The following is an excerpt from the Ebook "Shaping a New Body Narrative." You can access the full ebook and participate in the Body Connect meditation program that goes along with it. 
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Cultivating body awareness is different from training or conditioning; it brings mind, body, and spirit together in moments of focused, deliberate, open perception.

To have breakthrough in body awareness, it helps to be open to the possibility that your present idea about your body is incomplete and contains mistakes. There's nothing unusual about or wrong with that. Your brain works hard to simplify and condense information, and you can more or less get away with generalized and limited perceptions of the body as you go about life. But there is always something new to learn about the body, and always a new way to experience body presence.

Suspend your beliefs about your body
Let go of what you think you know about the body. Shifting awareness fully into the experience of what you feel allows you to gently and gradually deepen the mind-body connection. Approach the things you do as if you’re not exactly sure how it will feel. Over time this practice can generate a fun, ongoing storyline to your life, one that you get to build on each and every day as you come to notice the body’s patterns in more detail and with more context over time. An open mindset gets you connected with yourself, and it brings wordless coherence to everyday life. It can be a familiar, steadying feature that’s there when you’re not quite sure where your life is headed next.

A “relationship” mindset is key for training proprioception
When you think of the body parts in segments, for example “arms,” “legs,” “back,” you may inadvertently limit the kinds of movements you can engage. On the other hand, when you start to experience the various “parts” of the body in relationship to one another, something important happens.

For example, reach your right arm over your head and leftward. Lean to the left a bit for a sidebend, reaching as much as you can through your fingers. Even if you reach far, you may not get much stretch. You need to anchor down through the right side of your pelvis and ribcage, pulling the opposite direction. Ah, see? When you move like this, what is an almost imperceptible difference from an outside perspective can feel like a dramatic change on the inside.

Rest & Reflect
Practice without rest is like eating without digesting. To deeply internalize the lessons from your practice it is important to allow the body and mind to rest and recovery. I regularly find that after spending a bit of time away from one of my physical practices I actually come back noticeably more competent and skilled. By leaving space for my mind and body to process and work together during that down-time, I get to return to my practice with deeper understanding of my own body how it connects with my equipment. As a philosopher friend of mine put it, it allows us to return “more in relationship.” This seems to be supported by practicing meditation, which provides a baseline reference for how the body is feeling and functioning.

Instruction
By providing expert touch and instruction, a teacher can orient your awareness to parts of the body that you previously hadn’t been aware of, and can show you how that muscle or joint is supporting your action, among other things. Cultivating body awareness is different from training or conditioning; it brings mind, body, and spirit together in moments of focused, deliberate, open perception. Working with a qualified teacher is a wonderful way to enhance body-awareness and support your explorations of movement and sensation. 

Can flexibility training provide a counterbalance for our culture and offer a pathway for developing body awareness? Would there be a benefit to adjusting our perspectives on flexibility?

Are we an inflexible culture? Students and professionals sit for 6-8 hours a day. The former are often punished for fidgeting. Why on earth would a youthful creature not perfectly comply with being still for eight hours a day?

Considering our sit-at-a-desk-for-forty-hours-a-week culture, training flexibility can be a really helpful way to counteract stiffness from daily life and prevent injury. Training flexibility is a rewarding way to develop body awareness and strength, and offers  a wide variety of benefits, including enhanced oxygen flow to muscles and improved circulation. (Interestingly, because training flexibility can awaken us to our body's needs, we would become less likely to tolerate such work conditions as we proceed in practice.) Flexibility training can help us correct some of our lifestyle imbalances.

I became powerfully drawn to contortion right about the time I started doing full-time work sitting at a desk. Once or twice a week I would power home on my bike after work, lay out the yoga mat, and bend as deeply as I could. The relief was immense. All the pent up energy found a place to go. 

Watching the progress was exhilarating. I astonished myself with what I could achieve, and my mind began to open along with spaciousness in my body. And excitingly, I began to open to my body in unprecedented ways. Even though I had been an athlete my whole life and had been practicing yoga for years, contortion significantly deepened my body awareness. Because it brings on very powerful sensations, I could start to feel expressions in parts of my body I was usually dead to. Studying this wordless language became a deeply personal journey within the four walls of my room. There was an emotional side to it--the freeing of locked up energy.  I backbended through love and heartbreak. The practice was always there to help me refocus my mind and feel centered again.

