By the stars

The past twenty months have been strange, frightening and upsetting. People the world over have been forced to adjust their lives to the unwavering tide of change that the pandemic has brought.

And the circle of life continues to just be. Moving and meandering as it always has and always will. Shifting one person forards and wrenching another back. Giving and taking. Always in motion.

My response to all this change was to move my body. Somewhere beyond the grief and fear, I listened to an innate call for movement. I had never been called before.

One YouTube exercise video turned into three exercise videos a week. Months passed in a cloud of uncertainty and movement was my anchor. In those 45 minute sessions I was strong and focused, taking the day one rep at a time.

With practice I was able to move with fluidity and precision. Month by month I sought progress instead of the punishing need for perfection that clouds other areas of my life.

These daily sessions were me spending time with myself. Learning that the limitations I’d placed on my body for all of my life, were wrong. All those PE classes I’d spent in a hole of shame and anxiety. All those wasted hours crying in the toilets at school, fearful of opening the door to yet another bully. All because I equated weight to ability - and even more dangerous - to worth.

Standing in front of a laptop, counting reps with the trainer, I thought I was training my body but now I can see that I was coaching my mind too.

My days became peppered with tiny moments I’d never experienced before.

I began to enter rooms with my shoulders square instead of hunched up towards my ears. I moved through the air with an intention, an awareness of where my body started and ended. After a stressful day, I’d pound the pavements and reach a personal best instead of ruminating indoors and numbing with Netflix.

Before I’d existed only in my own head. I knew I had a body but I Didn’t Talk About It. I chose silence over words and stillness over movement, believing that no one needed to see this. No one needed to see me as I was.

I placed a great importance on thoughts and would intellectualise before feeling anything.

I understand now that i was almost disassociated from my own body, my brain’s way of keeping me safe through a challenging childhood. Useful in the moment but unhelpful if used as a default way of living as I had done. And this had led to a disconnect with my body.

Each workout was an opportunity to reconnect with my body, t check in with how I was feeling. To bring body and mind together.

Every rep was a marker in this new map I held that I didn’t realise I’d always had within me.

Instead of navigating life by the (imagined and real) opinions of others, within the narrow and invisible boundaries around my mind, I realise that at last, I’m exploring life by the light of my own stars. The stars that hang on my night sky.

They are different to the stars in your sky, but they are all unique to who we are and to what we need.