Hey Care Bears,
Inside you’ll find a flowy playlist to inspire Dreamweaver dancing, movement & journal prompts, tarot suggestions, some thoughts on being dreamers in a toxic culture, and a ‘lil love.
Dreams Langston Hughes
Hold fast to dreams For if dreams die Life is a broken-winged bird That cannot fly. Hold fast to dreams For when dreams go Life is a barren field Frozen with snow.
It isn’t easy, being a dreamer. I think we’re all born with the capacity to dream big, it’s part of our unstained essence. But sometimes life happens. Sometimes culture toxicity happens. Sometimes the winds are too turbulent, too violent to sustain our inner flame. The torch of possibility, hoisted by a staff of self-worth, can be broken, stamped to ashes, or never wielded at all.
It’s ironic, really, growing up with this narrative of the “American Dream,” when it is that very culture that blatantly tells so many of us—“you’re not worthy of that dream.”
For women, for people of color, disabled people, Queer people, people of lower economic status, this toxic culture systematically tells us we’re not enough. It doesn’t make space — literally and figuratively — for our dreams to flourish. When it tells us, we don’t have control over our bodies, it squashes our dreams. When it makes spaces physically inaccessible to us, it squashes our dreams. When it pays us less than the white guy in the same role, it squashes our dreams. When it tells us we have to fit into one box — just pick one, it squashes our dreams.
My dance dreams had vanished, within my mind, after acquiring my disability. I went so far as to completely dismiss the idea of ever being a dancer again, and I can’t blame myself, or my disability. But rather it speaks to ableism within our culture. Ableism that I internalized and let dictate what dancing and choreographing meant to me. And how dreaming could still apply to me. It dampened my self-worth, extinguishing possibility.
Not only that, but receiving government assistance means making oneself smaller to receive the help needed to survive. You can’t make too much money, or they’ll pull the rug out from under you. It’s so clear that these government assistance programs were designed, so long ago, by people who didn’t understand the life experience they were trying to serve. It was service without heart, which isn’t service at all, it’s business.
And what happens then? We have a system that doesn’t see people with disabilities, or whoever they’re “serving”, as human beings, capable of contributing, and especially not as people capable of dreaming.
This is why we have to keep dreaming. So that we are the ones changing the system for our collective well-being. But mostly, we have to keep dreaming for ourselves. To keep the flame inside of us alive, and to light others’ along the way.
Dreaming is not just for the wealthy, the privileged, the lucky ones. We’re not worthy because we check certain boxes or fit into a certain mold, we just innately are. Dreaming is for all of us. It’s for YOU. Maybe you think your dreams are too crazy.
But maybe they’re not.
Maybe you are worthy of chasing your dreams, or rather, running with them. Dreaming isn’t something you do in spite of what you’ve been through, it’s something you do because of it.
Because of who it’s made you and what it’s taught you.
March Embodied Healing Guidebook
I’m sorry this is going out a little late! I’m still finding my rhythm here, and I appreciate any patience and grace.
This month I wanted to give you some ways to embody the idea of listening to our dreams and their symbolism, and also reaching for our dreams in our waking life—making our dreams come true, dammit.
This month, in the Embodied Healing Guidebook, you’ll get…
Journal prompts for dreaming bigger and understanding our hangups
Tarot suggestions for retrieving messages, listening more deeply to yourself and making your dreams come true.
Ideas on giving ourselves moments of prayer
A flowy, Dreamweaver playlist
And of course, MOVEMENT cues for understanding the way our bodies suppress, allow and foster dreams
Become a monthly subscriber to get these Embodied Healing guides, and go deeper for yourself on your healing journey.
xoxo
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