Align Your Orbit #68 — Space to Breathe
Align Your Orbit is a series of philosophical and somatic experiments to guide ourselves toward intentionality and impact. Synthesized after years of conversations and now with inspirations from MidJourney, we’re fully embracing our cyborg natures. Find delight in these journeys of exploration. If you would like to receive these offerings as an email on the new moon, sign up here.
Exhale and imagine that bubbles float effortlessly out of your mouth. Each bubble contains a sparkling planet and a complete copy of your legacy. Each bubble gently holds everything it needs to thrive. Breathe in, breathe out and blow bubbles further out into the cosmic ocean as messages to anyone who might receive them. Trust your planetary messages to become their own beings. Encourage all the ways they will differentiate from you beyond this crossroads.
Remember that you are a set of lungs creating universes. Keep breathing. If you do nothing else, keep breathing. When you are only breath, keep breathing. It is enough to breathe one more breath here with us.
If you’d like to experience these recipes as a playlist, here’s the link.
New Experiments
1. disrupt meditated monotony – When you take a trip outside your day-to-day life, disconnect from the news cycle. Breathe into your own re-sensitization. Upon your return, enter back into consensus reality gently with fresh eyes. You are not the same person who left. You are more able to transform this rage in your belly. Do not waste these lessons or this energy.
Challenge Mode: Dominant culture strips us of our own agency and participation. Root down into communities and experiences that preserve, protect, and celebrate your ability to break out of the box. Create and nurture spaces that see the sacredness of diversity and emergent creation.
2. with a collective scream – Sand Talk discusses the value of communally held fights and violence. Let there be witnesses. Let none of your rage cling to the darkness. It is always better to bring it to light. If we continue to crave peace, we will forget to crave liberation.
Challenge Mode: When we trust our own safety to external forces, we become lax. We take peace for granted. We ignore the violence occurring on our behalf outside of our direct vision. Focus on protection, strength, capacity, and breath as tools to create your own sense of security wherever you go.
3. root in and bloom abundance – As the fruits of your labors pile up at your feet, ask yourself where this bounty goes from here. Seek opportunities to spread the wealth around in your community. Offer gifts to strengthen the network of connections. Accept what is freely offered.
Challenge Mode: It’s time again to refresh your magic. Choose a set of bracelets and intentionally alternate which ones you wear. Carry your sacred stones with you in your pocket. Learn how they ache for use. Charge your memorabilia and talismans in the light of who you are now.
4. to expand these lungs – We build strength in a series of tidal explorations, not straight lines. Explore the edges of your abilities and push just a little further. Growing the space you have to breathe will always make you feel about to burst. Honor that threshold. Offer time for the recovery. Eat what gives you energy to continue.
Challenge Mode: Listen to the stories you tell about your own capacity and assess if they are still true. How are you stronger now than you used to be? Mark your accomplishments and pin them up on the wall as reminders of what you’re capable of. Never forget that you are a walking miracle.
Andra’s Recap of Meaning, We
Our previous experiments related to using what’s available now, naming your universe spark, embracing the unique way you perceive, and creating new language shortcuts.
Wow. Last month was such a profoundly full and bountiful experience.
In terms of using what’s available, I had some great experiences with that when I went to SOAK*, Oregon’s regional Burning Man event. We had 13 people in a first-time theme camp and needed to make due with what we had brought. But, by pooling our community resources and accepting gifts from others at the event, we honestly overshot our expectations and were able to facilitate a delightfully positive learning, playing, and loving experience.
I had messages from multiple sources telling me that I can’t possibly know all the wonders that come out of simple tending of relationships. So, I’m trying to be a little gentler about when I expect reciprocity from others in my life. I want to allow exchanges to happen over longer periods of time to create the fullest possible fertility between us.
That said, my wife and I signed legal paperwork with three sperm donor candidates, so it feels very much like we are hitting a vein of culmination in our interactions at the moment. Much fertility in the air!
At SOAK*, I had the experience of disambiguating a new personal identity and spirit guide during one of the big burns. In brief, I was living into the experience of breathing into the cosmic lung of the planet and birthing legacies that would pass from our world into other ones. I imagined I was leading a telepathic guided breathing exercise with the entire festival, blowing a bubble we could all exist in together. I’m calling the part of me that led that experience “Periphery,” and it has been an utter delight to incorporate them into my day-to-day experience. I find myself humming and singing more, and it’s been so special.
And then the fire itself melted away all the tension in my body. I have never felt so comfortable in my own skin.
I’ve been much braver about using words and phrasing I’ve come up with myself to describe my experience. Letting others ask questions or puzzle on my meaning tends to invite juicier and more profound conversations. And then, past that point, we have linguistic shortcuts that allow for denser and more satisfying conversations. Never in my life have I felt so articulate, and I like the way that feels.
Seeking out the deeper context of an experience or event occurred for me while I was at the burn as well. I made the decision to dramatically fall near the fire while I was dancing as part of a performance I was doing for myself and anyone who cared to watch, but doing so made several people think I had passed out. They were then afraid for my safety. I calmly and lucidly held space for the fear I had caused in them and talked them through my thought process. I reassured them that I had many friends, water, snacks, and warm clothes nearby. The patience with which everyone navigated that experience was extremely healing and remarkable. There is perhaps no other community space where a participant’s agency has been so well preserved.
Part of my ability to hold space for their fear was recognizing that someone had self-immolated at a Burning Man event a few years prior, so their fear was legitimate. Additionally, having gone through fire safety training myself the day before to prepare for my own shift at the fire the following day made it possible for me to speak their language and communicate successfully. It was beyond satisfying to feel like I had a near-to-complete view of where all the pressure points were for everyone involved. And, ultimately, they let me stay at the fire, as I requested.
Whew. So much personal growth and community trust. I am looking forward to the unforeseen fruits of these experiences for many months to come.
I hope you enjoy our experiments for this next moon cycle!