Flat On My Back...

I am officially out of commission...

Ten days straight of "Fringe-ing", along with rigorous "Spiegel-ing" thrown in Thursdays - Sundays, and my lower back has finally called it quits! I am currently in bed with my laptop, a bag of frozen peas pressed firmly into my lower lumbar region. I live in fear of sneezing....

The odd thing is that I've done nothing particular to bring this on. The pain itself is familiar though...This is an OLD injury that I sustained while being a smart-ass during an improv show at the tender age of 19. Sitting is impossible, walking is a challenge, sneezing, as I said, inspires terror. Most likely my old injury is back after two months of stress and ongoing depression - which I won't go into at this time, but isn't it interesting how emotions manifest in the body...seemingly always in the areas we are the most weak?

I am trying to stay positive about this, and present. Physical pain does wonders for focussing the attention on the body...and back pain slows us down. So - now that I'm in bed and moving as slowly as I possibly can - the question is: what to focus on?
No doubt on the issues I've been wrestling with most recently - my early "mid-life crisis".....Or, as my good friend Patrick Brown calls it: "My mid-life healing". I like that!

As always - the career question is a struggle. Being an artist can be such a difficult haul....Not knowing where the next pay cheque is coming from, going on audition after audition to be rejected again and again, "Too tall, too short, we want a blonde, not the right energy, etc"....very little is merit based. It's hard to have so little control.

The BIGGER issue at hand though....Ying and Yang. The masculin vs. the feminine. Action vs. surrender....What does it mean to be a woman these days? I have always been terrible at surrendering. I was taught to fend for myself, and in so doing have shunned anything that appeared "weak" to me - namely most feminine traits that come to mind. I'm finally starting to realise that moving through the world with masculin energy is exhausting me....But here I am, in my 30's, and I have no idea how to act like a Lady! Well...no. I do sometimes...I'm just grossly imbalanced.

So.

My body, in all its wisdom has created the perfect scenario for me to taste surrender. I have no choice but to allow people to help me....Why is that so difficult? Because I'm an independent woman who knows how to take care of herself, thanks very much!

After the Spiegel Show last night...two handsome audience members (Mark and Jonathan) took my arms and walked me to a taxi because I'd been chatting with them, and they knew I was in pain. Perfect strangers! Mark carried my suitcase, waved down a cab, opened the door, helped me get in....I almost burst into tears! (which, in retrospect would have been VERY girly of me! Shit! I missed an opportunity there by being "brave".)....And I felt guilty and embarrassed about it. MY problem, obviously. Surrendering is also about receiving - something I need to practise!

As I lay here....I wonder if our feminist mothers and grandmothers may have pushed to pendulum a little too far? Perhaps "acting like men" has been confused with the equal and fair treatment they were after? And now, here we are in a "modern world" where women act like men, and men are being asked to display more and more feminine traits....and no one knows how to behave with each other anymore. Is it 'ok' to let HIM pay for dinner, open the door, make the plans? I know many men who would like to do those things....but are worried that it will be perceived as an insult! The energies are all messy....

At the moment, I long to encounter "Alpha Male" energy...because it activates my feminine energy...but when I've brought this up with the men in my life (who, God bless them, are mostly well read, funny, slightly nerdy Beta males)...they say, "You don't want Alpha male energy...Alpha males are assholes. Sure - they'll take charge and pay for your dinner....but they won't LISTEN to you, they don'g care what you're feeling and they certainly won't want to TALK about it." WOW! Such judgement of the Alpha Male! Is he really all that bad?

I don't know....I just don't know....I DO know that I don't want to be the "Alpha male" in my own life anymore!

For now - I am working from the outside in. I've committed to wearing dresses and skirts this summer. I've purchased a ton of sexy, girly underwear....And NOW - flat on my back, in pain....I'm all about receiving and surrendering....and a bit of crying...and am taking this time that's landed in my lap to think about what it means to be a woman.

Big stuff.