happy Friday loves 🥰🍄🦋💛🌻. sending love to you. I’ve been thinking a lot recently about what my Substack is for. When I was younger there was something we’d call DMCs — deep meaningful conversations. I want to try and create more opportunities for that here.
Particularly because I am always in awe of the comments left by our community. Thank you for being here and for engaging so thoughtfully.
I am really fascinated by the concept of aliveness.
I’d love to hear from you: what makes you feel truly alive? Who or what heightens your sense of aliveness, and what dulls it? What does aliveness mean and look like to you? Are you feeling its presence or absence these days, and how so?
Recently writing has taken over this role in my life, specifically with my decision to start branching out into poetry/ prose, I find it is wildly fulfilling to describe a single concept, such as loneliness or even something like sunlight in a manner so complex that it reflects exactly how I perceive/ feel about that thing
oooh "wildly fulfilling" has made my day. I am so happy to hear about this Asisa. I can already tell you write vividly from your description of your experience and I'm grateful you are committing your imagination to the page! So excited to be following your writing, I just subscribed. Sending love and thank you for being here 💛
Thank you so much for saying this! Your writing is amazing!!! Keep going! I just read the piece on Eurocentrism and loved it. Thank you for your work!!! 💛
I love baking/cooking and creating basic foods from scratch. Or taking micro doses of psilocybin and going to the park. Or eating edibles and cleaning and hanging out w my animals. All of these things have me experience life in a very present state. Feeling very grateful to exist in these moments
oooh I love this so much, Biscayne! Finding presence in each of these activities sounds delicious. Thank you for sharing and for being here! Wishing you many of these precious moments this week 💛
I feel alive when I am aware of all the kind things I have learned to do for myself. I feel alive when I'm in a conversation and someone is sharing themselves with me, WHAT?! A piece of them is now a part of me in memory or in emotion or shared experience. I feel alive when I do yoga and am mindful of each breath. I feel MOST alive when I have my guitar on my lap and I am creating a song, you know what's even deeper than that for me? Making it for a new friend, because WHAT! That is the best part of me that I'm sharing. I'm most alive when I do these things and when I AM intentional about living. I feel love and alive when I listen to Ayanda's podcast about her being excited about the same things that excite me. When she says, "I am you!" I'm like WHAT! You are me! I love your contribution to the collective to much.
I felt each "WHAT?!" sooo hard, Uluthando :') 💛. Literally FELT!!! WHAT?!!!!!!! This is literally delightful and I will be rereading this comment several times. There is so much here. I also looooove this feeling of conversational alignment, and you described it so profoundly and in a way that reminds me of just how MAGICAL this kind of connection can be, how WILD it is!!!! It's completely wild and easy to take for granted, so thank you for reminding me not to! Thank you for being so generous with your experience, I am smiling hard right now. I love that you feel alive in your yoga practice and in your guitar playing, I am sure that must feel so good to be in flow state with these activities! DIVINE! Thank you for your beautiful words about my podcast, I feel so much love from you that I am receiving and sitting with. Your words have enlivened me and made me excited to continue creating, knowing you are listening. WHAT!!! You are me! That's my fav sentence this week, THANK YOU!!!!! Sending you all the love my darling, thank you for being here and for being so engaged with my work, means the absolute world to me!!!!
I'm screaming and its 4am. WHAT?! I appreciate your input so much, my mornings are not complete without a Paradigm Shift. It literally shifts things inside of me. Your excitement about life is really overflowing into my life, I feel so excited too.
I spent half of my year drained by architecture school, I've grown to dread it actually. But your insights on these other beautiful things in life and tearing down paradigms that don't serve us and exposing the truth really brought back joy into my life. I'm literally "ECSTATIC, OVERJOYED" when I listen to your voice echoe in my dorm room. Girl I love you!
I have been thinking about this a lot this year, because very sadly I lost a close friend in February. And I’ve been very convicted that the best way to honor his memory is to live with as deep an appreciation and zest for life as I possibly can.
