In the past four stepping stones to you, we have talked about “how we think about our bodies” and how our present thoughts and words of the past can have an incredibly huge effect on how safe, how loved and how beautiful we feel in our own skin.

Hopefully by following the stepping stones, you have seen the effects of how simply by changing our mind about ourselves, our bodies and our lives and releasing old beliefs, we start to feel happier and more empowered.

In these “Stepping stones To You”, I am sharing with you my own process from mass self destruction to self love…

Guiding you through doorways to making “peace” with your body.

So this week, seeing as you are all in full flow with releasing negative interjects and filling your lives with loving words, I would like to move onto the next stepping stone…

Movement.    

You see it is one thing to have lived in this body for 40 years but another to know how to drive it, how it likes to move …what it feels is punishment and what it feels is pleasure.

Before we feel completely safe and at ease driving a car, we have to have driven it around the block, into town and back a few times and maybe a trip or two on the motorway. We become one with the car, know how far to push it… we know its limits, its character, its funny little ways, what it likes and what makes it conk out on us.

Your body is no different.

Feeling safe in your own skin, is to know your body, to move with and in it, to nourish, honour and cherish your body, take pleasure and pride in “owning” it …yes, just like that battered old car outside that you are so very proud of and your heart bursts every time you get behind the wheel and take it for a drive… singing with a contented heart.

Now I discovered that my body loved to move in the same way as my spirit, I was not into fast pace sports, I have never wanted a sports car :) I was not into punishing my body taking it to the extreme and getting all sweaty… movement for me had to be well full of childish freedom and fun!                                                                                                                                                               

So I took up hula hoop classes.

Boy, was this great… my own glittery, sparkly whiryly twirly ever so girly hoop!  Not only did it look pretty and felt sexy but after practice, I “got in touch” with my sacral in soft sensual ways, it healed and opened a most essential part of being a woman. And just as a little bonus toned my tummy and bum :)

I tried out different yoga styles, until I found the one that suited me … not a practice simply for the body but a yoga that embraced my mind and spirit too.  My body shape changed as parts for the first time became free.  I felt whole, balanced and focused.

I tried out different dance classes but being a bit clumsy after 38 years of rejecting my imaginary fat thighs, this proved more tough… until I found Nia, a fusion of dance, yoga and martial arts, with some choreography but oodles of yummy free dance…

A perfect opportunity to listen to my body and move it at it’s will, not another’s or mine :)

My body started to soften, trust me… relax.

Really show me what it could do and wanted to do for me.

It became no longer an alien place to live but a sacred home.                   

Sometimes a certain “move” would have a message, a memory stored, an old pain and then just as the movement flowed so too would healing and my body would breathe in a new way…invite me into deeper places.

I no longer felt on the edge of my body looking in but deeply rooted.

This was surprisingly the safest I had ever felt in my life and yet for so long this was the one place I refused to be.

The thing is the gym may make a body look firm and toned but a hard cold leather chair isn’t for everyone, personally I prefer to relax in a chair that will hold me no matter how much I wiggle, every position feeling safe, comfortable.  I want to know every contour, every crease and story of that chair and for it to let me explore it.

I think the key for me was wanting so much to feel I belonged and I knew belonging in my body was the major step required.

For too long I had punished it. I wanted to explore pleasure with my body, so I looked at ways to move it, that were exciting to me, lit up that “light” in me and made me sparkle … most of these things turned out to be what I loved as a child … dancing barefoot, twirling with a hoop, skating, walking on the cool sands.

All allowing natural, soft movements full of joy.

My question to you this week is…

What movements bring your body, your mind, your soul… oh and very importantly the “child within” pleasure and joy. 

The answers to this question, will be the key to the door you are looking for :)