Hannah Gadsby and the Power of Story

I finished Hannah Gadsby’s book Nanette last Saturday morning and I’ve been savoring each of its pages as I tried to figure out how to put into words for the past month and a half how much her work has meant to me. (If you’re unfamiliar with Hannah, which I was until earlier this year, she’s a comedian from Australia with a couple Netflix specials and years of experience in producing live comedy shows). I was gifted tickets to her show when she was touring in Minneapolis in July. The afternoon before the show, I watched her first Netflix show Nanette for the first time… just to make sure I was a little familiar with some of her body of work before seeing her newest show, Body Of Work.

I loved it. I laughed, I cried, I felt in awe at the weaver of story that she is and the powerful mark she was making while being a woman in art/comedy/the world.

Then, seeing her show live was one of the most transforming experiences I’ve had in a long while. I actually have tears in my eyes at how impactful and special it was just writing this now. The two hour show had me laughing more than I have in years. And laughing out loud with complete strangers felt so damn good! Being able to poke fun and laugh (while also inwardly groaning) at the jokes by an Australian that were made about the health care in this country, the messed up bans on peoples bodies, and the other dumpster fire mess we find ourselves in these days released a small layer of stress, despair, rage, and heaviness I’d been carrying and it felt like a healing sense of solidarity to be in a room of people who also felt similarly. A solidarity that’s different than just the sharing of posts and outrage on the socials (which is helpful too) and I didn’t realize I needed.

And the storytelling! The crafting of the thoughtful and intentional journey of taking the audience on a ride through a feel-good, love story between two women bucking the patriarchal heterosexual norms by choosing to love out loud (but in a quiet introverted way) was perfection. I was enchanted throughout and delighted at the ending. It reminded me of the power and magic of storytelling. It reawakened a part of myself that I had been missing: the part that craves being in the room with other people sharing in the range of emotions of humanity, the part that lights up my cells by being in a theatre with a gorgeous stage, and the part of my soul that has stories and art and expression to share with you.

I lived on the high of that experience for weeks and cherished the continued connection to Hannah and her bravery, brilliance, and backstory as I read slowly through her book every morning while sipping my coffee.

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Shortly after seeing her show, in one of the breathwork sessions I had for myself with my friend Amy, I realized I’ve been hiding a bit recently. With the volatile, divisive energy around those who have differing opinions, with all the changes to the social platforms/algorithms/reels, and with my own excavating of beliefs/biases/privileges/purpose/voice/heart, I’ve been quiet in my creating. Quiet in my art. Quiet in my writing.

(Not that this is a bad thing - not every part of the process and our cycle needs to be on display, especially if the best thing to do is to listen and learn from others - so just sharing my observation.)

I’ve written many a post or piece to you in my head or in my drafts, but they never got posted or published… for a couple of reasons I think. One: out of fear of making a mistake, of causing more harm. Two: the nature of how social media has changed in that it’s no longer just about pictures and words, but videos and short snippets while also favoring frequent posting and less emphasis on the creative process (another conversation for another time). Three: this year is about “homecoming” for me (again another conversation for another time) and I’ve been finding my way back home to myself.

But the other thing I realized in my cells during that breathwork session is, despite all of those reasons contributing to the fear of being seen, I have trained for this. I’ve put time and energy into practicing this art. In fact, in one of the actor trainings I did years ago, we would call ourselves “actor warriors”. Telling story is my craft and my love, whether through stage or page or photo. I want to continue to show up for it and for the process, whether quietly or out loud (maybe even in an introverted way!). Because stories matter. Stories are healing. Stories are nourishment and soul food for times like these.

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And so, this long missive is to thank Hannah Gadsby for her humor and heart. To my brother Eric for connecting me to her. And to the power of Storytelling for its ability to change lives, including mine.

My full moon wish for us:

May we all find the healing in our own stories and have someone who will listen to it with their whole hearts as we share.

Happy to be back writing to you. xo!

A New Beginning Needs An Ending

Saying goodbye to Stockheart

Covid has not been kind to most folks, particularly yoga centers and brick and mortar spaces.

We’ve all had places we love close or change shape as we’ve learned to adapt, pivot, and expand during a contraction. I feel like many of my newsletters as of late have been the bearer of bad news where another one of the beloved spaces I work out of is closing its current iteration.

So here I am again with some more news! The building I’ve been seeing 1:1 clients at in the Lyn-Lake area of Uptown, MN will be leased out to a group in July and I’ll be moving my practice yet again.

