invitation to conversation

alex · December 30, 2021, 4:35pm

how are you? how do you know?

I got interested in this topic (of how do you know how you are?) initially off a meditation on mood tunnels by Jeff Warren (a meditation teacher I listen to on calm.com, who also offers weekly livestreamed, group meditations as part of the Do Nothing Project). I’m not new to thinking about how my mood colors my perception, sets the tone, possibly the boundaries of what’s possible when we get together. But I hadn’t looked at it in a while, and the notion of affective realism ,

where we confuse our own affect, own inner feelings with how things are in the outside world

—that was new for me: it got me wondering about the experiences, beliefs, emotions swirling inside me and what exactly happens when they meet up with what is .

How exactly am I making the assessment of: How am I?

How about you? Are you well-versed in how to read your inner landscape? Is it something you work on? Has it changed over the years?

These last couple of years in our respective pandemic-lands has jostled all kinds of subtle and strong ideas, assumptions, expectations, narratives, out of their dimly lit familiar places inside us.

Biases, fears, hopes, mental models, love, commitment, loss, anger, longing, grief…What if we gave them a little space to move around, be seen? Would anything change?

I’m curious about this, and invite you to picnic on it. We’ll slow things down to the speed of meaning and see what we see. I’ll send discussion prompts over the weekend and you’ll receive reminder emails with the Zoom login info from Luma once you register. There is nothing you need to do to prepare. Just, some of us like to know what to expect.

What do you think? Is this sounding like your kind of conversation space?

Participating in a living room picnic is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership.

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

To attend: Just sign up here.

If you’ve never attended a living room picnic and feel like more of an introduction to UNDERMININGnormal and what picnics are like, you can stop by the courtyard; I wrote this for you. To skip to what is a living room picnic…

Got questions? I’d love to hear them!

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal living room picnics.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

Image credit: This gate was painted by Paul Kostabi. You can view more of his work here. I recently discovered his work and “Can Can Man” is my favorite - so far!

alex · January 6, 2022, 7:42pm

the purpose of fractals

A fractal is a never-ending pattern. Fractals are infinitely complex patterns that are self-simiilar across different scales. They are created by repeating a simple process over and over in an ongoing feedback loop. —Emergent Strategy, by adrienne maree brown, p.51

The purpose of fractals, of the small repeating patterns in our experiences, gestures, truths, moments that happen between us and inside us is to generate meaning.

These seemingly in-between spaces, mundane, habitual, overlooked, or out of our control are where we actually live. Where we forge the meaning in, and quality of, our lives.

In the moment by moment cultivation of our relationships, emergence of experiences and the journeys to our accomplishments and life milestones, fractals is to hold it together, provide structure, connection, direction.

We get pushed to hurry up already. Get to that next major marker. What’s new and exciting? (in the midst of all the noise, how loud, how big does your thing need to be to matter?) When really, what is the rush, or the point actually, when—

Small is good, small is all. (The large is a reflection of the small). —Emergent Strategy, by adrienne maree brown, p.41

I’m not trying to say that it’s only the little things that count. It’s that fractals comprise the large in a way that is powerful, that can be where great change, peace and value can be generated.

…what we practice at the small scale sets the pattern for the whole system. —Emergent Strategy, by adrienne maree brown, p.53

And while at times it may seem like it’s the big things, the headlines that are demanding, even fixating our attention, how that takes place in our lives, our bodies, our work, our families, is also comprised of fractals, of repeating patterns, sustained by us.

Whatever you’re doing, you’re training in something. —I think I’m quoting or paraphrasing Pema Chödrön or Sakyong Mipham circa 2009? (my reading, not their writing)

Physically, mentally, emotionally — neurologically, we’re doing reps, carving grooves, marking paths. Your attention is already there. And, at the top of the year, where many have decided on a list of goals, resolutions, projects, values — maybe boiled it all down to a word, a core theme for the year, I’d like to reflect on direction.

To consider the fractal-makeup of the journey, the work, the living we’re called to this year, this season, this week. When we zoom in, get that personal, does it all hold together?

No pressure to know things about where you’re headed or how you’ll get there. Totally cool if you do, if you have a plan in place.

Either way, we’ll just talk, about whatever you’re ready to talk about. Often, getting together like this can be surprisingly relaxing to ideas that are bracing against being seen or tested — whether you realized it or not.

I’ve only recently noticed the gap between what I say are my values and what I do, how I hold myself, hold space for others. It’s subtle (at this resolution) the difference, but what if I zoomed in? Not just to see if the difference is nontrivial (and definitely not to stand in judgment — I’ve done quite enough of that), but to understand the gap, maybe choose differently going forward — even-just-slightly change things. If it’s a pattern, a feedback loop, a habit, a belief system, a typical response, an expectation of a same-old, an unexamined risk assessment, a routine and I tweaked just so, how large of an impact might that have going forward at scale?

That’s what I’m hoping to explore in this discussion about fractals and purpose.

There’s nothing to prepare. I’ll share the discussion prompts over the weekend when you register (for those who just like to know what to expect).

What do you think? Is this sounding like your kind of conversation space?

Participating in a living room picnic is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership.

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

To attend: Just sign up here.

If you’ve never attended a living room picnic and feel like more of an introduction to UNDERMININGnormal and what picnics are like, you can stop by the courtyard; I wrote this for you. To skip to what is a living room picnic…

Got questions? I’d love to hear them!

