Embodiment means we no longer say, I had this experience; we say, I am this experience. ~Sue Monk Kidd

Visceral Self: Writing Through the Body: Week Four Solar Plexus | Turn Until It Flares To The Limit

Visceral Self: Writing Through the Body founding & paid events below (manage/upgrade your membership here). All Zoom links emailed day of events. We cannot wait to see you! xo

🗓️ Thursday, April 25, Noon-1PM Central, Silent Co-Write on Zoom (paid)

🕯️Wed May 1, 8 PM CT, Candlelight Yoga Nidra on Zoom (founding)

🗓️ Thursday, May 23, Noon-1 PM Silent Co-Write on Zoom (paid)

🕯️Wed June 12, 8 PM CT, Candlelight Yoga Nidra (founding)

🕯️Friday June 21, 1 PM CT, Celebratory Live Solstice Salon (founding)

“When we inhale, the air comes into the inner world.
When we exhale, the air goes out to the outer world.
The inner world is limitless, and the outer world is also limitless.
We say "inner world" or "outer world" but actually,
There is just one whole world.”

―Shunryu Suzuki

This week, it’s all about becoming—which is what we’ve been discussing in the comments (which are so marvelous, and a DIY MFA in and of themselves). Discussing how we write ourselves into becoming, that is. Because don’t we? Write ourselves into becoming?

I think so.

Paradoxically, though, I think we do accomplish that “writing ourselves into being” best when we look outward at least as much as inward, because the outer world reveals the inner world—and often with more accuracy than through any other means.

Remember that time we talked about the Anais Nin quote that says we don’t see the world as it is, but as we are?

This week, a Visceral Self writer said:

I'm amazed by the way this writing intensive is making me so aware of how I write disproportionately about the internal relative to how much I describe the external. This feels like such an important thing to be growing an awareness of in my writing—thank you, thank you thank you.

This writer’s note, along with the gripping snippet of new work that she shared, reminded me of all the other times we’ve looked very closely at the world and collected very precise, literal observations of what we saw/heard/felt/smelled/tasted (i.e., shimmers & shards), and then added the words “I am…” in front of those observations.

All of these past conversations and efforts are relevant to our work right now, as is yesterday’s Lit Salon post on how the literal can bring the metaphorical alive.

None of the above is required reading! But I did want you to have these links handy, in case you want them as we explore the third chakra, the solar plexus, with its selfhood and radiant energy of identity (which reminds me, too, of our recent Thursday Thread: What Makes You YOU, where we tried to home in on a particular quality or qualities that make us who we are).

And by the way, if you have been wanting to join us but haven’t yet, you absolutely still can, at any point in our process. If you have questions or reservations, feel free to email jeannine@writinginthedark.org, or post them in the comments if you’re already a paid subscriber but still have questions about jumping into this work.

Also, a reminder to us all: remember, please, to go at your own pace, to take breaks as needed, to trust yourself to stop if you need to, and to use this very effective 5,4,3,2,1 grounding technique as a substitute for any exercise or prompt in this intensive if ever you need to take a step back and just be present. This is actually fully embodied writing!

And now, a memory of being fitted for a prom dress.

The tailor shop was a dusty backroom on Raymond Avenue in St. Paul, between the corner grocery and the tax preparer’s office. I went alone, wadded bills from my job at Arby’s stuffed into my pocket. The seamstress was brisk and careful. She closed the scuffed door behind me and instructed me to take off my jeans and my t-shirt and stand in front of the three-way mirror. I shivered in my bra and underwear as she measured my narrow hips, my waist, my breasts. Her fingertips grazed my skin, pinching the tape measure, recording the numbers on a yellow pad.

I held myself still and stared at the naked girl.

I watched as she was measured and fitted.

The above is excerpted from a longer essay called “The Theme Was Inspiration,” that I wrote about 10 years ago for Star Tribune. The essay is about how I have no memory of attending the prom for which I was being fitted for that dress, and the reasons for my memory loss. I was trying to capture a sense of this narrator’s separation from her body without using the word “disembodied” or “disassociation.” I just wanted the reader to feel the sensation without my having to explain it.

I can’t be certain whether the excerpt demonstrates the effect I was going for (feel free to share your thoughts in the comments), but I shared it with you now as an example of a time I intentionally tried to use literal observations in ways that could carry more than the literal load, if that makes sense.

Here’s another example of where a writer is (in my estimation, having read and taught this book repeatedly), using literal details to do bigger work—this is from the opening of Jane Hamilton’s novel, A Map of The World (you can read the whole opening here if you want):

I opened my eyes on a Monday morning in June last summer and I heard, somewhere far off, a siren belting out calamity. It was the last time I would listen so simply to a sound that could mean both disaster and pursuit. Emma and Claire were asleep and safe in their beds, and my own heart seemed to be beating regularly. If the barn was out the window, clean, white, the grass cropped as close as a golf course, the large fan whirring in the doorway, then my husband Howard was all right. I raised up to take a look. It was still standing, just as I suspected it would be.

And yes, with the “It was the last time I would listen so simply to a sound…” we do get interiority as well as foreshadowing (both of which I think are very effective here!), but, for the most part, this paragraph is literal, and, even if we removed the foreshadowing sentence, the literal details do big work in the context of the story that soon unfolds.

Finally, here is Abigail Thomas using literal details to establish desire and pursuit in the narrator:

The dogs and I wake when the sun comes up, we are all excited today. The dogs tumble all over themselves to be first down the porch steps and into the yard. Tails high, noses to the ground, following trails I can’t possibly see, the dogs veer left, right, straight ahead, circle back around, occasionally stopping short to pay close attention to something I’d rather not know about (but probably will) lifting their heads to bark, or howl, and they are displaying the kind of excited behavior I am myself today.  I’ve been writing something I don’t understand yet, and what I’m following (or being led by), might have laid down its tracks fifty years ago, or yesterday.

Yes, Thomas does make a leap into reflection in the last two sentences, but, first, she draws our attention very closely to the (literal) thing itself.

The amazing discovery I’ve made is that if we can get the literal details to do this kind of work, work that is bigger than the sum of the literal details, we can often attempt a “leap” from that literal platform, a leap toward metaphor or bold proclamation or searing reflection or a simple statement of fact or opinion that truly alights inside the reader. I find that when we leap from such a strong foundation of precise observation, the lift-off can even leave a reader breathless.

That’s what we’re going to talk about this week, using one of my favorite Jane Kenyon poems as our inspiration.

Before we jump in—and especially if you’re new here (welcome! and feel free to skip ahead if you already saw this!): Billie Oh has created an ever-expanding catalogue of Visceral Self audio and video offerings, now collated as a stand-alone post for founding members and provided as an easy button on every Visceral Self post, like this:

Resources in the Founding Member Meditation Guide include the whole set for the intensive so far (so for now, resources for Week One, Two, and Three, and Week Four).

Usually Billie offers video instructions on pose options and a reading of the poem/excerpt as well as the writing exercise, so that you can listen to both while you are in your yin yoga pose. They’re also curating playlists to accompany the week’s writing activities.

If you’re not using Billie’s audio, you can read the writing exercise/prompt a couple of times to yourself (out loud) before you settle yourself into the pose (if you are doing the pose), so that you can write immediately when you come out of the pose.

Straight from pose to page—that’s how we teach this curriculum in person, and how we recommend you approach it at home, if possible. However, we don’t ever want to let perfect be the enemy of good. There are a million right ways to do this, and you can choose the one that works best for you each week.

[Ed. note: if you missed last week’s clarifications on the rest of the nuts & bolts and general mechanics of this intensive, you can find it here, otherwise, let’s jump right in.]

Week Four Writing Exercise | Turn Until It Flares To The Limit

Below, you will find the Kenyon poem and some thoughts toward a close reading of it (including questions), this week’s solar plexus chakra meditation, the accompanying yin yoga pose, our structured embodied writing exercise, and Billie’s supporting materials.

We can’t wait to write with you this week!