Hello...it's me...
It's been a minute. The week after I sent out my last newsletter which talked about interventions by the universe, I was in a serious bicycle accident. This latest intervention (are you joking universe, angels, guides, God?) made me question everything, yet again, for the millionth time. I have been in fallow periods during serious medical interventions when I didn't think my body could take another traumatic event: here was yet another one to deal with. I wanted to give it all up.
I went to some dark places. I grappled with my shadow. I felt hard done by, a victim of circumstance. I couldn't make sense of it. I leaned on friends. I leaned on my community. Angels were placed in my path in human form as they always have been during the hardest times of my life. I had to dig deep to find the grace in it. I broke my jaw and sprained my left arm: if I moved my arm I would shriek in pain and I couldn't laugh because it hurt (endless apologies to my friends who took care of me for the first week and were continuously shocked by my yelps and endless gratitude to them for also making me laugh). I'm left-handed and my livelihood is linked to WRITING and TYPING. Couldn't do that. FFS. Had to sign and write things with my right hand, a hilariously of course this is what's happening right now twist of fate: illegible to all. Throw in a casual international move to the mix in the midst of a global pandemic wearing a sling and only eating soft foods for good measure. I'm here to tell you that the intensity of the past few months has been dialled up to 11 and I'm just sat here now watching the dust settle.
I'm in New York now and have building myself back up, piecing myself back together. Healing is a motherfucker and I've had to do so much of it - as we all have in our own particular ways. If there is one thing I will forever tell the people I work with it's that healing takes the time that it takes, you can't force it. If there is one thing I've learned it's to be radically gentle with yourself in the process, especially when gentleness feels inaccessible. The inner voice that tells me: ‘Nora, get over it, you’re not healing fast enough.' will be met with my body wisdom to say: ‘Stop, rest, be quiet, heal.' The human body is extraordinarily resilient and this is what I've learned over and over again. Though I am pissed off at how many times I've been taught this lesson, I'm also in awe of how wounds heal over time: both physical and emotional.
Many good things have happened through it all, as they always do. I won a competition with Soho House to get my podcast So, Life Wants You Dead made. It's a project I've been working on since the end of 2019 about the patient experience and healing. I am so excited that I get to make it in the way I had hoped. Watch this space for the first season in 2022.
It seems fitting that I would reemerge from the depths of this pause to open my mouth again in the midst of Scorpio season on the full moon eclipse in Taurus - intensity is clearly my thing. The Scorpio mantra in Esoteric astrology, which I learned from the great poet, astrologer and teacher
Heidi Rose Robbins is ‘Warrior I am and from the battle, I emerge triumphant.’ I've been in battle, I have the scars (which annoyingly I now have more of) to prove it and I am ready to move forward, move on and keep going.
In the interim, I've completed more training with my beloved teacher Adriana Rizzolo in her school Body Temple Dance, a somatic movement practice that is SO healing and also SO fun. I'm looking forward to offering classes soon paired with regular meditation and breathwork classes both in-person in NYC and the Hudson Valley and online, so stay tuned. In the meantime, my books are open for private sessions, which you can learn more about here.
Thanks for being here, thanks for sticking with me, thanks for being you.