The elements that I’ve been exploring that are crucial for this for me are:
- creativity
- curiosity
- connectedness
- compassion
- centeredness (or mindfulness, but I like the alliteration trend)
- confidence (or feeling empowered and full of self love)
(And I’m exploring different ways to experience and dive into each one of these things. I’ve also been thinking about the opposites of each of these: stagnancy, boredom, isolation, cruelty, unbalance, self loathing, and numbness - and identifying things I should stop doing that tend to lead to those things)
Isabel, I am so sorry for your loss of your close friend and sending so much love your way. Thank you for your generosity in sharing this with us, I am sure so many people resonate with your grief and your alchemizing that grief and love into living with "deep appreciation and zest for life" -- such DIVINE words and truly a magical perspective and philosophy to adopt. Really inspired by you. I love each and every one of the elements you named -- each resonates with me on a deep level and I feel are my core values as a human as well. Thank you for laying these elements out for us! Creativity, curiosity, connectedness, compassion, centeredness, confidence, capacity. I am sitting with these words. I am not sure HOW you got them to all start with C's, a genius! Thank you thank you thank you for allowing us to learn from your friend's spirit. So grateful to have you here! Thank you!!!! 💛💛
Writing is the thing that makes me feel alive & grounded. After periods of feeling like I’m on autopilot, writing helps me remember that I am more than my lives experiences. I am simple and complex. Everything and nothing at all. I found a freedom in my writing that makes me want to show up and continue to explore and expand.
Thank you Ty for sharing this!!! I loooove that writing reconnects you with yourself and with aliveness. I really LOVE that you have found a freedom in writing -- and I love this phrasing because it's not immediately freeing, but we can work towards finding that freedom. I am still on the path to experiencing freedom in writing, so it's amazing to hear from someone who has found it. Thank you for being here and wishing you lots of moments of aliveness through writing this week! 💛💛
I often combine Aliveness & love, when two people are feeling alive together that is when they are in love. Anything where I am present makes me feel alive, where there is clarity in the present moment it electrifies me
ELECTRIFIES!!!! Yessssss.... I love this, Rose! I so agree, love and aliveness are soooo connected and I love how you have described it. bell hooks says "love makes us feel more alive" and I am reminded of her words reading yours. I also feel electrified by the feeling of presence. Thank you for being here and for sharing!!!!! 💛💛
What truly makes me feel alive is anything that allows me to be creative. Right now, I’m exploring the world of drawing & painting, and just picking up a pencil is making me feel things I haven’t in a long time. What dulls this feeling, is putting high expectations upon myself. Allowing myself to create freely and without pressure is the best feeling, honestly.
Thank you so much for sharing, Oleta! I am finding so much aliveness in my creativity as well, and finding new ways to express and tap into the abundant creativity in each of us! "Just picking up a pencil is making me feel things I haven't in a long time" WOW!!! I love that! And it's so interesting bc I was JUST thinking to myself, the leaves in this cafe are so beautiful I want to draw them... I think you have inspired me to get a sketchbook and pencil!!!! Oof.... high expectations and the silencing and crushing effect they can have on our creativity. I felt that. I hope we have a week of judgment and expectation and pressure free creating! Sending love your way darling and thank you so much for being here and being so generous! 💛💛💛
Ahhhh Kiana this has soothed me, thank you so much for sharing this list! I immediately took some deep belly breaths after reading your list. Thank you for being here !!! Wishing you lots of enlivening moments this week 💛💛💛
love this question so much!! your writing & podcasts & videos & voice make me feel alive!! ❤️🥰 seeing someone live so authentically, inspires me to do the same!! adore you!! 😍
THANK YOU SOOO MUCH for your beautiful words of love and encouragement my darling. I love and adore you!!!! Ahhhhh you inspire me daily. Thank you for supporting me always in all ways. I love yoU!!!!!! 💛💛💛💛💛💛
ooooh I so wish I could make clothes and I love that that enlivens you! Making things makes me feel alive too 🥹💛 thank you for sharing Whit and thank you for being here!!! 💛💛
Acting on my principles, acting for life, makes me feel alive. If I didn’t do that I would not be in truth. I live in the UK where thousands of people are now joining the tradition of civil resistance in response to the worsening climate genocide. Particularly doing this with other young people, in a way where I can feel supported, held, part of a collective, together we realise our natural power and democracy and that is actually a privilege and an adventure. To see the gigantic deep wound of injustice and instead of burying it, avoiding it, bring it to the surface for the world to see. This is what Martin Luther King described as ‘positive peace’ - peace with the presence of justice.
