Welcome home, my love.

There's a line in a song that I used to listen to when I was young that said, "Freedom, that's just some people talking." At the time, I remember not feeling very free and thinking, "Yes, that's probably true." I was trying to convince myself in some ways that it was okay not to have freedom.

And now, freedom is my number one value in life. After a lifetime of feeling like I needed to live by someone else's rules, I'm doing the hard work of finding my own rules. I'm slowly coming to believe that I am a sovereign being and that all the black and whites I was taught my whole life are prison cells. The most important lesson, I think, has been that freedom is found in the gray, in the space between, in the mystery.

The main area I felt imprisoned was around sensuality and sexuality. It was so inherent in my nature to be interested in sexuality since I was small. I mean, listening to Dr. Ruth lying in bed at 10 years old, trying on my mom's lingerie, making out with Winnie the Pooh. And then the battle began. "Don't enjoy that" and "Don't feel that." "Shut that down!" There was a war going on inside me, so much so that I developed an almost debilitating complex around sexuality and purity.

It was so ingrained in me through my strong Christian upbringing, with deeply committed parents who were leaders in a high-control church, that any expression in these areas outside of the one deemed "okay" was wrong.

And I tried to live like that for a long time, and it almost killed me. My soul was crying out…begging for something else. Now, here I am finally expressing myself, connecting with my gifts, letting go of the "ideas of right doing and wrong doing" (Rumi) and "only letting the soft animal of your body love what it loves" (Mary Oliver). I am no longer at war with my body, with sensation and pleasure. I can now not only accept it and enjoy it, but seek it out and help others find it as well.

And JOY is the word. So much joy! Opening to this part of who I am brings a huge smile to my face. Our ability to connect with other humans in this amazing transcendent way — through touch, eye contact, movement, sensuality - is one of the most amazing (maybe THE most amazing) and joyful blessings that we have in this human form.

While there are still parts of me from 35+ years of conditioning that still feel great concern for my current day choices, there is a deeper, soulful part of me that is feeling called — this part is connected to nature, spirit, and my body and when I’m able to connect with others in these ways and enjoy them, this part of me says, "My love, welcome home."

My desire in doing this work is to continue coming home to myself — leaning into desire and feeling joy and aliveness — and helping others find the same.

Love,

Beloved Morpho