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal living room picnics.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

$2022-01-10 the purpose of fractals UNDERMININGnormal — Instagram Square$

alex · January 14, 2022, 4:12pm

Many of us walk around (or sit in front of computers, counters, conveyor belts of one kind or another), trying to manage everything. It’s what we do: we take care of things, work, people we care about, committed to, ourselves and our homes. We do our best to stay on track with it all, but it can be hard, and when it’s hard, it takes a toll.

I’ve been thinking about those times when you feel off, whether it’s originating internally: you don’t feel strong or present or interested, or externally when a situation, and encounter, a relationship, a business meeting shows up like door smack-clicking shut just as you arrive.

I think it happens a lot.

(but wouldn’t it?)

I mean, if there is such a thing as on-track, you have to expect that you’ll find yourself off-track, unprepared, misunderstanding what’s needed, unsure or mistaken about how to proceed, bored, dissatisfied, feeling something, at some point, that doesn’t feel like an unequivocal yes!

Actually most feelings are a mix, I mean — people are complex, life, work, relationships, social life, family, healthcare are complicated; what are the odds that you’re in one of those pure joy moments? and is purity a goal?

So, most of the time, we’re modulating, moving among emotions, ideas and experiences, passing through and settling in our bodies, becoming the backdrop, the context, habits, beliefs, expectations and ultimately projections that appear as the world around us, and our places in it.

on-track — off-track
on-track — off-track — off-track

There being one of you and so many others of us (and them— if I’m honest about my feelings), it’s a naturally-occurring phenomenon that off-track moments are common. And maybe you learn to shrug it off, the slights, the snubs, the missteps, but what if we integrated them vs expelling them?

What do you do when you feel off, stuck, unable to decide, to start, to keep going, to remember what it was you were trying to do? When you feel insulted, othered, misunderstood, overshadowed, hindered, unseen, unheard***…what do you do?***

We all do something, whether it’s consciously chosen, in the moment or afterwards, or on an ongoing basis —to remedy the feeling of off-ness.

Can we talk about it?

Not from a perspective of fixing because you’re not broken, you’re being.

I believe in you and your path. No one knows what you know about you.

More from the perspective of cultivating resilience, fostering wellbeing (what do you need?) because I think we can work with these in-between spaces intentionally, creatively.

I’m inviting you to a living room picnic exploring the space between on-track and off. Where they become each other, and where we might make something new of them.

As always, there is nothing to prepare. I’ll share the discussion prompts over the weekend when you register (for those who just like to know what to expect).

What do you think? Is this sounding like your kind of conversation space?

Participating in a living room picnic is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership.

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

To attend: Just sign up here .

If you’ve never attended a living room picnic and feel like more of an introduction to UNDERMININGnormal and what picnics are like, you can stop by the courtyard; I wrote this for you. To skip to what is a living room picnic…

Got questions? I’d love to hear them!

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal living room picnics.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

alex · January 20, 2022, 1:47pm

what is easy is sustainable

Probably the first time I formally thought about how to make things easier — not that they should be easier! I’ve had and held that thought often enough over the years — in a range of incarnations/versions of me, all kinds of scenarios where you just know this does not need to be this hard, or you just wish it wasn’t regardless of shoulds, you just wish it was easier.

That experience is deeply familiar and for me, generally begins with a internal growl of WTF?! I own that. But that’s something else, it’s a reaction, intense and verbose at times, for sure, but it’s not formally thinking about how to make things easier. That it was even possible, or you were allowed! - to plan for, prep for ease - that didn’t show up for me until late 2007 when out of the blue I decided to quit smoking —after 26 years of, not just smoking a pack to two packs a day, but feeling quite fine about it.

How I came to want to quit is probably worth exploring too, but for today, for our next living room picnic, what I’d like to explore with you: is how to make things easier. How to cultivate ease for ourselves and for others.

I made it through the experience of quit smoking - which ranged from full-body mindbreakingly hard to endlessly aching and confusing (I was 15 when I started smoking so basically I had been controlling my brain chemistry my entire adult life, so unmoored and foggy barely covers how lost I was inside myself) to almost, almost feeling ok enough to exhale, really exhale and be in my body for a solid two years (no joke, I was broken) —I got through it because I had made it easier on myself going into it.

I know, it doesn’t sound easy and it didn’t feel anything like what I typically imagine when I think of ease. But it was a lesson in how to make things easier.

Ease is a mix of things.

It’s the moment to moment vibe of ooh-nice goodness that makes you want to stay, to continue, to explore and possibly risk.

Ease is the opening that welcomes you.

Ease is relaxation at a cellular level.

It’s others helping you without you even realizing it, much less asking.

Ease is many more things — It’s deep and biologically purposeful.

Ease plays a major role in sanity, integrity, wellbeing and progress.

What is easy is sustainable. And that, my friends, is what I want to picnic on. This aspect of ease as integral to the quality of our lives.

As always, there is nothing to prepare. I’ll share the discussion prompts over the weekend when you register (for those who just like to know what to expect).

What do you think? Is this sounding like your kind of conversation space?

Participating in a living room picnic is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership.

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

To attend: Just sign up here .

If you’ve never attended a living room picnic and feel like more of an introduction to UNDERMININGnormal and what picnics are like, you can stop by the courtyard; I wrote this for you. To skip to what is a living room picnic…

Got questions? I’d love to hear them!

