Episode 192 - The Art of Not Draggin’ Ass Through Life
drag·gin’ ass
verb
To feel tired and uninspired
To feel like you’re rolling through life like a suitcase with a broken wheel.
A state of high caffeine jitters mixed with low-grade resentment, while wearing the clothes you slept in
Hey, we’ve all been there.
That stretched-thin, low-flow place where life asks a lot and your energy has fewer places to draw from.
Listen, self-care is great.
But sometimes, a girl just needs something a little…more
Sometimes self-care needs to feel more like self-seduction.
It’s not enough to just drink more water or hit the snooze one extra time.
She needs sparkle, zest, cheek, and creativity to really fill her cup to overfloweth.
In today’s episode, I’m sharing six simple, sensory ways to feel less like a zombie, and more like the living, breathing work of art you are.
Hit play and let’s begin.
P.S. - If you enjoyed this episode, you’ll love what you find when you click these links:
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Episode 192
Hello beautiful and welcome to the Come to Your Senses podcast. I'm your host, award winning certified feminine embodiment coach, licensed esthetician, and enthusiastic foster dog mama to animals across the land. Mary Lofgren.
Here we explore how to bring more richness, radiance, peace, and pleasure to our lives, homes and hearts through the joy of beauty, the wisdom of the body, the warmth of connection, and the splendor of the senses. I'm so glad you're here. Pull up a pouf and let's dive in. Hello beautiful beings, and welcome to today's episode, which is playfully and joyfully titled the art of not dragging ass through life.
So I am feeling so energized and so alive and so inspired in this moment. And I just finished teaching a sanctuary spa, which the sanctuary is our global community of feminine presence. And it's really where we take everything that is shared here on come to your senses and turn it from information into integration, and make it a daily part of your life and a daily practice. And once a week we have a live 30 minute gathering of movement and breath and body and beauty called the Sanctuary Spa.
And this week was a movement spa called Move Like Velvet. And it was so moving because. You know, the members of the sanctuary are all these incredible feminine beings who are doing amazing things in academia, in the justice system, in entrepreneurship, and so many other gorgeous expressions of life, not just professionally, but in relationships, in service to their communities. And we gather for 30 minutes of sacred time to refill our cup with calming and presence, but also with the sensual. And today's episode, the Art of Not drag an ass. When I think about what really restores the feminine nervous system particularly is certainly regulation techniques, calming things. You know, maybe the occasional hot bath, but really it's the sensual like, let's get down to it. We need self-care for sure. But what we also need to feel whole and alive is seduction. You know, sometimes a girl just needs a little zest in her self-care cup, a little spark on her yoga mat or meditation cushion.
And that's exactly what we're going to talk about today, is how to condition and replenish and regulate the feminine nervous system. And when I say feminine nervous system, that might be someone who is assigned female at birth. Someone who identifies as cisgender might be someone who identifies as transgender, genderqueer, genderfluid, non-binary. The nervous system is one of the most fluid and adaptive aspects of our being. And so your nervous system, regardless of the body you were born into, the sex organs you have, may be more oriented towards these energies that we choose to call masculine.
So some of your superpowers might be action and assertiveness and a sense of purpose and drive and logic. And of course, we all have these superpowers and capabilities, but your nervous system might point in this direction more naturally, or your nervous system might angle more towards the energies of receptivity and intuition and beauty and connection and sensory experiences, in which case you may identify as having a nervous system that is more of the feminine persuasion. And personally, I think that assigning binaries to these energies can get really complex at best, harmful at worst.
But for the purpose of this episode, and for the fact that almost all of my listeners are folks who identify as feminine or with the feminine. That's how we'll be orienting. Today is how to take these superpowers and these natural oriented traits that are not valued or uplifted by a patriarchal, masculine framework in our culture, and sprinkle them into your life like rose petals on top of bath bubbles, or like rainbow sprinkles on top of a scoop of strawberry ice cream, or like cinnamon atop a foamy cappuccino.
Let us dive in to our gems on how to live a more sensual, Sparky, zesty, alive life in your nervous system through the art of not drag an ass. Here we go.
So obviously I chose this title to be playful and to also speak to the fact that when we're in a state of dragon ass, our nervous system is usually so numbed, so fried that things like dysregulated or terms like tired or low energy or, you know, whatever. It's like in states of extreme depletion, the nervous system and the mind only really understands extreme terminology.