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This ending, unlike some of the others I’ve experienced in the last two-ish years, feels more like a beginning though, despite my grieving the soon-to-be loss of it. This space was the one I first started in when I moved back to MN from NY and it’s the one that has stayed a constant through the height of the pandemic. I’ll forever be grateful for this home to land my work in.

And! I’ve grown and changed a lot since 2017, particularly in the pressure cooker that has been 2020-2022. I feel like I’ve been to the underworld and back again. I’ve traveled to the outside edges of my spiral and I’m working my way back to my center. So it feels appropriate to be starting fresh in a new home where my ever-evolving, learning, unlearning, seeking, healing self can plant some roots in a new way that feels really grounded and aligned.

I’m really excited for this next stage and, while I’m not quite ready to announce my new home yet, you are going to love it.

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So the thing I’m really feeling into right now is:

In order to have a new beginning, there is an ending.

Sometimes the ending is what’s most heavy or what draws the most focus. Sometimes it’s the new thing that’s carrying the most potency. And SOMETIMES, it’s the in between moments. That transition time before the beginning but just after the ending. The unknown. The void.

Each phase of the cycle has medicine to share if we take time to notice. Where are you in yours?

To celebrate this ending and to not rush through to the next thing, I’m offering sessions in June at a discount to finish out my time there with a bang and to give YOU (or your loves) some hands-on healing / touch / breathing / balancing / grounding / care that you need for your own growth and cycles. In-person or virtual! Would love to see you on my schedule and on my table if it aligns with what you’re needing.

Use code STOCKHEART to get $30 off your session!

And in the meantime, I’m sending you big love for your beginnings, your endings, the in-between moments, and your evolution and expansion. We can do this! xo

The Humming Of My Cells

On Friday, as I was entering into the dog park, I noticed that the leaves on the trees were suddenly bigger, more expansive, greener, more stretched open wide than they had been just the week before. Spring has been slow to come in Minnesota and the few pockets of warmth that we’d have here and there would make my cells hum with life as I soaked in the sun in between all the stretches of grey and rainy days in April.

I’ve been listening to the We Can Do Hard Things podcast a lot lately and I’m loving the inspiration I get from the conversations they have with really cool people. Recently I was listening to the episode where Susan Cain talked about being melancholy and how society isn’t orientated for folks who feel sad. I’m paraphrasing here, but the idea being that we need to reclaim the wisdom in sadness. Rather than feeling that something is wrong with us because we don’t feel happy, we have an opportunity to explore the connection and bittersweet-ness we feel because we care deeply about something. How we might get tears in our eyes watching something that brings us joy. How we might honor our longing as a strength rather than a weakness. It’s something I’ve been mulling over and musing on as I prepare for virtual breathwork group this month.

The conversation reminded me of the term “griefwalker” by Stephen Jenkinson, who teaches about “how death empowers us to live and that we must know grief well in order to appreciate our own lives”. While I’m someone who is very easy to laugh and very in touch with my ability to feel childlike joy, I am also very connected to carrying deep grief because of the loss I’ve experienced at a young age.

The spring season reminds me especially of this! I feel an urgency to savor and to take in all the delicate blooms that have just bursted into existence from a very brown winter landscape. Because we know the cycle of the seasons, we know these blossoms won’t last forever! There’s an invitation to enjoy the beauty knowing that the shedding, dropping, releasing will be coming again eventually when the timing is right and can we be in the moment with where we are right now?

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These conversations about hard things and the impermanence of our lives also remind me of why I host breathwork. To offer a space for us to come and allow ourselves to feel all the things we feel as human beings living in this wild, chaotic, blooming, heartbreaking, beautiful life. To offer the opportunity to set aside time to pause and go within. Sometimes we tap into joy when we gather to breathe and that’s such a gift. Some days it’s our rage that we need to feel. Maybe it’s peaceful rest. Perhaps it’s feeling into our deeply tired and burned out bones. Often we allow the sad to bubble up. Always we get to feel the vibration of our cells humming because we are alive in this moment. This is why I love breathwork. There’s space for ALL OF IT. And we get to do it in community. We don’t have to carry it alone. We walk our own specific paths, of course, and we have our own flavor of grief and joy, but we get to walk with each other as we journey.
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Yesterday, we are experienced a full moon lunar eclipse in Scorpio. While I haven’t studied astrology, I know that this full moon has the potential to be an emotional one.

