Athletes are tough. The mind, body, heart connection is crucial for sports. You have to understand when to ignore a flaming chest or a mind screaming you can't do this when you know you can. You have to know when to ease up even if it looks like others are passing you so you'll have the right energy at the right time. You have to know how to read the room, notice small cues, and know when to hand off to a teammate. You must understand recovery time, what muscles need, and how to fuel yourself in the off-season. You get to practice winning and losing, fighting and laughing with others. You suffer through people being mean to you, not caring about you, making fun of you, and bouncing back every time. It's the perfect training ground for life. And if you're really good but not good enough to play professionally, then you also don't feel very entitled to things. (Story of my life.)
My early years at the YMCA and all my school years are filled with happy memories of coaches and friends. Hitting the water for swim practice at 6 am, assembly line showers before school, and weights in the afternoons. Traveling on weekends for an indoor soccer league, running the track begrudgingly, and extra practices at the rec center where my coach would pound me (the goalie) with two racquetballs at once. By the time I became a rower in college for two years, I felt prepared for the training schedule. Our coach was a former Olympian who did not come to play games. Until the birth of my second son, I stuck with weight training, pilates, and yoga because it felt like home to me.
85% of the time, I'm thankful for that life training, and the other 15%, I'm bummed that it takes me a minute to discern my responsibility (my part) and sit down somewhere. I think you know what I mean. Those moments in life where we think the solution to everything is to go harder and then go harder, so we PUSH PUSH PUSH PUSH PUSH. We read the room wrong, take responsibility for someone else's part, or ignore red flags for too long.
Just a little farther, a little faster, a little more, with no conscious connection to the unraveling edges of life. The cost to our body, peace of mind, and sense of self are harmful.
I'm in a season of slow, as you know. I'm practicing yoga and mindfulness exercises. My body needs something different post-babies and post-lockdown.
Most people I know are exhausted beyond belief, and many women, especially those new to midlife, wonder what in the Sam Hill is going on around here. I'm guessing going hard for the wrong reasons is no longer an option, and I want to encourage you:
Tenderness is precious in a world that requires crudity to survive.
Stay soft.
Perhaps because of my background, God often uses my physical body to teach me spiritual truths. I drove to a small spa in Pasadena for a lymphatic drainage massage on Sunday. The lymphatic system is the unseen hero of the body, fighting infections, and diseases. The vessels exist right under the layer of skin and need breath and muscle contractions to move because this is the only system in our body that doesn't have a pump.
After soaking in the sauna and taking a shower, I parked it on a couch in the waiting room and waited for my therapist. She escorted me down the hallway, asked briefly about my medical history, and explained how the massage works. Then, she showed me how it would feel using light brush strokes. That's when I got nervous. Neighbor, I only had one gift card that I did not want to waste on 80 minutes of light petting.
We started with deep breaths, and then she began the barely-there motions across my face, ears, neck, chest, and arms. I felt my heart open and tingling in my skull as fluid moved through my body. The therapist explained that the lymphatic system is like a thin layer right below the skin, and the way to make lymph move is to lightly brush the skin with the softest motions.
I don't know if it was the fact that I had three hours ALONE or if Aunt Flo was ready to visit or if it was just SPACE TO BREATH that sent tears pouring out of both sides of my eyes, but my girl had to wipe my ears out with a towel.
Soft touch. Not more pressure, but less. Not fast, but slow.
Tenderness heals the body's invisible system; the same is true for the soul. People do not get better when you shout at them to do better. Fear is a powerful motivator: We might muscle up or perform afraid for a time. But it wears off. It does not produce freedom in the soul or restoration in relationships, or miracles in the body. Only grace can do that. It reminds me of that verse, "It is God's kindness that leads to repentance."
Change is born from love.
As I lay on that warm table, vulnerable to a healer, I marveled at how long it's taken me to understand that you can only go hard for so long. There are seasons to go slow, opportunities to resist cruelty, good reasons to stay soft.
Our bodies, hearts, and minds will pay for all the years of going hard. To survive, you may have had to build a steel wall of resentment around your heart. Maybe apathy is the only way you can deal with reality. Maybe pushing your body to carry on and perform felt like the only way to forward.
Armored up might feel like the only way you can live in this world. But I wonder, if this holiday season, you might love yourself enough to move slow. I wonder if you might make space in your heart to let go. Could you find the courage within yourself to stay soft?
You artists and dreamers and creators and mothers and healers and truth-tellers and bridge builders, you, who are brave and kind and true, you owe us nothing, but believe me, your tenderness is everything. Teach us, with your love and vulnerability, how to stay still, to trust, to surrender, to be. Help us stay soft in a world that wants us desensitized and cold.
I know everything hurts but let's hold on to our humanity.
You are not alone.
Love you,
Ash