An OE customer said this week that people say she is frivolous for caring so much about how her space feels. I was taken aback when I read that. Simultaneously I felt the poke that someone intended that comment with and the way we misunderstand the importance of the felt sense. It kept running through my mind.
Why do we give the space around us, our environment, care and attention? Why do we want it to feel good?
There is an internal space in me that I am in constant relationship with. For many years I tried to avoid this spot and built a mansion on top of it. I adorned it with the right clothes, the right type of apartment that looked the part, building a business, yo-yo no-carb diets. Really anything to avoid coming into contact with this internal spot. In order to begin getting in touch with my internal, I had to begin emptying. A process of removing the adornments I had put on top, a loosening of the girdle of life I had been wearing, a letting go to bring me back to my bones. The space in between.
This is not a one and done affair. Or a get it done and forget about it kind of thing. This is a daily, consistent practice of touching into this space in me. When it goes too long without attention some of the adornments seem to creep back in. After too long, they start to cement on top of me and the chiseling away is sometimes painful. The funny thing about my body is it forgets how much the armor weighs until I remove it and remember this internal space. Often the beauty of the nakedness inside catches me by surprise.
This is true for our spaces and environment. The purpose of Organic Erotic is to have your external match your internal, such that accessing the internal space in all of us becomes easeful and a delight. I light a candle each night not because I want the room to smell good, but because some part of that ritual reminds me to unwind, slow down and remove any layers I put on in the day. I have an alter stand in my bedroom not because it looks good to friends that come over, but because each time I enter the room, something in me is reminded of the me that lives inside and for a moment, I exhale and remember.
Slowly, over time, when the external is prepared and tended to it allows us to live in the hollowed place inside, the depths of the internal. They go hand in hand. A moment by moment remembering. As I kept coming back to this comment someone said to our OE customer I flashed on a thousand, small, seemingly mundane moments when the exterior reminded me to touch in, to exhale, to relax. That is my answer to why we care how our space feels. It gives us access to live at the depths. In the depths is the felt sense we are all longing for.