Spring has finally sprung in Northern California, after the longest and rainiest winter I can remember in the 15 years since I moved west from Michigan. Tyler and I decided to celebrate by waking up yesterday and going for a walk in downtown Sausalito. We got into the car with Lucy, drove to the coffee shop, bought coffee, started walking on the boardwalk overlooking yachts in the harbor and promptly got into a big fat fight.
I’m not going to share the topic of the fight, but lets just say it was as inconsequential as if two people got into a REAL argument on the topic of whether hot dogs are best when topped only with relish vs. without relish and instead the simple ketchup/mustard combo. I’m sure
this fight has happened in the history of fights, but you get the idea. The content of the fight wasn’t the point.
It ruined the walk. Yes, it was beautiful outside, but both of us were steaming.
We came home, talked it out, decided that
being kind is better than being right (
thank you, Dr. Wayne Dyer), hugged and said nice things to each other. It was a genuine ending to the fight. A reset for the day.
But here’s the thing: even though my MIND knew
– great! That’s over and I’m grateful to share my life with a partner with whom I can speak my feelings and listen to his and we can show respect to each other and move on – my BODY could not move on.
I went to work, and even while having pleasant interactions with friends, I had a monologue running in the back of my soul—a crappy monologue that bordered on panic. My heart raced at certain times throughout the day. I felt a sense of dread. My body felt sad and weighed down, like it was carrying a 500-pound shield. I went to yoga and struggled to breathe. Had to get into child’s pose several times throughout the 75-min class to calm myself down. I went on a run afterwards to clear my head, blasted hip hop and found my body wanting to cry.
I started walking. What is my deal? I thought. We had resolved things. I know we love each other. I know we heard each other. Yes, marriage is hard and long-term relationships are hard, but why do I HOLD onto fights when they are resolved? Or, more accurately, why does my BODY hold onto them?
I wasn’t thinking these thoughts consciously at the time, but my body was on the case. I turned off Lil Wayne and switched to listening to the podcast
Don’t Keep Your Day Job. I recently found this podcast, and I really like it for its real conversations with famous (and not-so-famous) people on how to live a life you love. I opened up the app and clicked on the first episode I could find. It was one where
the host, Cathy Heller, was interviewing author Tara Mohr.
I’m familiar with Tara’s work; she’s the author of the hugely popular
Playing Big: Practical Wisdom for Women Who Want to Speak Up, Create, and Lead. She also lives near me and goes to my co-working space (I’ve had a few fan girl moments when I’ve seen her on the way to the bathroom but felt too awkward to say hello for fear I’d say something stupid---WINNING). The pair was talking on the podcast about how women, in particular, struggle to speak their voice. Struggle to speak their truths.
Tara said this is something she sees a ton in her coaching practice and in women who aspire to leadership positions. Even beyond that, she seems women of all types (not just CEO-aspirers) doing this. Dampening themselves. Making themselves, in her words, “smaller.”
But then she said something that made real sense to me. She explained that when women DO speak up, do advocate for themselves, do say THE THING they need to say even if that thing will make people mad or perhaps make others not like them as much, they feel like they are going to die.
To die.
Their bodies feel this. Their minds race. As I write this—hand to GOD—I am feeling this. I’m scared to share this with you. I'm full-on stress-sweating. I’m scared every time I write this newsletter because this is my voice and what if everyone who reads it hates it and thinks I’m an idiot? (I’m tried to quell some of that feedback with the delicate flower disclaimer below, but I’m still scared straight.)
Tara explained that this reaction is completely understandable if you consider how women have been treated for millennia. For most of history, she explained, women haven’t held positions of power. They haven’t been able to vote, they’ve been told what to do, they’ve been incentivized (with compliments/threats) to stay as small as possible—with regard to their bodies (stay skinny or feel like shit!), they’ve been told that when speaking their voice they are “bossy” or “overly assertive” or “a complete bitch” or “stay away from her” or “unapproachable.”
This is very real. There is evidence of all of these fears coming true. Look at the Salem Witch Trials. Look at the death threats to CURRENT politicians
who speak out, like Maxine Waters (and her kick ass response). Look at what happened in the media (and in the Supreme Court) to Dr. Christine Blasey Ford.
When women speak up, when women “play big,” as Tara explained, they are scolded for it. And have been for generations.
Tara’s work is to help women lean into their voices, deal with the negative Nancy’s in their minds (and the greater world) and SHOW UP ANYWAY. The same goes for the podcast host Cathy Heller, who in the same episode explained that she used to feel
physical pain when she thought she was about to disappoint someone. She’s worked on that in therapy, and feels better today than years back, but I appreciated her vulnerability.
I got back to my car after my run feeling more understood. This message made complete sense to me. I am passionately interested in how the experiences of our ancestors—not just parents, but grandparents and 15 generations ago and even before that—impact our experience in this life. Impact our lives right NOW. I talk with people about this concept a few times a week. It seems that many people are equally interested in how trauma from past generations impacts them.
Right now there is a robust conversation in politics on whether or not the government should issue reparations for slavery.
Presidential Candidate Kamala Harris has spoken about how African Americans living TODAY are experiencing, in her words, ‘psychological outcomes,’ from the unprocessed emotions of their ancestors.
There are few things that fascinate me more than this. Think about it in your own life. If we dig deep enough, we are all impacted by these concepts. It’s easy to understand when we think about our parents, how issues they’ve struggled with may be passed down to us (we may parent like they did, etc.). That shit is real and passed down traumas are also real.
And then I’ve wondered why some people have phobias that are unexplainable. I’ll offer Tyler as an example. He has a real fear of heights. He feels scared in his body when he even THINKS of being on a high ledge of some sort. I’ve talked to him about this, and he can’t figure out why he feels this way. He’s never been under threat of falling off a cliff that he can remember. He doesn’t know of an ancestor that had that experience, either.
It makes me wonder if maybe a far off ancestor DID have that experience, and it was passed down to him. You get the concept.
So back to me on my run. Tara, without knowing it (or knowing I was even listening to her interview; although I’m saying out loud now that I’m going to say hello next time I see her even though I’m scared), has named the feeling in my body.
My fight with Tyler necessitated me speaking my mind. It mandated that I say what is in my heart, and explain my feelings. That shit is scary as fuck. It makes me wonder if other women (or men, for that matter) deal with bodily feelings of PURE FUCKING PANIC after getting into fights. Maybe that feeling is passed down to me for a reason other than the fact that women throughout history have been shunned for speaking their truths.
I’ll leave you with an excerpt of this quote—one I’ve always found deeply inspiring—said by
late activist Maggie Kuhn:
