Spark

February 4, 2015 By Kelle

After four days in California and an incredibly fulfilling retreat experience, I slid into my seat for the flight home last night, exhausted and uninterested in talking. My legs were crammed into the small space between my seat and the seat in front of me like a prank pop-up snake in a fake mint can, and my body followed suit, curling into roly poly bug mode. Poppeling, if you’ll recall–a trick too many people use not only for airplanes but for life: outer shell visible, inside one hidden.

And then if we’re really good, we take it a step further–paint the outer shell. I mean, if it’s all anyone’s going to see, we might as well make it look good. (If you’d like to learn more about painting outer shells, see also “social media.”) Fortunately for me, the jig was up last night and there was nothing I could have done to elicit anything other than, “Oh honey, you look tired. Are you okay?” But I couldn’t help but think, in the dark space of nose-to-knee in 27A, that life’s greatest gifts are available to us when we uncurl. When we lose the fear that people might shutter at the naked part under our painted shells. When we trust that there’s another roly poly bug out there just like us–and they’re waiting for us to be brave and stretch out so that they can come join us. Curled painted shells might be beautiful and all, but you can’t really move forward when you’re all balled up.

Okay, enough of the bug analogy. We’re talking about women–specifically twenty-two of them who joined me and Claire Bidwell Smith, and our friend Annie, for our first Spark retreat, dedicated to helping women use writing for self-discovery and personal inspiration. To get in self-discovery mode, we thought roughing it was best–you know–charming villa, gourmet meals, late night hot soaks, morning yoga, mountain views. That part was awful, I’ll admit. So many women confessed that this was such a foreign concept for them–nourishing themselves. Because we’re so busy taking care of everyone else, because we’re selfless, because everyone else’s needs are more important than ours. I’m so glad these women don’t believe that stuff.

For three days, we wrote–both about the ordinary and the extraordinary–one woman’s story creating space for the next. Deep life truths came out through simple descriptions of a Sunday scenic drive, pains from the past were revisited through poetry and hidden strengths were found both in words on paper and from the mouths of new friends. And laughter. It is amazing where you can find laughter–buried in the darkest corner, hidden in the hardest stories.

We didn’t sing Kumbaya or make up hand claps (couldn’t find anything to rhyme with Ojai), but we did hold hands…literally, figuratively.

Permission to feel please? Permission to be honest about those feelings? Permission to uncurl the beautiful painted part of our shells and expose the underside–the stories that make us who we are? Permission to write those stories down? Permission to share them? Permission to stop pretending everything is only great and dig into the hard stuff–motherhood and marriage and friendship and body image and broken stuff and lonely stuff? Permission to say “I’m scared” and “I’m alone” and “I don’t know what I’m doing” and still be part of this club, still hold my value as a strong, beautiful woman?

Permission granted.

Sometimes we just get stuck and need a little direction and connection to push us forward and remind us how strong and amazing we are–and how NOT ALONE we are. What an inspiring thing it is to watch the uncurling–like seeing 22 butterflies all emerge at once.

Thank you so much to the women who showed up this weekend and reminded me how beautiful it is to uncurl and move along.

“I write because I am alone and move through the world alone. No one will know what has passed through me… I write because there are stories that people have forgotten to tell, because I am a woman trying to stand up in my life… I write out of hurt and how to make hurt okay; how to make myself strong and come home, and it may be the only real home I’ll ever have.” ~Natalie Goldberg

We’ll be announcing the next Spark Retreat, scheduled for this September, on Instagram tomorrow (see @etst and @clairebidwellsmith).

A few vignettes from our weekend:

neglected but charming motel we saw on our drive up