Wow, thank you so much for sharing this with us, Maddie. Realizing that we have the ability to act in alignment with our values, and doing so, is very powerful and enlivening! I hadn't connected that with aliveness explicitly, but I so feel that. We are with you and the movement that you are a part of in the UK. Wishing all power to the people in service of moving towards love and climate justice and away from violence and climate genocide. Thank you for being here!!!! 💛💛
Thank you so much Ayanda, and thanks for the question and all that you share so generously. I am so grateful for that! I hope you take spaciousness too and not always reply though it is super lovely to have a conversation.
I just read your passage from 3 months ago about despair and despair is something I have danced with a lot. There is the aliveness but also so much pain.
I find the work of Joanna Macy really invaluable. She speaks of honouring our pain for the world, and in fact there’s an exercise which spirals through gratitude, honouring our pain, seeing with new eyes, going forth. Her book Active Hope is a life changing guide to aliveness in these times and I hope everyone gets the chance to draw comfort and strength from it.
- asking people to describe what they love most about their favorite friendships
- reading!! (recent authors I’ve enjoyed: Ada Limon, Raymond Carver, Emma Cline, Mary Oliver, John O’Brien, Angela Davis)
- flirting - i live for witty banter and mutual intrigue!! love a summer (or winter) romance
- jazz in the morning!
- lastly, just conversations! as much as I love being alone, nothing makes life worth living to me more than the possibility of connection. seeing people and allowing myself to be seen!
ahhhhh you read me IMMEDIATELY saadiq. Meditating in the sun is my JAM. Literally obsessed with the sunshine, basking in it, breathing with it. Truly SOOO enlivening. Hehehe I love your list! Reading! Specific authors! Flirting! Jazz in the MORNING (you described my perfect Sunday morning!!!)! So beautiful and specific, I would love to incorporate some of these into my life. Thank you for sharing. I sooooo agree with each of these. "I live for witty banter and mutual intrigue!" is a line that needs to make its way into a movie or book or tv show, me thinks!! Ahhh I love the vibe I get from your list, thank you for sharing!!!!
DMCs how sweet!!! 🥹🥹🥹 hmmm for now, there are many things that make feel alive. some of those are
the people around me particularly my sisters and friends, when i’m people watching, when i see someone else or i make a wish, when the sun, stars and moon shines, reading, being in water and nature. aliveness to me is like what you once said about life is a paradox; how we are all the same yet so different, we all make wishes but in different forms, when i see or experience stuff that are so relatable yet different im reminded that i’m alive. what dumps down the aliveness is the overthinking or trying to control things 🥲 because i’m doing the opposite of how most things in life works hahaha 😂. i hope that makes sense 😁sending you lots of love and sunshine ☀️ 🪼🍀🍵📍✨💖
My dear Sania!!! Hello love!!!! 💛💛 I am so happy to hear there are MANY things that make you feel alive!!! Woohoo!!! That's something major to celebrate in and of itself. I'm so glad that you are surrounded by love! You radiate so much love so it warms my heart to know that the universe and (including!) the people who surround you are radiating lots of LOVE right back!!! omg the idea of making a wish is so delightful, as is the image of "the sun, stars, and moon shining"!!! Ahhhhhh!! Delicious and wonderful. I so agree re: overthinking and control, I struggle with the same things. This all makes all the sense in the world, thank you for sharing!! Sending you lots of love and sunshine right back! Thank you for being here and always being so engaging and generous !!!💛💛💛💛💛💛
ahhhh I love this!!! like nature is flirting with you and in a deep and conscious relationship with you and vice versa. imagine we were encouraged to relate to the earth in this manner... mmm.... thank you Leah!!!! for being here and for sharing 💛💛💛
I have struggled to feel alive lately, as a result of shifting the focus of my life away from romantic relationships so that I can make space for finding who I am beyond being a Lover; shifts like these tend to leave me feeling hollow until I Figure Out the new me enough to lean on him.