My wish for you this full moon is to embrace the fullness of your emotions. For the curiosity to listen close to the messages they have for you. for you to find those practices (like breathwork is for me) where you feel the permission to be fully yourself. For the opportunity to get quiet and find the spring beauty that makes your cells hum with aliveness.

And here’s an album I’m loving lately as a meditation to help those cells hum this spring: Resonance Meditation by Beautiful Chorus.

From "Normal" to Natural

I’ve known for a couple years that I have Hashimoto's thyroiditis (an autoimmune disease where your body attacks the thyroid), but being a type 1 diabetic, managing my blood sugars has taken center stage for most of my years. This summer, after getting a new insulin pump that was a total game changer in my care, I noticed some changes in my body that felt like a nudge to pay more attention to my thyroid. 

So working with a naturopath, a dietitian, and my endocrinologist, I asked for a full thyroid panel and when the blood work came back, my thyroid antibodies were extremely high and my other numbers were out of whack. My dietitian gave me a resource on the Autoimmune Protocol and, being the healing nerd I am, I’ve been diving right in. 

I’d looked at the Autoimmune Protocol diet several years ago and wasn’t super jazzed about it because it focused on all the food groups you have to cut out, which made it feel too restrictive for me. But this ebook! This particular author emphasizes adding all the nutrients in, taking foods out that could be causing the body to be inflamed and in attack mode, getting therapeutic levels of sleep, moving your body gently every day, getting outside to see the daylight, and taking hikes in nature. Now I can totally get on board with that! Most of that stuff is already my jam. 

The thing that struck me the most from reading this book was how often she mentioned type 1 diabetes - my first autoimmune diagnosis - and I’ve been pondering on how I never really focused on the autoimmune component before. Over the years, I’ve tried all the diets, all the supplements, all the exercise, and all the healing modalities. My management of it as of late has been the best I’ve ever had, and yet it still feels like I was missing something. 

And that’s when it hit me: when I was diagnosed in 2000, I was 14 and about to go into high school that fall. The goal at that time in my life was to be as normal as possible. I just wanted to do what I needed to do (which was sometimes the bare minimum!) in order to get back to being a normal high schooler. And a normal college student. And then a normal adult artist! 

When I was freshly diagnosed, one of the most encouraging things my doctor told me was the only two things in the entire world I couldn’t do as a type 1 was go scuba diving and go to war (because of blood sugars - thank the goddess!). Everything else was fair game! Well, I had no intention of going to war anyways and I’m a little claustrophobic, so I’m fine skipping the scuba diving. The freedom in not being defined or limited was huge and I think human beings are such multi-faceted creatures that labels can sometimes hinder the brilliance of how we experience the world. 

And! At this point in my life, with my second autoimmune disease under my belt, I’m less concerned about being NORMAL. 

(Besides, what is “normal” anyway and is “normal” actually healthy in this capitalist, patriarchal, white supremist world we live in? But I digress….) 

This new way of looking at my needs as a person with autoimmune diseases feels more like getting back to NATURAL.

It’s like returning to a rhythm of life that feels more balanced, seasonal, restful. It’s listening to the body first, business second. It’s honoring the need to slow down, to be filled with nutrients, to let go of the day's stress like we did as kids rather than bottling it up like responsible adults. 

Now, I also want to acknowledge how there’s privilege that comes into play here in trying to create a life that bucks the system. I’ve grown up in a working class, single parent family and I lived in New York for a time without health insurance, so just getting my insulin was as much as I could do sometimes and I get it. There may be some obstacles in crafting this kind of existence if it’s a struggle to find clean water and fresh food or if you don’t have a partner to help with the household finances or if you need to have childcare or you have to work 12+ hour shifts in your career. But my hope for us is the more we advocate for each other and these basic needs of thriving instead of just surviving (needs that are everyone’s birthright), the more it can be a reality for more folks.

So, long story short: my goal for this year is to continue to come back to a natural way of being.  

And my wish for you on this full moon is for you to remember what makes you feel good. 

To listen to your body first. 

To find ways to add nutrients to your life, whether that be a quick nap, an art project, a bouquet of flowers or a new plant baby, a date with a friend, a snuggle with your pets, a big ol steak with a side of greens, a toe-curling orgasm, vitamin C, a big belly laugh session, etc etc etc! 

To create a new normal that feels more natural.