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal living room picnics.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

alex · January 21, 2022, 2:06am

winter love hangouts

On Friday 21-Jan at 5:30-6:15pm EST (and every Friday to the end of Spring) we’ll be hanging out, talking about love.

defining love (21-Jan)
love ethic: the roots of love (28-Jan)
love practice: a way of being (04-Feb)
love recipe (11-Feb)
boundaries (18-Feb)
self-love (25-Feb)
radical love (04-Mar)
lovingkindness (11-Mar)
love for sale (18-Mar)

There is nothing to prepare. I’ll share a brief text at the top, and we’ll talk.

While we start with a text, it’s not a book club, not literary criticism; it’s an entry point into a conversation among friends, (even if this is our first time meeting), about what we think and feel about love.

So far, these dates are inspired and informed by the work of bell hooks, Prentis Hemphill, Sonya Renee Taylor, Loretta J. Ross, Sharon Salzman, Jeff Warren, Barbara Kruger and Cole Porter.

Also, the text could be in any medium.

As a society we are embarrassed by love. We treat it as if it were an obscenity. We reluctantly admit to it. Even saying the word makes us stumble and blush… Love is the most important thing in our lives, a passion for which we might fight or die, and yet we’re reluctant to linger over its names. Without a supple vocabulary, we can’t even talk or think about it directly. —Diane Ackerman, A Natural History of Love

next winter love hangout: Fri 20-Jan at 5:30-6:15pm EST
our topic: defining love

While there is nothing to prepare for us to hangout, you may feel inspired to pull out your favorite texts about love in advance of us getting together, and that’s cool too. Either way, it’ll be great to hang out with you and talk about love.

Register here to attend.

Participating in a winter love hangout is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership .

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

alex · January 28, 2022, 2:39am

Both this week’s winter love hangout topic (a love ethic) and Monday’s living room picnic (embrace y/our complexity) in their own ways offer an opportunity to contemplate interconnectedness, in terms of the quality and nature of our connection (possibly love) and the active (vs reactive) experience of interconnection.

love…

Is love an experience within you, something passed between us? — an exchange of energy, a kind of feedback loop?
Is it a choice, an act of will, a practice? What guides it?

If you’re curious and available to hang out with these questions, on Friday, 28-Jan, 5:30pm-6:15pm EST, register here. I’ll share a brief text, and we’ll let it take us where it does. Introverts and doodlers are welcome, as are bubbly extroverts and code-switching ambiverts.

y/our complexity

On a similar note, on Monday, 31-Jan, 7:30-8:30pm EST, we’ll welcome complexity,

internal (you are a universe, everyone is — I don’t expect sameness from you)
external (as we humans are endlessly networked with all beings living and non-living, present, past and future in ever-changing ways).

Complexity does not mean difficulty. At least, it doesn’t have to. That’s why I’d like to picnic on it — and why I’m offering a series of four picnics on how to embrace y/our complexity.

backstory

What got me tuned into thinking about y/our complexity was a characterization of interdependence as iterative, that: “being interdependent is a series of small repetitive motions.”

What a surprise! (interdependence is a process?)

[heh]…so, for me, interdependence, while foundational and important to me, was a concept. It lived in the mind.

While it is observable fact: everything, everyone is connected and necessarily so — what functions without relationship or interaction with something other than itself? Interdependent was just how things are. Which is a huge thing if you think about it — basically, interdependence is the algorithm that generates reality. But the way I had it: it was just a recipe written on paper, the unactivated alchemy of life, disconnected from the experience of living.

I’m kind of stunned writing this, that I could have missed the is-ness of my own belief and engaged it only as a mental construct when it is inherently the most living, the most bodied of living truths. It is literally everywhere.

But I did. miss it.

which brings us to us —

What would it be like, my perception, interactions, energy level, decision-making (experiences and outcomes), peace of mind — if I nudged it forward, if I nudged myself toward living interdependently?

What is your relationship with interdependence? How do they relate to each other? What if we iterated on that?

How would that affect you? us? everyone?

That’s where I’d like to picnic. Right there in that snuggly space of what if….

embrace y/our complexity: be seen is the first in a series of four living room picnics, where we’ll consider iteration, specifically these repetitive motions that lead us toward, and embody, interdependence:

As always there’s nothing to prepare. I’ll provide our discussion prompts over the weekend and we’ll delve into aspects of being seen, our relationship with being seen, which is naturally complex, and a rich opportunity for connection.

credit & gratitude

The inspiration and source for the love ethic conversation is ALL ABOUT LOVE, by bell hooks (referring here to more than one page but jump to a section on love ethic, go to p.136) and the source of the [*] quote and the four repetitive motions leading toward interdependence is Emergent Strategy, by adrienne maree brown, pp.93-96).

What do you think? Is this sounding like your kind of conversation space?

Participating in a living room picnic is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership.

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

To attend: Just sign up here .

If you’ve never attended a living room picnic and feel like more of an introduction to UNDERMININGnormal and what picnics are like, you can stop by the courtyard; I wrote this for you. To skip to what is a living room picnic…

Got questions? I’d love to hear them!

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal living room picnics.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

alex · February 1, 2022, 8:33pm

embrace y/our complexity: be wrong

Be wrong . It seemed best to rip off the bandaid with this one . I think we’re headed into counter-intuitive territory here, as we continue the journey into embracing y/our complexity , waving the banner of ‘Be wrong’. Are you up for it?

I’ve reserved us a spot by the fireplace (yes, imaginary, you will not leave your living room) along with a slightly spicy feast of comfort food (maybe we can coordinate a menu — nothing fancy, but I just made myself hungry).

Be wrong.