And a lot of times when clients come to my work, they feel really tired. But what's really going on beneath the surface is that they feel really uninspired, and the two can feel really similar. You know, it's exhausting to be in a constant state of robotic repetition. It can create a lot of structure in which our bodies can rely and bloom inside of. You know, in my life where I have a lot of autonomy in how I plan my time, sometimes I feel like I'm drowning in the divine feminine hot tub, which is a term that I heard once from my friend Rochelle Schieck, where there's not enough structure and there's not enough logic, and I'm just floating out there on the boy of my feelings, and I need more of that masculine energy in my life and in my day.
But for many of us, especially if your work life is in a more masculine oriented field, if you need to rely in your day to day life on these powers of logic and analysis and strategizing, whether it's work or just life, which in a patriarchal culture most of us do, that muscle of the masculine is probably veiny and grizzled and calcified and bursting at the seams. Whereas your feminine superpowers are intuition, creativity, embodiment, cyclical ways of being and thriving beauty, glamour, fun and play. I could probably use a week at the Canyon Ranch of Pleasure and play, if you know what I mean. Could probably use a little integration and a little support and a little exercise.
And so with today's gems, what I'd love to share with you. Our six laser round, lightning round ways that you can work. These energies that we call the feminine. And you know, the feminine has so many different flavors. Oftentimes feminine energy is perceived as well. I'll just, you know, say my own perception, which is this very soft. Very soft spoken, floating around on a peach colored caftan with long, luxurious locks and, you know, drinking hibiscus lavender tea all day. Like that's one flavor of the feminine. There's also the flavor of the feminine that is like nature in her ability to destroy and her ability to set boundaries and her ability to create from death. There's the side of the feminine that is Sparky and glamorous and zesty and sassy. And so today's episode.
My hope and prayer is that we thread lots of different flavors of the feminine into your life, because relying on just one image is like saying there's just one kind of love. You know, I think about how in many Inuit languages, indigenous Inuit languages, snow isn't just snow, but there's dozens of ways to describe its texture and its temperature and its mood, whereas English lumps it all into one word. Their language treats snow like what it is, which is a living thing with different textures and different expressions and different personalities. And. A lack of understanding of the kaleidoscope of feminine energy can sometimes lead to denial of it or avoidance of it. And so here we go with the grand bouquet, the grand banquet of different flavors of the feminine that you can drop into your days to open up more of this aliveness and more of this spark. So the first is sass. I mean, say that with me. Sass. I mean, just it's so delicious on the tongue. Tastes like a little bit of chocolate with cayenne pepper sprinkled into it. So it's interesting that the etymology of the word sass actually comes from the word source. So if we think saucy, cheeky charm and the number one portal for me to SaaS is the body and specifically sensual dance in the body. So I have done a lot of exploring and experimenting with different types of sensually moving my body, everything from a really deep, sexualized kind of sensual movement where I'm literally just letting my senses guide my body and letting my movement be an expression of my intuition.
All the way to performing on the burlesque stage, covered in glitter, in sequence, all the way to whipping myself around a pole in a candlelit room. You know, actually, I was thinking the other day that where my sensual journey really began was in my living room in 2002. Probably. When I got a VHS tape of the Art of exotic Dancing for Everyday Women, I had seen it advertised on TV, and I remember going to like Best Buy or something in Midtown, and I got this VHS tape that essentially taught the art of striptease and sensual movement, but not just from a performative place, although we're here for that. I love to perform, I love to engage others, I love to have an audience. But from a place of dancing for yourself in the mirror as kind of the core of your practice.
And I just remember one of the exercises was to make eye contact with yourself in the mirror and to walk towards yourself in a sensual way without breaking eye contact. As you move towards yourself and as you move away and, you know, sensual. There's a lot of ways to describe that in a walk. For me, this was not about any particular movement of my hips or articulation of my posture, but it was more allowing my senses and my sensuality to animate my body.
And I just couldn't even believe how transformative it was, because at that point, I was 22 years old, I was in the height of an eating disorder, and I just never imagined in a million years that those kinds of energies in that kind of expression could be for me, for a person like me. And so that's one way to incorporate sensual dance into your life and into your day is through sensually walking and moving. Another way is to strip tease your problems. Now here's where I'm given a little bit of the sauce away. Given a little of the milk away for free. Because in the sanctuary.
