I Hungered For Freedom In My Body
Although I’m the Founder of The Emotional Institute and Creator of Femme!, and have empowered thousands of people around the world to embrace, express and embody their emotions...
As a child, I was emotionally and physically shut down.
I didn’t start off this way. None of us do! I loved to sing and dance. I’d roll my hips to the rhythmic sounds of reggae. But it didn’t take long before I was told, “Good girls don’t do that,” and, “Stop it or you’ll bring on unwanted attention.”
When I came home from school, bouncing off the walls with joy for being elected as class president, I was told, “Shhh… you’re too much.” I got the same message when I expressed rage and upset.
I quickly learned there was something shameful about my body and my emotions.
I also experienced sexual abuse and trauma in my early years. The shame intensified and kept me silent.
At the age of 17 I married a young man who was also in the Jehovah Witness religion and community I’d grown up in.
As the years went by, my hips swung less and less. I was frustrated with living such an unexpressed life, vocally, emotionally, physically. But I didn’t know what else to do.
In my late 20’s, I felt claustrophobic and realized I could no longer live a stifled, repressed, limited version of myself. After much agonizing debate, I left my marriage. Which also meant I ended up being excommunicated (“disfellowshipped”) from my religion. My family and community treated me as though I was dead.
This period of my life was devastatingly painful. Gaining personal freedom meant losing all that I cared for, all of whom I loved. I had a nervous breakdown which led to a suicide attempt. That’s what finally led me to get support from a skilled therapist.
In addition to therapy, I started going to different dance and movement classes.
I was hungry for freedom in my body.
Ultimately, movement was the key to my healing and transformation. I even became certified in some dance modalities. Yet the movement that was most healing for me wasn’t dance… it was the primal movements evoked by African drums that led to messy, slow, fast, grunting, growling, spinning, stillness... whatever my body wanted.
As I moved my body in these ways, shame and worry melted. The rules that had once dictated my every move, dissolved. I came home to myself and felt more powerful than ever before.
I began to teach my own classes and brought in different elements, such as live African drumming and guided, unchoreographed invitations for participants to listen to their own body and allow their emotions to move them from within. Some participants even started asking me if I could train them on how to teach these classes.
When my mentor told me I was creating my own ‘thing’ I was upset at first. Triggered, even. Who was I to bring forth a totally new and different kind of modality? It took some time and more support to finally acknowledge the value of what I had created and had to offer.
This unique approach to movement became known as Femme! and launched me into a whole next level of leadership and life where all emotions were embraced, embodied and expressed. I have now taught Femme! classes online and in person around the world and certified over 100 instructors to teach it as well.
My hips now have a fuller range of motion, as do my emotions and expression. I continue to bring curiosity and play to the adventure of emotions, and invite you to come explore with us, too.