Not just be ok with it. This isn’t about humility or generosity , this conversation is about embracing and fully expressing your complexity , while I and she and he and they express theirs, which means there will be twists and turns, construction zones and traffic on the way, as we make our way toward and away from each other in an unsynchronized dance number.

It could be fun actually. Like improv. Heh - actually, it is improv.

Life is improv.

The easier “being wrong” is for you (the faster you can release your viewpoint), the quicker you can adapt to changing circumstances. Adapting allows you to know and name current needs and capacity, to be in relationship in real time, as opposed to any cycle of wishing and/or resenting what others do or don’t give you.

Sometimes there isn’t one definitive truth. (My favorite situations).

Sometimes there is one and you can’t see it. (My least favorite. Least.)

Just at least consider that the place where you are wrong might be the most fertile ground for connecting with and receiving others. —adrienne maree brown, Emergent Strategy, p.94

Connecting with and receiving others . Interdependence. We’re headed in the right direction! Even if we’re being wrong.

embrace y/our complexity: be wrong is the second in a series of four living room picnics, where we’ll consider iteration, specifically these repetitive motions that lead us toward, and embody, interdependence :

As always there’s nothing to prepare. I’ll provide our discussion prompts over the weekend.
It doesn’t matter if you attended the previous picnic.

credit & gratitude
The inspiration for this picnic, and source of the quote above, as well as the four repetitive motions leading toward interdependence is Emergent Strategy , by adrienne maree brown, pp.93-96). Can’t recommend this book enough!

What do you think? Is this sounding like your kind of conversation space?

Participating in a living room picnic is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership.

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

To attend: Just sign up here .

If you’ve never attended a living room picnic and feel like more of an introduction to UNDERMININGnormal and what picnics are like, you can stop by the courtyard; I wrote this for you. To skip to what is a living room picnic…

Got questions? I’d love to hear them!

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal living room picnics.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

alex · February 8, 2022, 3:57pm

love recipe (a winter love study hall)
Fri, 11-Feb from 5:30-6:15pm EST.

Until recently, when I thought of love, which was rare, I generally took love to be a feeling. A feeling inside us, inside them for us, or as a thing passed between us —that someone gives you (or takes away from you, or that you might never feel again).

I didn’t think about how I loved, just who I loved, and that I loved them.

What if, as M. Scott Peck explains, in The Road Less Traveled, love is a practice of being, not a challenge of getting and keeping. What if —

“Love is as love does. Love is an act of will—namely, both an intention and an action. Will also implies choice. We do not have to love. We choose to love.” (p.83)

And if it is a practice, then you can become better at it, you can explore variations of it, you can learn about and expand your experience of it.

In ALL ABOUT LOVE, bell hooks, posits that “To truly love we must learn to mix various ingredients—care, affection, recognition, respect, commitment, and trust, as well as honest and open communication.” (p.5)

What do you think? Is this the recipe of love?
Can love exist between us in some other configuration?

What do you think? Is this sounding like your kind of conversation space?

Participating in a winter love study hall is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership.

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

To attend: Just sign up here .

If you’d like more of an introduction to UNDERMININGnormal, you can stop by the courtyard; I wrote this for you.

Got questions? I’d love to hear them!

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal gatherings.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

alex · February 15, 2022, 3:15pm

embrace y/our complexity: accept my [your] inner multitudes

It will never be uncomplicated, tidy, manageable to be you. This is not an admonition. It’s fact. Have you ever experienced otherwise?

There is always more.

You are not a brand, a type or a demographic.

You cannot be simplified to a formula.

There is no algorithm that can express you. Not even a little.

The history and truth held in your body is ever-evolving in real time. The act of even retrieving memory changes it.

There is no tech that can catch up with you, simulate you or understand you.

The same goes for me. And her and him, and them…

Being is not a test that can be scored.
Or sorted. No matter how many forms and surveys you’re asked to fill out.

There is no system of logic, no set of morals prescripts, no way to wrap your mind around what goes on inside me, or what goes on inside you.

Ok - what if there was?

How do we do that?
And why?

I really care about the why here. I realize this picnic takes place on Valentine’s Day and maybe you have plans, but if not…let’s picnic. Pink and red hearts are optional.

embrace y/our complexity: accept my [your] inner multitudes is the third in a series of four conversations exploring y/our complexity.

It’s based on the discussion of interdependence as a series of repeated motions (beginning on p.93 of Emergent Strategy by adrienne maree brown) that describes four iterative practices leading toward interdependence:

Be seen.
Be wrong.
Accept my [your] inner multitudes.
Ask for and receive what I [you] need.

You don’t have to have read Emergent Strategy in order to picnic, though I [not surprisingly] highly recommend it. Come as you are, for what resonates for you. As always, there is nothing to prepare. It doesn’t matter if you attended the previous picnic.

What do you think? Is this sounding like your kind of conversation space?

Participating in a winter love study hall is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership.

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

To attend: Just sign up here .

If you’d like more of an introduction to UNDERMININGnormal, you can stop by the courtyard; I wrote this for you.

Got questions? I’d love to hear them!

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal gatherings.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

alex · February 15, 2022, 3:38pm

boundaries (a winter love study hall)

Until recently, when I thought of love, which was rare, I generally took love to be a feeling. A feeling inside us, inside them for us, or as a thing passed between us —that someone gives you (or takes away from you, or that you might never feel again).

I didn’t think about how I loved, just who I loved, and that I loved them.