But, some of the paths I've found to aliveness:
-creating (lately in the forms of painting, sewing, cooking, and writing)
-purposefully connecting with Nature
-actively caring for and being in community with my friends
-daydreaming of my wildest & most ideal future and finding steps to take towards it
Thank you for sharing this LR. The struggle to feel alive as we shift identities is so real. There is both death of the old self and rebirth of the new involved, and the former process is disorienting and painful. I'm proud of you for finding "paths to aliveness", each of these sound very centering and loving to both yourself and to your people. I trust that through this expansion beyond being a Lover, you are creating space for the birth of something divine. and you're trusting in the space before it fully exists in order to bring it into Being, which is powerful spiritual work! Wishing you lots of luck, wisdom and self-compassion through this process! thank you for sharing and for being here!!! 💛💛💛💛
this was such a kind and affirming response, thank you 💛 the death of the old self really is painful every time, even when the growth is both necessary and beautiful. It is so important to trust the process, you're so right about the spiritual&divine aspect of it- i can feel my connection to the Universe grow more beautiful and strong through this process of expansion. appreciate you and your well wishes, thank you!! 💛😌
ahhhh reem yesss I do indeed know that feeling and experienced that just this weekend! Music is so healing and enlivening. Thank you for this list! I love it. I love each of these thingssss. All so enlivening. Reading "hysterically laughing with friends" made me giggle and smile to myself -- truly so delightful. I saw you recently started a Substack!!! I just joined!! So excited to support you. Sending love your way!! Thank you for being here <3 <3 <3 and I've been dancing alone a lot lately, so enliveninggggg omg !!! Thank you 💛💛
I love each of these, Cheyenne. Singing is something I have only realized later in life gives me sooooo much joy and feels so enlivening! It's amazing what we can do with our bodies! I love this so much, the idea that these activities reconnect you with your body and with your joy. Absolutely agree. We ARE joy, or we at least can be, through connection to the body in joyful practice. Thank you for being here and thank you for sharing!!! 💛💛💛💛
Recently writing has taken over this role in my life, specifically with my decision to start branching out into poetry/ prose, I find it is wildly fulfilling to describe a single concept, such as loneliness or even something like sunlight in a manner so complex that it reflects exactly how I perceive/ feel about that thing
oooh "wildly fulfilling" has made my day. I am so happy to hear about this Asisa. I can already tell you write vividly from your description of your experience and I'm grateful you are committing your imagination to the page! So excited to be following your writing, I just subscribed. Sending love and thank you for being here 💛
Thank you so much, this space and your support has been a real highlight for me on this app
Thank you so much for saying this! Your writing is amazing!!! Keep going! I just read the piece on Eurocentrism and loved it. Thank you for your work!!! 💛
I love baking/cooking and creating basic foods from scratch. Or taking micro doses of psilocybin and going to the park. Or eating edibles and cleaning and hanging out w my animals. All of these things have me experience life in a very present state. Feeling very grateful to exist in these moments
oooh I love this so much, Biscayne! Finding presence in each of these activities sounds delicious. Thank you for sharing and for being here! Wishing you many of these precious moments this week 💛
I feel alive when I am aware of all the kind things I have learned to do for myself. I feel alive when I'm in a conversation and someone is sharing themselves with me, WHAT?! A piece of them is now a part of me in memory or in emotion or shared experience. I feel alive when I do yoga and am mindful of each breath. I feel MOST alive when I have my guitar on my lap and I am creating a song, you know what's even deeper than that for me? Making it for a new friend, because WHAT! That is the best part of me that I'm sharing. I'm most alive when I do these things and when I AM intentional about living. I feel love and alive when I listen to Ayanda's podcast about her being excited about the same things that excite me. When she says, "I am you!" I'm like WHAT! You are me! I love your contribution to the collective to much.
I felt each "WHAT?!" sooo hard, Uluthando :') 💛. Literally FELT!!! WHAT?!!!!!!! This is literally delightful and I will be rereading this comment several times. There is so much here. I also looooove this feeling of conversational alignment, and you described it so profoundly and in a way that reminds me of just how MAGICAL this kind of connection can be, how WILD it is!!!! It's completely wild and easy to take for granted, so thank you for reminding me not to! Thank you for being so generous with your experience, I am smiling hard right now. I love that you feel alive in your yoga practice and in your guitar playing, I am sure that must feel so good to be in flow state with these activities! DIVINE! Thank you for your beautiful words about my podcast, I feel so much love from you that I am receiving and sitting with. Your words have enlivened me and made me excited to continue creating, knowing you are listening. WHAT!!! You are me! That's my fav sentence this week, THANK YOU!!!!! Sending you all the love my darling, thank you for being here and for being so engaged with my work, means the absolute world to me!!!!
