Dare Sohei

MUSIC IS BLOOD

Ritual is a creative process of attunement through which we can co-regulate our nervous systems with the more-than-human world.
Largely, i feel the interpersonal neurobiology lens is crafted out of the white (supremacy) lens, even as it helpfully focuses us towards our mammalian and evolutionary biology… it still myopically prioritizes living human beings as the holy grail of beinghood and personhood.
Thus, when we usually speak of co-regulation, we tend to limit ourselves based on a white body supremacist, colonial, heteronormative, patriarachal worldview.

I am personally working on a reframe/reclamation of a “trauma-informed/biology-informed” perspective that allows for more than just living humans to be centered or prioritized, while also not heirarchalizing the different kinds of beings/forces that are available to be co-regulated with. Animist Somatics.

I believe we evolved in a fundamentally polyrhythmic acoustic environment, where even dissonance, de-coherence and “trauma” are nested within larger containers of signal/rhythm/song. Something about trauma and our trauma-based society dampens our ability to feel/hear those larger containers. I believe this has to do with physiological sensory receptors and how we process and prioritize attention, based on how we are raised and what we have inherited ancestrally.

A simple analogy is bandwidth – only so many units of data can go through a wire at any one time based on many factors both up and downstream of the wire. We can alter many factors up and downstream, as well as altering the health of the wire itself, but mainly we can alter what is being sent through the wire by process of saturation, by a process of producing novel or different kinds of sensations.
Any sufficiently large volume of new data can override old data, which is why we listen to music, get a massage or watch TV – all of these are immersive sensory experiences that tend to override whatever we were predominantly sensing before. It’s this process that i’m tracking especially as it pertains to pain sensation and accumulated trauma.

to be continued

*****

Im noticing, really im re-noticing some disgusting horizontal relational violence in this period of astro weather. I want to say, as a human who was born with a penis, who also experiences society as deeply harmful and unfair, all of the “youre not doing enough”, “youre not good enough” bullshit against people, against people with penises, is a fucking shitshow of hell on earth. And guess what, for many people, it’s already hell on earth, so why be a cannibal?
We can all improve, but also, what if this is it?
I mean really, fucking really, what if this is as good as it gets? Yeah, im sure that is uncomfortable to hear, but indulge me for a moment:
I drowned when i was a baby, was abused by abused parents, i was sick and diseased for decades, and i live with chronic pain and auto immune and std issues that i manage 24/7 with a strict diet and neuro-emotional practices, and no matter what i do, these are with me, as they are for millions of people. I’m pretty sure we are working hard 24/7 to eek out an existence of love under duress. When i look at the terrifying faces of men, be they domestic terrorists or ice agents, when i look at the faces of women, be they survivors or perpetrators, i see pain and grief and ancestral trauma and disease. What i don’t see is anyone actually desiring to be “not good enough” or “bad”.
I see people desperately trying to survive and have one more loving, pleasurable encounter before their body returns to the earth.
Look, im just as conned by capitalist white supremacy as the next person into believing that i need to constantly do better in order to be loved and not exiled. And i do want this rampant violence to stop.
But how is more shame going to do that? People are already saturated with shame and blame. It causes severe nervous system breakdown. No one can be a better person if at their core they are discarded, canceled, unloved, and deeply wounded by society.
Until we actually start to love ourselves and hold ourselves to an ethic of love, i just dont see how our actions and words will do anything other than harm us more.
Sincerely, someone who is pigeonholed as a white male by other people.

*****

Perhaps the greatest inner work we can do as humans living today is to radically accept.
Disappointment.
Loss.
Discomfort.
Disease.
Trauma.
There are ways to love inside loss.
Maybe those are the only ways to do so.
Beauty in how we can perceive, and beauty in transforming our perceptions.
Grief is knocking on the last locked door inside.
Live this moment in love, even if it hurts.

*****

NEW MOON ECLIPSE
it’s okay to be sad all the time
It’s okay to be angry all the time
It’s okay to be grieving all the time
None of these feelings has to become violence, self abuse, depression, or delusion
These feelings are all normal responses to being human
There aint no cure for that
We all got told we could live forever in comfort
Sorry
Resiliency is built through hardship and being committed to an ethic of kindness
It’s not a competition
Everyone dies, but nothing ever really ends
How we live matters
Each moment allows for a choice about kindness
What does kindness look like, for you, in this moment? In the next?
All my teachers are dead already, and that keeps them alive!
Don’t be confused, become fascinated.
This world is a crazy dance.