What if, as M. Scott Peck explains, in The Road Less Traveled, love is a practice of being, not a challenge of getting and keeping and — “Love is as love does. Love is an act of will—namely, both an intention and an action. Will also implies choice. We do not have to love. We choose to love.” (p.83)

And if it is a practice, then you can become better at it, you can explore variations of it, you can learn about and expand your experience of it.

If love is in the actions we take (or don’t) and how, whether it’s a romantic love relationship or a different expression of love, the tension between what I want, need, believe matters vs what you want, need, believe matters is ever-present, whether actively generating or habitually, perhaps passively accepting, the quality of the relationship between us.

In this study hall, we’ll look at boundaries.

“Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.” — Prentis Hemphill

What do you think?

Let’s talk about it…

While there is nothing to prepare for a winter love study hall, you may feel inspired to pull out your favorite texts about love in advance of us getting together, and that’s cool too. Either way, it’ll be great to hang out with you and talk about love.

Register here to attend.

Participating in a winter love study hall is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership .

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

alex · February 16, 2022, 2:34pm

embrace y/our complexity: ask for and receive what I [you] need

This is last because it’s probably the hardest — it’s an all-in, fully-body embrace of y/our complexity.

Ask for what you need. Receive it.

I don’t mean like a genie grants our wishes, or a machine dispenses it.

I also don’t mean that you should expect to get just what you asked for either.

I mean we practice asking.

We practice receiving.

Not to get good at getting.

And not just when we’re full-on desperate, can’t do it alone because we don’t have a particular skillset or the necessary information. You’re never really doing it alone.

Every thing you used has a history, as does every thought you’ve held, and feeling you’ve felt. The cells, the stories, the meals you ate on the way, the love, the challenges, they all come from others who came before you, from others who were and who are around you, somewhere.

That distinction between doing it alone and having help is an artificial construct that focuses us hard and narrow on the math of mine vs yours.

Making it hard to see human being reality for what it is.

We practice asking and we practice receiving because it’s our nature.

We ARE interdependent.

Asking and receiving, listening and giving.

What else is there?

We can fight it (I hate asking for help and others will say that I, or you, or they do not deserve it) or deny it (that shit over there, that is not me, not mine, no — let them answer for it!), or feel like it just isn’t true, in our isolation, pain, fear, fear of losing what we have (and perhaps have had to fight for),

a notion of hierarchy, a ranking of deserving, a system based on pay to play, or some kind of separate but equal scenario can seem like the truth.

But it isn’t.

It’s the math of mine vs yours. I’m not anti-numbers. I like math, and we will have to deal with it - with it - to get to the heart of this endeavor to embrace y/our complexity.

Pack up the math and bring it along. This is a picnic not a battlefield (though damage has been done); we picnic to better connect, to feel more, to understand more —not to get more, not to win. And not to lose. Though, I think embracing complexity will lead to a very different place than many of us have ever known. And probably, there will be some kinds of loss on the way to new ground with new math.

I need this conversation.

There, I said it. How about you?

Ask for and receive what I [you] need is the last in a series of four living room picnics, exploring y/our complexity. It’s based on the discussion of interdependence as a series of repeated motions (beginning on p.93 of Emergent Strategy by adrienne maree brown) that describes four iterative practices leading toward interdependence:

Be seen.
Be wrong.
Accept my [your] inner multitudes.
Ask for and receive what I [you] need.

You don’t have to have read Emergent Strategy in order to picnic, though I [as you may have noticed] highly recommend it. As always, there is nothing to prepare. It doesn’t matter if you attended the previous picnic. Come as you are, for what resonates for you. I’ll share the discussion prompts over the weekend.

What do you think? Is this sounding like your kind of conversation space?

Participating in a winter love study hall is a way to join the UNDERMININGnormal community.
It costs $7.00 to attend, and comes with a month of membership.

Members can participate in all UNDERMININGnormal gatherings and programs.

To attend: Just sign up here .

If you’d like more of an introduction to UNDERMININGnormal, you can stop by the courtyard; I wrote this for you.

Got questions? I’d love to hear them!

If this is your kind of thing, or you’d like it to be, sign up to receive invitations to UNDERMININGnormal gatherings.

UNDERMININGnormal is where deep-thinking, change-seeking women can find community, care and unhurried space for conversations we don’t usually get to have.

alex · March 1, 2022, 10:06pm

radical love (a winter love study hall)

I’m not sure whether it was via bell hooks or Loretta J. Ross, that I first heard about (more like felt) the notion radical love. Love as a foundational and transformational basis for being. For living. For each action we take.

Responsibility, accountability — living interdependence as the path to full self-expression — radical love makes this possible.

Otherwise, it’s at best petty squabbling. And we get to see the worst and everything in between daily. Some of us getting hit harder than others.

why not radical love?

It’s not a bubble gum sweet fantasy, this sh*t is serious. I’m not saying it can’t be wildly fun… It’s everything. Or, I imagine it is (because I am nowhere near embodying radical love — I’m kind of squeaking open a door here)…even though I have little from personal lived experience to share with you - for this Friday’s winter love study hall, I did want to ask: what would you propose instead?

To attend this winter love study hall on Friday 04-Mar from 5:30-6:15pm EST,

There’s nothing you need to do to prepare for winter love study hall, though you may feel inspired to pull out your favorite texts about love in advance of us getting together, and that’s cool too. Either way, it’ll be great to hang out with you and talk about love.