I started to think more critically about the alarm I generated with my extreme flexibility training. Why are we not alarmed when someone sits for forty hours a week at school and work? Why do we blindly accept that? Contortion MIGHT lead to injury (as with American Football, running, basketball, or other culturally accepted activities). Sitting for forty hours a week WILL lead to injury, and it will also put you at higher risk of depression and other health troubles. The body wants to move, and our muscles want to breathe. Stretching delivers more oxygen into your muscles--that's partly why it feels so so good. Stretching is like deep breathing. Plus, the quality of awareness is critically important. Because risk does rise at your end range, you have to be so so careful. So present. When I train contortion, I am fully with every sensation, and I have learned how to adjust and respond to the sensations that unfold at my flexibility boundaries. I have to keep my ego at bay, understanding that the deepest I can go is not always the deepest I should go. 

When we sit for hours, we stop listening to the body. If we listened, we would have to get up too much for most employers' liking. But the body-aware must settle down. Sitting for forty hours a week is justified in our culture because we-must-work (imagine that in a robot voice) and because generally it is difficult for us to recognize the danger of slow-onset injury and disease. We are also biased toward mental development, systematically and institutionally neglecting care for the body for the sake of doing-work (robot voice) and cultivating brain skills. We accept sitting and rationalize the unease it brings us, just as we accept driving and rationalize the trauma and death it brings us. Contortion, of course, is on the fringe. People who do it often highlight its eccentricity, which is fine, but that comes with a lot of false perceptions. 

To me, contortion is almost exclusively a personal, private practice. To me, contortion is an intimate ecology of self-study, challenging boundaries of mind and body, discernment, and discipline. Even though it's extreme, it's oh-so-subtle. What I feel in my body from one practice to the next is so slight, yet sometimes so profound. Fundamentally, and to me most excitingly, the practice is an exploration--which means it offers the thrill of new discovery.

Also, I find that deep flexibility can be mysterious, and therefore intriguing. Someone once told me that deep stretching simulates the feeling of somebody touching you--that the brain interprets those sensations in the same way. Sometimes I wonder if this is why I so often associate deep stretching with love. Somehow I feel there is emotional processing during deep stretching. Is something happening on another level? Sometimes I feel like a light or bright energy is patterning through my body, showing me where and how to move next, showing me when my back and my hands begin to communicate noticeably for the first time ever. What is that? Why is it sometimes there and other times not? I also love the feeling of new contact between parts of my body. I get a lot out of feeling my toes against the back of my head, or my elbow on my foot, and I adore the feeling of taking my feet into my hands when I am in cheststand. Is it the novelty? Is it like when we were first encountering the world? I'm enchanted with the questions offered by my practice of flexibility. 

​Our personal lives and our culture as a whole need corrective practices, rituals, and works of art and literature to help us out of the narrow patterns we slide into. As we carry into the 21st century with a continuing bias toward mental development, we need pathways into body awareness. We need practices to help us draw our shoulders back, strengthen our hamstrings, and lengthen our hip flexors. We need to prioritize proprioception and interoception. We need expansion at the throat and the heart center, and we need to move our joints in all the ways they can move. Flexibility training could be a promising counterbalance, not only because it will work, but because it is attractive enough to generate interest and is tangibly rewarding enough to motivate disciplined practice. ​

As a woman training contortion, I represent the extreme end of the spectrum. You don't need to go there. But what would happen if you asked your body what mobility it would like? Would you like to be able to comfortably touch your toes? Stop slouching? Reduce back pain? Flexibility training can support you in counterbalancing the habits of movement that, left unchecked, lock you into an ever-shrinking range. 

Challenging cultural perceptions of flexibility
Just as we need high-quality, careful, discerning awareness when we practice flexibility in order to train safely, we need to apply a high-quality awareness to our perceptions of and attitudes toward flexibility. Flexibility is a total temptress--it is SUPER easy to just say "I want to be able to do the splits" and in maintaining that narrow mindset, the practitioner bars herself from the true depth and offerings of the process and gets cozy with her ego. To touch into the essence of the practice, I encourage a soft, curious mental approach to training flexibility. I would discourage using it as a way to show off, or pushing too hard to get to some depth before your body is ready. Flexibility training truly tests our self-awareness and restraint. Let's highlight and make honorable these aspects of flexibility, rather than splashing in the shallow waters of vanity and dominance. This isn't about showing off, although sharing learned skills and the joys of the practice is a potentially connective and beautiful thing. We don't need to exclude sexual appeal or sheer impressive athleticism from our cultural perceptions--but wouldn't it be so much more interesting if we placed those legitimate aspects of flexibility in the broader context of the practice, including inner-personal exploration and self-care?

