Let’s suppose for a moment, that you, like me are working on some kind of self-actualization.

 

Call it whatever you want.

Even simply “being a better person”, or “being the best version of yourself you can be”.

 

A lot of us are striving for this for some reason or another.

Just consider the billions of dollars of revenue found in self help sales.

 

I want to point to something that almost never gets talked about in the myriad of self help “hacks” out there.

Strategies that claim to trick your brain into “doing better”.

 

Most of them are missing a very important – no an essential – piece.

Many are seducing us into thinking we can trick ourselves into behaving in a “correct” or desirable way, when they are leaving out the most essential piece.

 

Our biology.

 

Our biology makes us do things.

And we are so hopelessly naive to think we can out think, out run, or outsmart it.

 

We cannot overcome our biology anymore than a woman who is crowning can just close her legs and pretend she isn’t already deep in the process of birthing.

 

This isn’t hyperbole.

It’s fact.

 

So no, those self help hacks aren’t going to do shit when you’re triggered because it’s your biology that’s being triggered.

 

Marketers know this.

The advertise to our so-called “reptilian brain” (which is really just our whole animal body in all of its incredible wholeness).

And it works.

 

We are seduced into buying our way into fantasy.

Sex doesn’t sell.

Our animal being is stirred into ferocious desire and drive that defies logic.

Logic is the real illusion.

The fantasy that we are in control of our physical form.

When really, we are along for the ride.

 

And what a spectacular ride it is, really!

 

If we can get past the idea that we have control over everything.

On a side note, can you just imagine! The idea that our minds control biological function! Just thinking yourself into needing to poop when it’s convenient and not when you’re about to get on stage and do something that triggers your nervous system to high noon! Laughable!!!

 

Triggers.

 

So what can we do?

What are the real strategies?

And why is almost no one talking about them?

 

We can begin to heal our relationship with our own biology.

 

Just like the woman with baby crowing, we must surrender to the experience.

Baby, like biology is happening whether we like it or not in that moment.

 

It’s one of the reasons we so desperately try to sanitize and “manage” the natural world.

We are not at peace with our own relationship to our own animal being.

 

This is what embodiment is essentially.

It’s simply acceptance of our animal nature, and the willingness to let it be felt, experienced, move us.

 

It’s surrender.

 

It’s like any relationship, one that requires tending, and nurturing, and as much grace from judgment as we can manage in the moment.

 

I’ve found that simply in better understanding my own biology from the perspective of it having it’s own intelligence has allowed me bit by bit to accept what is difficult for me to accept.

 

My menstrual cycle for example.

It’s always been a challenge physically with nausea, debilitating pain, and sometimes flu-like symptoms.

But like so many women who have been told to go on birth control and just shove it under the rug like some nasty thing we’re trying to hide, I always intuitively knew there was something deeper here.

25 years.

Monthly waves.

My perspective and relationship with myself, evolving over time.

My biology still with me, now cycling with the moon.

There is still pain.

Nausea.

Headaches.

Also now,

there is ceremony.

There is release and processing of deep anger and rage.

There is a conversation with this intelligent animal being I embody.

She is home.

I accept.

 

I think that’s the biggest – and most challenging – piece of all.

Acceptance.

 

It probably took me over 20 years to accept.

And I’m still deepening into acceptance every day.

 

I accept my humanness in its entirety.

Even when I can’t.

Even when I don’t want to.

Even when I don’t like it.

 

I accept my triggers.

I let myself be responsible for them,

and also soften into them.

 

I give myself more grace than ever.

I still require more.

More grace is a work in progress.

 

So that is what we can do.

We can be responsible for our animal.

We can embrace and accept Her.

We can listen to Her needs and wants, fears and desires.

We can nourish Her, feed Her, chose to support Her in the way She needs it.

 

In doing this, it’s easier to take responsibility for myself.

It makes this messy human more loved, more understood, more honest in Her existence.

 

I will say this one last thing.

Triggers don’t make you any less of a good person.

Your failure to control your triggers and your animal being are not failure any more than a mother closing her legs on her emerging child.

Surrender is not giving up or giving in.

It is a conscious choice to accept and be fully responsible for who and how you are.