Hope to see you there,
—Alex

alex · March 3, 2022, 3:56pm

in order for forgiveness to happen, something has to die

a living room picnic on Mon 07-Mar from 7:30pm-8:30pm EST

got questions? send me a note

I look forward to getting together with you
—Alex

"In order for forgiveness to happen, something has to die." — Joe Reynolds, an Episcopal priest that Brené Brown tells us about in her book, Rising Strong: The Reckoning. The Rumble. The Revolution. (on p.150).

the invitation

Forgiveness isn’t about them, no matter what they did —it’s about you. It’s for you. generated by you, experienced by you — sometimes unfolding, roller-coastering, shrinking or expanding— and evolving in you over time: it’s not about them, it’s about you.

It may matter to them and we hope it does.

It may help them to become accountable, to change, to grow, but that’s not what you’re doing. That, is up to them.

And, it may be that you want that, want it badly, for whoever did you wrong to change, to take responsibility, to be a better [friend, partner, boss, leader, team member, neighbor, parent, sibling, child, politician, civil servant, colleague…]

But that’s not what you’re doing when you forgive. For one thing, that could happen without your forgiveness. They could see what they did and the effect it had and CHANGE regardless of whether you’ve forgiven them. And sometimes what they do to make up for what they did is never going to be enough for you to forgive them. Forgiveness is not a requirement on you. It’s an option. It’s a path.

It’s complex and complicated by the absence of conversation about what exactly it means to forgive. So that you can find your way. And I can find mine. And we can be accountable. To each other, to ourselves and to a bigger picture of who and how we want to be with each other (or without).

To forgive is not just to be altruistic. It is the best form of self-interest. It is also a process that does not exclude hatred and anger. These emotions are all part of being human. You should never hate yourself for hating others who do terrible things: the depth of your love is shown by the extent of your anger.

However, when I talk of forgiveness I mean the belief that you can come out the other side a better person. A better person than the one being consumed by anger and hatred. Remaining in that state locks you in a state of victimhood, making you almost dependent on the perpetrator.

If you can find it in yourself to forgive, then you are no longer chained to the perpetrator.

— Bishop Desmond Tutu, quoted in Rising Strong: The Reckoning. The Rumble. The Revolution. (on p.151-152.

That said, it’s a process…

something has to die

Whether it’s the expectation (or belief) that someone you care about could never or would never […]

or that you wouldn’t be capable of […]

that the relationship would always feel a certain way…

that safety or trust would mean never […] or always […]

that you could always at least count on […]

or that this relationship would never have to end,

something has to die.

And that means feeling it and grieving for it.

I never thought about that way before…that something has to die. But it makes sense to me. More importantly, it feels right to make this about what is being lost, the pain, and the grief. It’s a full-bodybeing letting go to actually forgive. And…you don’t get there in a step…everything that came before in your relationship can’t be settled with a click.

What’s your experience been? With forgiveness—giving, receiving, witnessing forgiveness…?
Let’s picnic!

what to expect

Most living room picnics mix abstract, intellectual nerdery with deeply personal storytelling (whether you share with the group or just tell yourself). There’s nothing you need to know or do beforehand to participate. Here’s how it’ll go —

opening discussion prompt to get to know each other a little
journaling session to gather our thoughts
discussion to share and witness
closing moment to feel it and savor unhurried conversation time

when: Mon 07-Mar from 7:30-8:30pm EST
to attend:

alex · March 10, 2022, 4:43pm

lovingkindness (a winter love study hall)

There are just two more winter love study halls…oooh, does that mean Spring is coming to NYC? It’s hard to tell with the temperature swings we’ve been having, but the calendar gods think yes, we’ll have Spring soon. We’ll do that Daylight Savings Time switchover too (why do we do this again?) so —instead of hanging in for online love study hall— it’ll be time to soak in the extra sun, wind and shade hours somewhere sweet outside…

But, first —

In our next love study hall, we’ll look at lovingkindness.

The practice of lovingkindness is about cultivating love as a transformative strength, enabling us to feel love that is not attached to the illusion of people (including ourselves) being static, frozen, disconnected. —Real Love, by Sharon Salzman, p.18.

Yep… #interdependence

Separateness, even if it feels so real, is an illusion.

Let’s talk…

To attend this winter love study hall on Friday 11-Mar from 5:30-6:15pm EST,

As always there’s nothing you need to do to prepare for winter love study hall, and you’re welcome to bring / share your favorite texts about love. It’s study hall, not a lecture (and there are no tests!).

Hope to see you there,
—Alex

alex · March 11, 2022, 3:33pm

spring 2022 collective grief ceremony

Dear fellow deep-thinking, change-seeking woman,

At UNDERMININGnormal, we hold collective grief ceremonies seasonally. While loss, disappointment and heartbreak are normal parts of life (there is no way to care, to participate, to love, work, dream, build anything meaningful in a life without something breaking or ending at some point) in my culture, we act as if that’s not the case. Grief is ok in certain instances - like if someone you care about dies, but eventually you’ll get over it.

Like a lot of thinking about how we live our lives - our personal development, our relationships, our careers - there are stages and you make your way through them one by one. It’s linear in a way that nothing actually is in life. Least of all during times of deep transition.

Is it different for you in your culture? Is the subject, and experience, of grief normal? Is there space and acceptance for it, for you, when you feel your shapeless, non-directional, omni-directional, cyclical, surprising, tender, stuck, painful, love-soaked, desolate feelings? Or do you also try to exclude what is transpiring inside you as if it, you, don’t belong, not like this?