I'm screaming and its 4am. WHAT?! I appreciate your input so much, my mornings are not complete without a Paradigm Shift. It literally shifts things inside of me. Your excitement about life is really overflowing into my life, I feel so excited too.
I spent half of my year drained by architecture school, I've grown to dread it actually. But your insights on these other beautiful things in life and tearing down paradigms that don't serve us and exposing the truth really brought back joy into my life. I'm literally "ECSTATIC, OVERJOYED" when I listen to your voice echoe in my dorm room. Girl I love you!
I have been thinking about this a lot this year, because very sadly I lost a close friend in February. And I’ve been very convicted that the best way to honor his memory is to live with as deep an appreciation and zest for life as I possibly can.
The elements that I’ve been exploring that are crucial for this for me are:
- creativity
- curiosity
- connectedness
- compassion
- centeredness (or mindfulness, but I like the alliteration trend)
- confidence (or feeling empowered and full of self love)
- capacity for deep appreciation and enjoyment
(And I’m exploring different ways to experience and dive into each one of these things. I’ve also been thinking about the opposites of each of these: stagnancy, boredom, isolation, cruelty, unbalance, self loathing, and numbness - and identifying things I should stop doing that tend to lead to those things)
I love this!!! I also love contrast and how it can bring things into sharper focus for us. Thank you for sharing your process with us! 💛
Isabel, I am so sorry for your loss of your close friend and sending so much love your way. Thank you for your generosity in sharing this with us, I am sure so many people resonate with your grief and your alchemizing that grief and love into living with "deep appreciation and zest for life" -- such DIVINE words and truly a magical perspective and philosophy to adopt. Really inspired by you. I love each and every one of the elements you named -- each resonates with me on a deep level and I feel are my core values as a human as well. Thank you for laying these elements out for us! Creativity, curiosity, connectedness, compassion, centeredness, confidence, capacity. I am sitting with these words. I am not sure HOW you got them to all start with C's, a genius! Thank you thank you thank you for allowing us to learn from your friend's spirit. So grateful to have you here! Thank you!!!! 💛💛
(Oh also I’m adding another time to my list! “Childlike awe and wonder” ❤️
Thank you so much! ❤️❤️
Writing is the thing that makes me feel alive & grounded. After periods of feeling like I’m on autopilot, writing helps me remember that I am more than my lives experiences. I am simple and complex. Everything and nothing at all. I found a freedom in my writing that makes me want to show up and continue to explore and expand.
Thank you Ty for sharing this!!! I loooove that writing reconnects you with yourself and with aliveness. I really LOVE that you have found a freedom in writing -- and I love this phrasing because it's not immediately freeing, but we can work towards finding that freedom. I am still on the path to experiencing freedom in writing, so it's amazing to hear from someone who has found it. Thank you for being here and wishing you lots of moments of aliveness through writing this week! 💛💛
*lived
I often combine Aliveness & love, when two people are feeling alive together that is when they are in love. Anything where I am present makes me feel alive, where there is clarity in the present moment it electrifies me
ELECTRIFIES!!!! Yessssss.... I love this, Rose! I so agree, love and aliveness are soooo connected and I love how you have described it. bell hooks says "love makes us feel more alive" and I am reminded of her words reading yours. I also feel electrified by the feeling of presence. Thank you for being here and for sharing!!!!! 💛💛
What truly makes me feel alive is anything that allows me to be creative. Right now, I’m exploring the world of drawing & painting, and just picking up a pencil is making me feel things I haven’t in a long time. What dulls this feeling, is putting high expectations upon myself. Allowing myself to create freely and without pressure is the best feeling, honestly.
