The more I write and pay attention to my own creative nervous system and mental health, the more I realize that stress and the outside world, including the emotional toll it takes, plays a large role in how much I write, what I write, and when I write. This week is a great example. I’ve been finishing my thesis in preparation for defending it on Friday, and so I’ve put my daytime writing on hold. My evening writing (done after I feed the horses/senior kitties and go into the house at the end of my “work day”), I’ve been able to do, and this week has been more productive than ever. Which is something I’m thankful for.
I’ve been really focusing on my own nervous system lately in preparation for some changes that will happen at the end of this year. I’m not going to sugar coat it, my cPTSD has been really rough lately driven by multiple factors, and that doesn’t help my multiply neurodivergent brain or frankly my writing output. There’s one thing that I’ve really found that helps, and that’s yoga. Specifically I’ve been practicing yoga nidra, which is a practice that prepares one for meditation and is focused on sense withdrawal and body awareness.
Now let me be clear, I’m not shilling any cures or quick fixes here. There are times when the words won’t flow and sometimes getting up and moving, doing a little yoga or walking in nature, helps shake them loose. But also, what yoga does is helps me tune into my body, my self-awareness, so I can feel what’s happening and what may be blocking those words or the writing flow.
To me, both can be spiritual as well as simply mental/physical processes. Writing is as much a part of me as the ways in which I move my body and get in touch with my body. They feed one another; they’re connected to one another. When one is missing in my life, the other suffers, and when both are working together, it can be pretty amazing.
There’s a connection there, a touch of something liminal, a space that isn’t exactly mental/physical/emotional and yet isn’t spiritual either. They both exist as practices which can help us tap into something both inside ourselves as well as larger than ourselves.
When we start to see how everything in our lives moves together, as part of a greater tide, ebbing and flowing, rather than packed into boxes or silos, then it’s possible to see there is a connection between these practices. It’s possible to tap into something beyond ourselves.