is to revolutionize the way women move and nourish their bodies and abolish current body image culture to create new standards for her peers, elders, young women and little girls. Liz works with large groups of women virtually through her 12 week Wild Soul Movement experience, and more intimately through her Wild Soul Circle and 1:1 sessions. For fun and connection to a global community of Wild Soul women, search Facebook or Instagram for #ishineyoushine and #wildsoulwednesday. You can also join her private women-only Facebook group, The Soul Movement Salon.
Image courtesy of Catherine Just via Danielle LaPorte.
