The Unsexy Truth About Expansion
What follows an inhale? An exhale. What follows expansion? Contraction.
Sex and Style is written by Somatic Sex Coach Sarah Ward. This is intended as general advice. If you’d like a personalized guidance, I’d be honored to connect with you in a discovery session.
Nature teaches us the inherent rhythm of life.
On the inhale, we are full.
On the exhale, we empty out.
This week I danced with my demons.
The Annual Flamenco Festival came to town and I was there for my 11th year in a row. Picture this: studying flamenco with world class artists. Seeing nine shows in just as many days. Performing at the end. It was a veritable rollercoaster.
While it wasn’t on the agenda, I came face to face with big fears and inadequacies.
It started great! Seeing friends from all over the country felt like camp for grown-ups. I delivered heartfelt compliments in Spanish and was told by someone I adore that my Spanish was perfect. (It’s not, pero gracias!) The artistry and shows were phenomenal!
But as the week wore on, I felt the effects of fatigue: physical, mental and emotional. The headaches wouldn’t stop. I came down with a rattling cough. I had an asthma attack during one of the most memorable shows and ran out of the theater, coughing uncontrollably.
Things felt off somehow. When I slowed down and sat with my thoughts, here’s what I discovered in the background:
You’re not good enough. You’ll never be good enough. Even after everything you’ve given and sacrificed to be here.
You don’t speak their language. You’ll always be an outsider. You don’t belong here.
You are undeserving of kindness and praise and love.
No wonder I felt shitty, with these thoughts left unchecked.
As much as I was moving my body, I was deeply disembodied. I was stuck in my head. Furthermore, I was gaslighting my own experience when it didn’t ladder up with the lit up experience my friends were having.
Here’s the unsexy truth:
Expansion is always followed by contraction.
We can be up to cool shit in the world. Opening our hearts. Making friends. Falling in love. Traveling. Learning new things.
And there is an inevitable come down that follows.
Have you seen this video of a dahlia blooming? As you watch the petals unfold, layer by exquisite layer, you’ll see them expand and then contract. It follows a predictable rhythm.
The expansion and contraction happens in nature. And nature is in us. Our veins look like rivers seen from an aerial view. Our nervous system looks like the roots of a tree. We share the same rhythms as the natural world, especially those of us born into female bodies. All four seasons come and go in the span of a month with our moon cycles.
This week I’m in the come down, in the contraction. I’m coughing and clearing. I’m tired. It’s less than sexy.
My transmission today is simply this: Let’s normalize the come down.
There is nothing wrong with us for being in our feels, or for not having the same experience as someone else. We aren’t lesser humans for feeling sensitive, or taking things personally, or raising our voice at our cats or kids. This is a totally normal part of the process of being alive.
I invite you to join me in a simple embodiment exercise:
Breathe in for a count of four.
Breathe out for a count of eight.
On your next inhale, arch your back and tilt your head up towards the ceiling.
On the exhale, curve your spine like a cat, bring your belly button towards your spine, and lower your head.
Repeat as often as it feels good.
Nature teaches us the inherent rhythm of life.
On the inhale, we are full.
On the exhale, we empty out.
We see this circadian rhythm in sex: thrusting in, pulling out.
You rarely see someone thrust and stay in stillness. The hard-on would fade fast.
It is pleasurable because of the act of moving in and out, with both polarities present.
The expansion is the filling.
The contraction is the emptying.
It isn’t possible to be in constant expansion. The contraction always follows.
May we let it.
Sex and Style is written by Certified Somatic Sex and Relationship Coach and Wardrobe Stylist, Sarah Ward. She has spent the last 20 years studying human sexuality and minted it in 2021, certifying in the VITA™ Methodology with Layla Martin and as an Erotic Blueprints™ Coach with Jaiya. For personalized support, schedule a free discovery call with Sarah.
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Beautiful if not uncomfortable way to be reminded of the essential contraction to every expansion.
I do hope your cough is soothed and smoothed away soon, I have a little lingering cough from a week ago, my pelvic floor isn’t happy 😂
Love this - and so appreciate what you share here!
To be able to objectify and normalize this process which is such an easy target for our inner critic to judge and gaslight is an amazing gift. I don't know of a better way to accomplish that than for all of us to continue sharing these experiences with each other as you have so beautifully and bravely done here. ❤️🌹❤️