During our sanctuary spa, I taught some burlesque movement, and we learned a little routine. And then we took an area of our life that we wanted to feel more flowing, more fluid, more velvety and luxurious. And we did the routine with that issue as our audience member, our admirer, and we practice flirting with and seducing and shimmying as a way of approaching whatever that issue was with an intelligence that's different from thinking, strategizing, mentally mastication its solution, and seeing if the cauldron of the hips and scintillation of moving the chest and breasts might shake up a different solution.
And it was so impactful and so powerful. So strip tease your problems away. My friends. Works every time. The second is sleep. Now I am not one to coach people on their sleep issues. I've been a night owl my whole life, and it takes a ton of willingness for me to get to bed in my sleep window, because around 9 or 10 is where I naturally feel tired. But if I go beyond that, I get this second wind and then I'm going to bed at like 1 or 2 in the morning. And just one night of rich sleep can transform everything about our lives.
And recently in the sanctuary, we did a seasonal intention setting where as we go into wintering together, we share our intentions and what we want to focus on this coming winter, and not just the way our minds think it should look, but the way our bodies are craving to live in alignment with the season. And when I closed my eyes and went within, I got a really clear message from my body that prioritizing sleep was going to transform everything about this winter.
And so I've really been keeping that commitment to myself, and it is just incredible the amount of creativity that I feel and the way in which I don't. Want to die in the morning. I mean, you know that I wake up and I'm like, okay, let's get out of bed. Instead of pull the covers off of my head. I'd want to stay here forever because, you know, I haven't gotten enough sleep. And it's of course, the body is going to tell me that when it's not getting its needs met.
So that's number two. And bring in more. Spark is making sure your body is rested enough to generate the energy of that spark and zest. Number three is filling your cup with an artist date. Or perhaps we might call this a sensuality or sparkle date. So the artist date is a known practice. From The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron, and it's a suggested weekly practice to engage with your creativity in ways that broaden your edges of creative inspiration. And often when we have time to ourselves, you know, especially if you take care of others as part of your daily life, whether that's children or elders or someone else who might be a dependent, a pet, a high maintenance pet, whatever. You might feel so scarce on the self-care that you use every spare moment you can to just do the basics. And that's totally understandable.
And here is where it might be a worthy question to ask yourself am I feeling tired? Or am I feeling uninspired? Because when I'm feeling uninspired, all the sleep, all the rest, all the downtime in the world doesn't actually give me my energy back. Whereas one night of dancing, one visit to an art museum or to a dance performance in a theater, one trip to the little boutiques that are here in Berkeley and strolling around a bookshop, or strolling around a lotion and potion shop. And even if I don't buy anything, you know, nourishing my eyes and my senses and my creativity with new ideas and new experiences.
So surefire way to stoke the pizazz fire to give yourself an artist or a creativity date. Number five is also a creativity exercise, which is adornment. Ah, don't you just love that word? It's so much more rich to me than getting dressed or dressing up. Even adornment elevates the ritual of dressing from putting on clothes to decorating and blessing. This temple of the body, laying offerings of tinkling gold bangles and soft fabrics and provocative shapes. Oh my goddess, there are just so many pleasures awaiting us in the art of adornment, and especially if you work from home. I know I don't need to tell you that a recipe for dragon ass is to work in the clothes you slept in. Which, let me tell you, even as somebody who considers themselves a expert, for lack of a better word in this field, I do more often than I'd like to admit. And just in teaching the sanctuary spa, you know, I know that once a week when I see these blessed beauties on zoom, I want to bring my full merry ness, because that's where I can be of maximum service, because I'm in my broadest sense of inspiration. I mean, it's why I felt inspired to record this podcast immediately after the spa, because my creativity was just circulating and brimming.
Whereas all morning I've been trying to think of an episode to record this week that just doesn't turn me on. And it's not lost on me. The impact that adornment and feeling, the drape of a long lavalier set of miniature pearls, and the fluidity of the kimono that I'm wearing around this one piece dress, where my shoulders are exposed and my pink lipstick is fresh. Like I just feel different. Like that's the beauty of adornment, is that it's not just about looking good or looking different. It's about how it feels to be bedazzled and bejeweled as the living altar that your body is so adornment quick and true. Way into Pizzazz City, USA.
