Lean Into Your Shadows
Marina Nash
Lean Into Your Shadows
Our life force smolders deep within us, sometimes buried beneath years of pain. Yet it is always waiting to be excavated and revealed, to reemerge as fresh and wild as broom plants in fields of ash and streams of lava.
In April 2022, my year-long course in Embodied Mindfulness Leadership was coming to a bittersweet close. Day after day of showing up, doing my work, and finding my feet, this marked the beginning of yet another new chapter in my life. What a gift.
It took sixty-two years to arrive here. It’s never about the place. It’s an arrival at a very intimate connection with self. I finally felt seen, not only by others but by myself. Hearing my self-written obituary read out loud by one of my peers was a raw, gut-bending and empowering experience, something I could never have imagined. I surrendered to who I had been and will become. What was, was. Now is all that matters.
A deep state of acceptance washed over me. I am a seeker. I need to understand. I have always had grit, but this was different. Placing my hands on my heart, I could feel the life force beneath them and acknowl- edge the tremendous Journey I had been on. It was one with my body, my soul, and my mind; one with nature, my family, my community, and the universe. I felt such an abundance of light and love vibrating through me that it obliterated negative thoughts and feelings. It elevated me to a place where self-compassion trumped true grit. I could begin to open my heart and learn to allow love again.
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Marina Nash | Lean Into Your Shadows
It has taken a lifetime of crisis, loss, and grief to find my center. A life filled with shards of glass ripping at my core; shattered splinters emanating from family members’ mental asylums, prisons, evictions, addictions, and deaths; and the suffocating grip of a pedophile’s enmeshed pursuits of me.
Some people learn quickly from experience, while others need to drag out their pain until their soul begs for mercy. I am one of these. I learned to move sideways. Explore the currents. Invite the unknown. Seek the light. Jump in. What finally brought me to my knees was my diagnosis of stage IV cancer, followed three years later by my husband’s death from his.
Fear paralyzes. I have lived there. After many years of practice and study, I thought that alignment meant physical balance and posture. It wasn’t until my yoga instructor adjusted my pose that I realized how easy it is to fall out physically. It’s the focus, intention, and breath work that keeps us steady. Alignment is not perfect, permanent, or static. It’s a continuous unfolding into vulnerability. It’s failing, falling, then begin- ning again in order to rise up stronger the next time we seek it.
Pause. Breathe. Hold your heart. Repeat. Alignment doesn’t just happen. Being in alignment is a conscious choice. There have been times in my life when I felt aligned: I stood upright, self-confidence circulating throughout my body; I glowed as energy was emitted from every pore of my skin.
And yet these moments were never permanent. It’s easy to collapse out of alignment, only to discover another opportunity to arrive at a deeper, more meaningful practice and achieve even greater balance. I’ve learned that it is the process of practicing throughout a lifetime that brings one closer to that place of inner peace. Nothing is flawless. Smile at your imperfections and surrender to what might be the most beautiful moment of your life.
Sometimes being out of alignment is circumstantial when life is riddled with trauma that is out of our control. That was my norm throughout my life. I didn’t know any other way. Survival of the fittest.
Just do it. Then do it again, but better. Climb, run, pedal faster, win at all costs. Although it was familiar and habitual, this was not a state in which to thrive. It wasn’t until I could afford my own psychotherapy that I began to understand the deep scarring that had left me numb and incom- plete. It had become so embedded that it seemed comfortable. It was my normal.
Warp speed. Everything happening at once, driving me to improve, perform, succeed. Constant crises, obstacles, tragedies. My life unfolded quickly, demanding the agility and attention of a mountain goat caught in a rockslide. Continual bad news became a way of life. Breathing remained shallow. Then, just as I almost regained balance, Wham! Another turn, another twist, another loss.
Find your path, pivot, adjust. Run. Time flies when left unnoticed. Trauma happens with no warning or preparation, leaving unfinished or unresolved relationships in its wake. Moving, switching languages, leaving friends behind for reasons that were not mine, left me shrouded in a dark cloud. The constant changes and shifts were so swift that the only thing that overpowered the excruciating pain of abandonment was shame.
I have finally found the way to my center again. Nature brings me back. She has always been there to capture my eye and warm my heart. She reminds me to breathe. Slow down. Moments filled with wild rasp- berries and crisp narcissus illuminated my escapes, embellishing my inner landscape and softening the shards of chaos.
Living in the moment can mean different things to different people. In order to survive, one is definitely living moment to moment, hanging on to every breath to avoid being pulled under again; but that is not the same as living in the moment. That is not the kind of presence or aware- ness that I call alignment.
It has taken me a lifetime to unwrap all the tragedies that affected me, and some still lurk suspiciously in the shadows. If I have learned anything about living mindfully in the present, it is that one must be fully embodied
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Marina Nash | Lean Into Your Shadows
and awake, pause often, slow down to a crawl, and take life in through all of one’s senses. Then and only then can one embody the essence of being fully alive.
Grit. True grit. Fall. Get back up and do it all over again. Align- ment, if rigid, can be fragile. Allowed to be flexible and resilient, it will be vigorous. Alignment isn’t a linear path. It is the process of self-explora- tion throughout a lifetime of experiences. It flows like a mountain stream emerging at its source, cascading down sheer facades, finally restrained within the lush flora it nourishes. Alignment is the journey where it is natural to get caught in life’s distractions, caring for others, getting lost, being found, and searching for inner peace along the way. Sometimes alignment can be accelerated by shock, grief, loss, or trauma, as dramatic and sudden as a lightning bolt searing its way through thickened skins, or a series of compounded tragedies that make their way through the obscure and murky labyrinths of our minds.
I’ve always wondered why I was born with the gifts of resilience and determination. I am eternally grateful for these attributes. My curiosity, too, is often the source of solutions to my troubles, and I believe that suffering often propels us to seek realignment with our purpose and our values.
My advice is simple to give, though it is difficult to manifest. Surrender. Get back up and face yourself. Do the work. Keep showing up. Ground yourself through your feet and open your heart. Give thanks and love always. This daily practice has become the foundation of my new life. Let it be yours. Alignment reveals purpose. Live well, teach by example, be creative in every way. And lean into your shadow. Darkness always seeks light!
www.marinawarrennash.com
TEDx AIMS: youtu.be/I6f2q4wpHyc
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