Thank you so much for sharing, Oleta! I am finding so much aliveness in my creativity as well, and finding new ways to express and tap into the abundant creativity in each of us! "Just picking up a pencil is making me feel things I haven't in a long time" WOW!!! I love that! And it's so interesting bc I was JUST thinking to myself, the leaves in this cafe are so beautiful I want to draw them... I think you have inspired me to get a sketchbook and pencil!!!! Oof.... high expectations and the silencing and crushing effect they can have on our creativity. I felt that. I hope we have a week of judgment and expectation and pressure free creating! Sending love your way darling and thank you so much for being here and being so generous! 💛💛💛
Thank you. I hope you do get that sketchbook!
- tuning into my gut/intuition
- feeling my body, connecting to all the sensations, moving consciously
- spending time with animals
- touching plants, trees, grass
- connecting deeply with people, including myself
- taking deep belly breaths
- ...
Ahhhh Kiana this has soothed me, thank you so much for sharing this list! I immediately took some deep belly breaths after reading your list. Thank you for being here !!! Wishing you lots of enlivening moments this week 💛💛💛
love this question so much!! your writing & podcasts & videos & voice make me feel alive!! ❤️🥰 seeing someone live so authentically, inspires me to do the same!! adore you!! 😍
THANK YOU SOOO MUCH for your beautiful words of love and encouragement my darling. I love and adore you!!!! Ahhhhh you inspire me daily. Thank you for supporting me always in all ways. I love yoU!!!!!! 💛💛💛💛💛💛
Making clothes, making anything really🥹
ooooh I so wish I could make clothes and I love that that enlivens you! Making things makes me feel alive too 🥹💛 thank you for sharing Whit and thank you for being here!!! 💛💛
Acting on my principles, acting for life, makes me feel alive. If I didn’t do that I would not be in truth. I live in the UK where thousands of people are now joining the tradition of civil resistance in response to the worsening climate genocide. Particularly doing this with other young people, in a way where I can feel supported, held, part of a collective, together we realise our natural power and democracy and that is actually a privilege and an adventure. To see the gigantic deep wound of injustice and instead of burying it, avoiding it, bring it to the surface for the world to see. This is what Martin Luther King described as ‘positive peace’ - peace with the presence of justice.
Wow, thank you so much for sharing this with us, Maddie. Realizing that we have the ability to act in alignment with our values, and doing so, is very powerful and enlivening! I hadn't connected that with aliveness explicitly, but I so feel that. We are with you and the movement that you are a part of in the UK. Wishing all power to the people in service of moving towards love and climate justice and away from violence and climate genocide. Thank you for being here!!!! 💛💛
Thank you so much Ayanda, and thanks for the question and all that you share so generously. I am so grateful for that! I hope you take spaciousness too and not always reply though it is super lovely to have a conversation.
I just read your passage from 3 months ago about despair and despair is something I have danced with a lot. There is the aliveness but also so much pain.
I find the work of Joanna Macy really invaluable. She speaks of honouring our pain for the world, and in fact there’s an exercise which spirals through gratitude, honouring our pain, seeing with new eyes, going forth. Her book Active Hope is a life changing guide to aliveness in these times and I hope everyone gets the chance to draw comfort and strength from it.
Thanks again and take care, sending love 💛
- meditating in the sun!!
- asking people to describe what they love most about their favorite friendships
- reading!! (recent authors I’ve enjoyed: Ada Limon, Raymond Carver, Emma Cline, Mary Oliver, John O’Brien, Angela Davis)
- flirting - i live for witty banter and mutual intrigue!! love a summer (or winter) romance
- jazz in the morning!
- lastly, just conversations! as much as I love being alone, nothing makes life worth living to me more than the possibility of connection. seeing people and allowing myself to be seen!
- thanks for posing the question :)
ahhhhh you read me IMMEDIATELY saadiq. Meditating in the sun is my JAM. Literally obsessed with the sunshine, basking in it, breathing with it. Truly SOOO enlivening. Hehehe I love your list! Reading! Specific authors! Flirting! Jazz in the MORNING (you described my perfect Sunday morning!!!)! So beautiful and specific, I would love to incorporate some of these into my life. Thank you for sharing. I sooooo agree with each of these. "I live for witty banter and mutual intrigue!" is a line that needs to make its way into a movie or book or tv show, me thinks!! Ahhh I love the vibe I get from your list, thank you for sharing!!!!