To support an intimate, meaningful practice, I encourage anyone training flexibility to bring meditation into the picture. It doesn't need to be a perfect integration of meditating while stretching, but having a consistent meditation practice greatly supports the practice. Not only does meditation support us in applying quality awareness to the present moment, but it also actually accelerates flexibility training, because as the nervous system learns to relax, our muscles begin to let go, and we gently ease out of our rigid holding patterns. 

And finally, can we reconsider the 40-hour sitting-standing workweek? Can we be more creative than that, and systematically implement stretch/movement breaks into our schools and workplaces?

​Let us please, please have the wisdom to hold body awareness in the same esteem we hold intellectual acuity--after all, isn't it intelligent to know what's going on within our bodies, and to be able to take action that supports our best health and happiness?

Do you want to get in touch with yourself while encouraging a cultural shift through your own personal process? Get started training flexibility safely and mindfully. ​​

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2. Shopping for clothes on Amazon 
For a while, I felt like I was getting awesome deals and amazing new outfits. But when I started paying closer attention, it was obvious that A) the clothes were very low quality; B) They were not ethically or sustainably made; and C) Many of them were drenched in nasty chemicals, possibly even formaldehyde, which is supposed to keep clothes unwrinkled and in "nice" condition. NO THANK YOU. You are not #winning when you get the cheapest deal, because there are always consequences somewhere when companies cut corners to bring down the price--the only difference is the consequence is in your natural environment and the well-being of your community rather than your bank account balance. When we go cheap, we're asking someone else to pay the price, and eventually, that comes back to us, because of course we are all connected in social and ecological networks.

I prefer to support people I personally know, and one day I'd like to learn to make my own clothes. Today I almost exclusively wear American Eagle and Aerie clothes. They are quality, flattering, and affordable (especially if you hit the clearance section, which often has great stuff!). I am not sure about their environmental impact but they are doing great things on the body positivity and inclusivity front. Thrifting is another great option. I have one shirt that I always get compliments on, and I got it at a thrift store for $1.50.

3. Denim & other uncomfortable materials
In high school I didn't really know that leggings and yoga pants existed, for some reason. I always wore jeans and was always uncomfortable. As I discovered the options out there and became more body aware, I became way better at selecting clothes that I love to wear. Today I exclusively wear clothes that feel soft, comfortable, and breathable. I love yoga pants, stretchy seams, palazzo pants, and cotton. I can't stand feeling restricted, and when we wear clothes that don't make us feel really great, it affects our mood and thus our poise. And on that note, underwire bras never feel right to me. They don't move with my body properly. They are not necessary for most people--bralettes are fine and they move with your body. That said, I am still on the search for a reputable brand that sells very simple, plain bralettes that are soft; comment if you know of any! Keep in mind that bras weren't always around...Society can get over itself, thanks :P

4. Corn syrup & artificial foods and products
JUST NO. There is no place for these things in our bodies and homes, and artificial ingredients don't even taste good! It's possible to get conditioned into enjoying these products but there is always the option to re-wire your taste buds by nourishing yourself with natural foods that obviously came from the earth or the sea. This is not complicated. Watch out though: "Natural Flavor" usually means artificial flavor. Choose environmentally friendly detergent, soap, and cleaning products as much as you can. Look for locally made options. Your nose will tell you if a cleaning product is toxic or not. Sometimes, you really do need something toxic. Let it be the exception, and otherwise, clear out your cupboards. ​

5. Yelling
Unfortunately this one is inspired by what I could hear from the neighbor's house while writing this. Yelling can damage people's nervous systems and puts us into fight-or-flight mode. Our ability to think and communicate clearly and openly drastically decreases. Exceptions: haunted houses, talking across vast distances, spotting horses or tiny animals, special emergency situations, splinter extractions, acting. Lol. ​​

What about you? What have you cut out or would like to cut out? I'm still working toward reducing waste and finding eco-friendly makeup products, particularly nail polish. Please comment!