I’m not an expert in grief. This is just the third season of collective grief ceremony for me. I just believe that we need to support each other in our respective journeys, and that grieving is part of it.

what to expect

The collective grief ceremony isn’t meant to resolve or settle anything.

We’ll be off-camera and you won’t be asked to share. There will be no photos or breakout rooms. This is just for you, so you can be with your grief privately, within a space of collective caring and acceptance.

We’ll have three sessions of private journaling to support us in naming, recognizing and claiming our respective losses, sadness and grief.

I will guide us through and keep time, though there will be no pressure to finish, and at the end of the third session, we’ll go light digital candles This will also be private. You can dedicate your candle in any way you like. You can light more than one. Each candle burns for 48 hours.

There will be an opportunity to share and talk about grief at the end of the ceremony. You’ll see if you feel like it. It’s also fine to head out after lighting your candle, and not say a word.

when: on Mon 14-Mar, the collective grief ceremony is held from 7:30-8:30pm EST, with an after-hangout where we can share or talk about grief from 8:30-9:00pm EST

to attend:

with much care and interest,
—Alex

alex · March 16, 2022, 12:51pm

love for sale (a winter love study hall)

This is the last winter love study hall for 2022.

We’ll end with a topic that feels in many ways like the beginning (to me), like where we are, and have been for as long as I can remember and have heard about - culturally - love is transactional.

Love’s gettable, earnable, can be bought and sold, and there are just a few love relationship types, with sexual love reigning at the love market.

Our last / first topic is love for sale.

Let’s talk…

To attend this winter love study hall on Friday 18-Mar from 5:30-6:15pm EST,

As always there’s nothing you need to do to prepare for winter love study hall, and you’re welcome to bring / share your favorite texts, questions, complaints and dreams about love. It’s study hall, not a lecture (and there are no tests!).

Hope to see you there,
—Alex

alex · March 16, 2022, 7:15pm

emotions are like breathing (a living room picnic)
on Monday, 21-Mar from 7:30-8:30pm EDT

the invitation —

Like breathing, emotions pass through cycles of intensity: sometimes you’re breathing heavily, fast and hot, other times your breaths come more slowly, or more lightly, or your holding, still. Varying in rhythm and intensity, quality of breath varies, cycles in and out and this happens on its own, or per your leadership (like calming yourself, or inhaling deeply to ready to speak up).

We can control how we breathe. Most of the time our body leads on this.

Relying on its inherent know-how, your body naturally maintains and regulates breath levels for you. And some of the time, for different reasons and purposes: say…cardio exercise, sex, fear, excitement of a game, other kinds of wins, losses…you intervene, take over the reins, (try to).

How you breathe affects your overall health. Also, you can practice breathing, learn its ways and get better at it.

Emotions, like breathing pass through cycles of intensity, vary with situations and serve a purpose that your body understands and that your mind can’t always perceive. Much of the time they / your body lead(s) — it feels first. Your mind can interrupt, redirect the energy. Though, unless you’re practiced at it, and at noticing, what’s going on inside you/r body, you’ll miss the chance to step in. And, like breathing, while you can step in and give direction, emotions are integral being human, and are primarily ruled by the body.

In contrast with breathing, there’s a diverse range emotions; they have history; we have opinions about them and they have a decidedly wider pendulum swing to their cycling of intensity. Emotions are complex experiences, though they are often treated as if they are merely positive / negative indicators. Good feeling / bad feeling.

Like breathing, emotions are a foundational aspect of experience that I’d like to better understand, and, if I can… to - eh, improve our relationship.

How about you? What’s your relationship like with your emotions? Can we invoke the experience of breathing, another natural functioning of our bodies that we cannot live without, as a way to better understand and relate to ourselves and each other?

Let’s picnic!

what to expect

Most living room picnics mix good-natured, intellectual nerdery with deeply personal storytelling (whether you share with the group or just tell yourself).

There’s nothing you need to know or do beforehand to participate - it’s nerdery, not snobbery. Here’s more or less how it’ll flow —

opening dip into the topic to get to know each other a little
journaling session to gather our thoughts
discussion time to unhurriedly think out loud together
closing moment to collect ourselves and cross back over

when: Mon 21-Mar from 7:30-8:30pm EST

to attend:

Discussion prompts are sent out over the weekend (in case you just like to know what to expect).

alex · March 23, 2022, 1:12pm

overwhelmed? Play is indicated. (a living room picnic)
on Monday, 28-Mar from 7:30-8:30pm EDT

I get overwhelmed.

It’s not something I thought about much (previously), but it’s actually not an uncommon experience. I try to hide it when it’s happening (even if I don’t realize it’s happening, hide-it mode tends to kicks in).

I didn’t realize that this was an emotion. Meaning, overwhelm is a sensation in your body and like stress, worry, anxiety (not to mention joy, boredom, sadness and belonging and another 75 or so others) it’s an emotion—and that means the we can work with it.

We can get to know it better, understand it’s mechanics, it’s source (in the body, as well as the scenario in the mind — these are two related, but different aspects) and very possibly, work with it.

I did not know this. Not that there’s a body-source of feeling that is not regulated by the mind and that there were opportunities here —inside our bodies, in the moment, through play (of all things!).