DMCs how sweet!!! 🥹🥹🥹 hmmm for now, there are many things that make feel alive. some of those are
the people around me particularly my sisters and friends, when i’m people watching, when i see someone else or i make a wish, when the sun, stars and moon shines, reading, being in water and nature. aliveness to me is like what you once said about life is a paradox; how we are all the same yet so different, we all make wishes but in different forms, when i see or experience stuff that are so relatable yet different im reminded that i’m alive. what dumps down the aliveness is the overthinking or trying to control things 🥲 because i’m doing the opposite of how most things in life works hahaha 😂. i hope that makes sense 😁sending you lots of love and sunshine ☀️ 🪼🍀🍵📍✨💖
My dear Sania!!! Hello love!!!! 💛💛 I am so happy to hear there are MANY things that make you feel alive!!! Woohoo!!! That's something major to celebrate in and of itself. I'm so glad that you are surrounded by love! You radiate so much love so it warms my heart to know that the universe and (including!) the people who surround you are radiating lots of LOVE right back!!! omg the idea of making a wish is so delightful, as is the image of "the sun, stars, and moon shining"!!! Ahhhhhh!! Delicious and wonderful. I so agree re: overthinking and control, I struggle with the same things. This all makes all the sense in the world, thank you for sharing!! Sending you lots of love and sunshine right back! Thank you for being here and always being so engaging and generous !!!💛💛💛💛💛💛
you’re the best and most full of love 😭🥹🥹🥹💖💖💖🍀🪴🌱✨
Listening to the waves while having the sun kiss my skin and the wind blow through my hair makes me feel alive
ahhhh I love this!!! like nature is flirting with you and in a deep and conscious relationship with you and vice versa. imagine we were encouraged to relate to the earth in this manner... mmm.... thank you Leah!!!! for being here and for sharing 💛💛💛
I have struggled to feel alive lately, as a result of shifting the focus of my life away from romantic relationships so that I can make space for finding who I am beyond being a Lover; shifts like these tend to leave me feeling hollow until I Figure Out the new me enough to lean on him.
But, some of the paths I've found to aliveness:
-creating (lately in the forms of painting, sewing, cooking, and writing)
-purposefully connecting with Nature
-actively caring for and being in community with my friends
-daydreaming of my wildest & most ideal future and finding steps to take towards it
Thank you for sharing this LR. The struggle to feel alive as we shift identities is so real. There is both death of the old self and rebirth of the new involved, and the former process is disorienting and painful. I'm proud of you for finding "paths to aliveness", each of these sound very centering and loving to both yourself and to your people. I trust that through this expansion beyond being a Lover, you are creating space for the birth of something divine. and you're trusting in the space before it fully exists in order to bring it into Being, which is powerful spiritual work! Wishing you lots of luck, wisdom and self-compassion through this process! thank you for sharing and for being here!!! 💛💛💛💛
this was such a kind and affirming response, thank you 💛 the death of the old self really is painful every time, even when the growth is both necessary and beautiful. It is so important to trust the process, you're so right about the spiritual&divine aspect of it- i can feel my connection to the Universe grow more beautiful and strong through this process of expansion. appreciate you and your well wishes, thank you!! 💛😌
-Listening to the right song/s at the right time (you know when music just hits that spot)
-Being in love
-Dancing alone
-Hysterically laughing with friends
-Swimming in the sea
-Sharing my writing
ahhhh reem yesss I do indeed know that feeling and experienced that just this weekend! Music is so healing and enlivening. Thank you for this list! I love it. I love each of these thingssss. All so enlivening. Reading "hysterically laughing with friends" made me giggle and smile to myself -- truly so delightful. I saw you recently started a Substack!!! I just joined!! So excited to support you. Sending love your way!! Thank you for being here <3 <3 <3 and I've been dancing alone a lot lately, so enliveninggggg omg !!! Thank you 💛💛
Thank you so much for joining!! I admire your work and I have to say that you are the person who inspired me to take that step :D
I love each of these, Cheyenne. Singing is something I have only realized later in life gives me sooooo much joy and feels so enlivening! It's amazing what we can do with our bodies! I love this so much, the idea that these activities reconnect you with your body and with your joy. Absolutely agree. We ARE joy, or we at least can be, through connection to the body in joyful practice. Thank you for being here and thank you for sharing!!! 💛💛💛💛