I’ve been working with an acupuncturist (the super talented Emily Greenstein of Greenstein Acupuncture and Wellness) to address a few nagging physical things—a randomly arthritic right big toe, a 40-plus-year-old gymnastics injury, some shoulder pain. It is so old-person-sounding when I see it on paper. In any case, as I was putting back on my shoes and socks after a recent appointment, Emily asked, as she always does, “How do you feel”? I thought for a minute, trying to figure out both what I felt and how to describe it. “Great. The last two minutes, I relaxed, but instead of that floaty heading toward sleep kind of relaxed, it felt like an energized relaxed.” “Hmm,” mused Emily, “kind of like your body relaxed into a foundational energy.” “Yes,” I replied, “exactly like that.”
This reminds me of something our drumming teacher does to demonstrate the importance of relaxing and breathing, which it seems he is almost always begging us to do. He drops his relaxed hand onto the surface of his drum—or one of ours as if to prove that it isn't the drum that makes the difference—to let us hear the sound that makes compared to when one of us hits the drum. The pantomime that goes along with this is hilariously, embarrassingly, and accurately stiff and concerted. The hit results in something that sounds tinny, flat, and almost cursory, while the drop makes a rich, reverberating sound you can feel in your body across the room. The dropped hand is a conduit for rather than a creator of sound, and you can hear and feel the difference.
My associations with relaxing are almost the exact opposite of that. I don't like naps and hot tubs make me feel sleepy to the point of slightly sick delirium. The idea of relaxing—grip, effort, muscles—as a way of accessing energy is new, and I am intrigued. I'm starting to notice when I'm hitting and trying out dropping. In the grocery store. On the Peloton. At my desk. Even in conversation. It's a pretty fun game, and so far, nothing terrible has happened. Maybe you want to try playing too?
xo Jill