Where am I getting this from? Well, in part from Brené Brown’s Atlas of the Heart, p.7, where she talks about Jon Kabat-Zinn’s description of overwhelm as

the all-too-common feeling “that our lives are somehow unfolding faster than the human nervous system and psyche are able to manage well.”

and the sense she made out of Kabat-Zinn’s suggestion that we engage in “mindful play, or no-agenda, non-doing time” when hit with a bout of overwhelm…

If you also struggle with overwhelm, or want to explore your relationship with it the possibilities and opportunities, let’s picnic on it.

what to expect

We’re not going to solve it, and you don’t need to bare all your stories of overwhelm (though you can if it feels right — we aren’t making candy) and this isn’t group therapy (I’m not a therapist!) — it’s conversation space, where it’s ok to start in the middle, not know what you mean until you hear yourself say it, and to listen more than understand. Other stuff’s cool here too.

There’s nothing you need to know or do beforehand to participate. Discussion prompts are sent out over the weekend (in case you like that).

Here’s more or less how it’ll flow —

opening dip into the topic, or topic-adjacent, to get to know each other a little
a brief journaling session to gather our thoughts
discussion time to unhurriedly think out loud together
closing moment to collect ourselves and cross back over

when: Mon 28-Mar from 7:30-8:30pm EST

to attend:

alex · March 29, 2022, 5:35pm

anger is protective (a living room picnic)
on Monday, 04-Apr from 7:30-8:30pm EDT

Among other things, anger is protective…

Anger is also a diagnostic indicator (of what matters - even if it’s not clear yet: to you or to others, what it is that you’re so mad about).

Anger can be a path toward intimacy.

Anger can serve the greater good, and it can be wielded as a weapon of misdirection.

Whether you have a well-developed relationship with anger, or if you’re like me and you’ve been boxing it up in the corner, ducking it on the streets and in all kinds public and private rooms, I think we have lots to picnic on here… let’s talk

There’s nothing you need to know or do beforehand to participate. Discussion prompts are sent out over the weekend (in case you like that).

Why go deep on anger?

Well, it seems that anger may be a rich source of information…what would happen if we gave it more space — proper space, intentional space, caring space — to do its thing, less fettered by the bad reputation it has for being monolithically destructive and more supported by a deeper understanding of the roles it plays in our lives?

What do you think?

Does this sound like your kind of conversation?

Here’s more or less how it’ll flow —

We open with a question of some kind to get to know each other a little, then we take time to gather our thoughts (a brief private journaling session) and move into discussion time to unhurriedly think out loud together. When I haven’t cut it to close to the edge, we close with a moment to collect ourselves and cross back over to our respective worlds. It’s personal, relaxed and non-performative. A small group of women interested in conversation and each other’s [unique] views.

when: Mon 04-Apr from 7:30-8:30pm EST

to attend:

alex · April 5, 2022, 5:45pm

what feeling allows (a living room picnic)
on Monday, 11-Apr from 7:30-8:30pm EDT

“What Feeling Allows” is the section heading from a wonderful class I’ve been taking: Self-Guided Embodiment Basics Course, taught by Prentis Hemphil. Can’t recommend them enough.

So, as we began to look at “the incentive for feeling” —Prentis posed the question for us to come to with our own answers: “Why Feel?”—When it can be hard, painful, lead to, or back to, untenable experiences inside you…Why feel? Why not avoid it?

They gave their answer, from their body. And I’m working on mine. I’d love to do that in company with other women drawn to exploring what it is that feeling allows…

And allows might be — makes room for, gives permission for, enables, authorizes, facilitates, contains, exposes, brings ease to…

What would you say?

I come from a culture that tends to see feeling and thinking as two separate spheres. With thinking on top. Like being emotional is a controllable state, a choice, and there are good emotions and ones to avoid, not to mention norms around how and when to express emotions. Binary. Hierarchical. Missing the point, that emotional is how we are. Machines calculate. People think, and when we think, there is always an emotional aspect to it. That part of your brain, your mind, your memory, you meaning-making is ALWAYS involved (even if it’s being blocked, suppressed, sublimated - still involved).

The question is how well do you know — well, you?

Where I come from, we don’t say much about emotions, and when we do, it’s more about the person or circumstance understood to have brought it on than about what’s going on inside us. With all the rules and general rushing toward doing and thinking (as if they can happen without feeling), the conversation (with ourselves) gets stopped before it starts.

With the caveat that this is an offering of a conversation, not a teaching, I’m inviting fellow deep-thinking, change-seeking women to a living room picnic about how we experience the truth and history held in our bodies—as Brené Brown puts it, the biology, biography, behaviors and backstory (Atlas of the Heart, p.xxx) to explore what feeling allows —

Why go deep on what happens when you feel your feelings?

to explore the value of emotions; it’s not that emotions aren’t so bad, it’s that they are integral to being human (this is one of those times when you really do want to read the manual)
because when experience is filtered through the rational-vs-emotional way of characterizing how we think, we’re missing out on a source of knowledge and information, and we’re wrong about what’s happening

What do you think?

Does this sound like your kind of conversation?

Here’s more or less how it’ll flow —

We open with a question of some kind to get to know each other a little, then we take time to gather our thoughts (a brief private journaling session) and move into discussion time to unhurriedly think out loud together. When I haven’t cut it too close to the edge, we close with a moment to collect ourselves and cross back over to our respective worlds.

It’s personal, relaxed and non-performative. A small group of women interested in conversation and each other’s views, interests and stories.

… let’s talk

when: Mon 11-Apr from 7:30-8:30pm EST

to attend:

P.S. If you’re curious about the course, pop over to Instagram where you can watch a glimpse of Prentis Hemphile teaching Module One: The Body at @the.embodiment.institute.

So much life-transformed, smiling gratitude for who what they bring to the world with their work, generosity and openness. — Alex