Finding Ground

I’m drenched in tears as I stand in the gray carpeted room where we had just finished the first onsite training for somatic touch therapy. “Goodbyes are so hard for me,” I manage to say to a friend in between sobs.

Sensing people leave bring up so much pain for my body.

As a young child, I’ve been taken from one home to another to stay with relatives, and even strangers, so my single mom could work. Where and how I grew up back in that time (working class Manila in the late 80s to early 90s), adults didn’t really talk to kids like they could understand, so it makes sense that I have no memory of properly being told why or for how long I would be at these places, and I only have memories of being left there but never of anyone returning to come take me home.

My body must have learned that when people leave, I never really know if they were coming back at all.

I can clearly and easily recall the numbing sensations of fear and confusion that my body recorded from these experiences. They’d make me feel like my body is just holding itself in space with no ground underneath my feet. Interestingly, they’re the same sensations I feel when I get stuck in my creative process or when I’m faced with challenging social situations.

They’re the same sensations that, if I’m not feeling resourced or if I’m unable to remain anchored in difficult moments, make me avoid.

I personally hate how we as a society currently shrink our understanding of relationships into mechanical perspectives about attachment theory, but that’s a topic for a different time (reply to let me know if you’re into it!) and today, I’m feeling like writing a love letter to my avoidant.

After three people I’ve dated in my polyamorous life chose to disappear abruptly, or in other words, ghosted in different ways (last count at the time of this writing at least), I have: 1) confirmed that a lack of response can register as physical pain in the body; and 2) noticed that the avoidant in me is kicking and screaming to be seen.

If there’s anything that my shadow work (plus my five Scorpio placements in my house of intimate relationships) has made clear to me, it’s that we are all mirrors for each other.

As my former mentor and dear friend Allyson Byrd would say, “in this world, we can only truly see ourselves.”

So when all these intimate relationships in my life presented glaring elements of avoidance, I knew it was time to turn my gaze inward.

What did I realize? I’m a ghoster too. Yup. Big time.

I've ghosted a friend in my early adolescence soon after they so bravely shared with me that they have a crush on me AND that they had just been ghosted by another friend whom they admitted their feelings toward. Terrible, I know.

I’ve ghosted a friend whom I had a hard time setting boundaries with.

Most of all, I’ve ghosted myself. And I’ve done it over and over and over.

I’ve ghosted myself repeatedly with my plans to drink more water and to work on my sleep habits. I’ve ghosted myself in learning and creative projects, leaving a graveyard of online courses and untouched craft tools. And the longest ghosting dance of all — I’ve ghosted myself in the many work projects that I’ve rushed into a little too raw and then chose to abandon. I even ghosted this Substack for months!

Listen, I know I’m exaggerating here, but the point of this isn’t at all to make myself or anyone wrong.

I remember being on the subway one day and wanting to be present but I notice my attention slowly drift away, and I couldn’t really hold on to it even if I tried. I was about to go into self-judgment until I realized how much stimulus was hitting me all at once — the noise of the people around, the announcements from the train operator, a million fucking ads plastered on the walls — of course my system would shut down and try to protect me from all of it!

That’s my long way of saying that our system will do what it needs to do to keep us safe. We’ve already heard this many times in different ways, but it’s a lesson worth repeating until our understanding of it gets etched into our bones and we truly learn to give ourselves grace for it.

More than simply advocating for self-compassion, giving the avoidant part of us grace is what will truly heal it.

The paradox of healing is that the moment we embrace rather than resist a quality that we’re trying to move away from is when the change actually happens.

And yes, there’s more nuance to be explored about what embracing looks like and all that but here’s what I invite you to take with you: from the POV of our internal landscape, there’s no such thing as self sabotage, every part of us, even those with outdated thoughts and beliefs, just want us to be okay.

The parts of us that hold patterns, which no longer serve us just need to be met and understood in how they’re trying to take care of us so we can co-create a new plan that is in resonance with versions of ourselves that we are wanting to become.

If that feels like a lot, just start with curiosity.

It was, after all, being curious about my avoidant through what was being reflected to me by others that led me to a path of finally being able to show them enough grace for them to find that there can be ground underneath their feet.

In fact, my avoidant and I have now learned to work intimately together, and I’m grateful and proud to say that today I finally revealed to the world a project that’s close to my heart, which I’ve been holding back from for years.

So, there’s really no other way to end this but to say — thank you, my dear avoidant. The depth of your medicine has made my work and my life so much richer.

Image credit: Thais Aquino
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