And finally, number six is to put your hands into anything that gives you the sense of creating the other day. And this was also after a sanctuary gathering. Like I just really can't tell you how much. These gatherings bring the embodiment of what I teach here. Of sensual living and feminine living and nurturance and seasonal living into our lives. You know, like into a lived experience rather than a concept that lives in our brains, not just for our participants, but for me as the one who's teaching it. And I had taught a class that day called Cozy Comforts and Savoring Slowness, which is our November curriculum and set of practices.
That's all about savoring the distinct pleasures of the month of November, and really supporting our bodies to live in harmony with the cooler weather and the bare branches and the darkening days. And I had bought a butternut squash and I'm like, oh, what the hell, I'll cut this thing up. I'll put it in a pot with some chicken broth and some coconut milk. And I turn on Practical Magic, which is absolutely probably my top favorite autumn movies. And I just kind of had it on in the background. It was on my phone. It wasn't anything fancy, and I started cutting and peeling the butternut squash, feeling a sense of abject dread as I always do when I start cooking.
But then I was like, oh, I have a Fuji apple. Oh, I have this onion that I haven't used. Oh, I have a can of pumpkin. And all of a sudden I had butternut squash soup simmering on the stove. I was making these delicious pumpkin almond flour. Almond butter cups. They're like Reese's peanut butter pumpkin cups that you stick in the freezer and that are just epically autumnal and delicious.
And then I had all this leftover pumpkin. So I searched for recipes and ladies, gentlemen and humans of all genders, I now have a container of pumpkin hummus that I made for my own G-d cupboard. Okay. Miracles happen. My friends, the one area of my life that I still yearn for sensuality to fully wrap itself around is in my relationship to cooking. And, you know, this night, just from the action of slicing that chef's knife through the top of a butternut squash and giving myself the added company of Nicole Kidman and Sandra Bullock and Diane Weiss and Stockard Channing.
Let's be honest, we cannot forget those characters because they're legendary. I. had such a transformative experience that gave me so much energy and so much delight. And so whatever you can put your hands into, even if it's a delicious cup of coffee, a coloring book, if that's your thing. Dipping a fluffy paintbrush into a mason jar of water and swirling its belly around in a pan of cerulean blue. I mean, come on, there are so many opportunities to create and to play and to immerse ourselves in pleasure through the senses. And the last thing I'll say is that our moments matter so much more than our willpower.
So often we are moving through the day. With this sputtering engine of willpower. Of all that we have to do. All that we must do. That isn't even conscious, but that just lands on our list. And taking the time. You know, one of the things I said to the folks today at the spa is, I really want to honor you for taking sacred time. One of our participants came in almost 20 minutes late. The spa is 30 minutes. No problem. Some of our participants join while they're working, so that they can just have that frequency in their ear to ground their nervous system. Great. It's these tiny moments of devotion to the fire that we call feminine energy, that fuel the rest of our lives, because drive and ambition and willpower are really powerful tools to have in your clutch purse.
But those are things that run out if they are not fueled and kept supple by pleasure and play and inspiration and creativity and rest and sleep and sensuality. And so, my friends, may your journey into scooping your ass up with a kitty litter scoop, putting it back on your body and placing yourself into a velvet kimono, slipping those slippers on your feet and getting permission from Auntie Mary to paint, to play, to make pumpkin hummus, whatever it is to nurture and to nourish yourself through your senses. Graned.
And next week I am so excited. I am bursting at my kimono seams with excitement to reveal a little pebble of a preview. That next week I am debuting my very first come to your senses physical product. Something real, something tangible, something you can hold in your hands to take whatever medicine you receive from listening to this podcast and bring it out of the ethers and into a real, lived, tangible experience. So come back next week and I will see you in our exciting next episode. Ciao!
For more gems on how to celebrate life through the richness of your senses. Head to Mary Lofgren. There you'll find an abundant library of free gems and resources. You can check out my award winning coaching programs or flirt with stepping through the garden gates of the sanctuary community. Come and learn how to make beauty, presence, and everyday luxury a lifestyle at Mary lofgren.com.