It’s 4th of July week.
The flags are out. The fireworks boom.
But nothing about this moment feels celebratory.
I can’t fake it. I won’t.
Because what we’re living through in this country is not fucking freedom.
And my body knows it.
Does yours, too?
The Body Knows Before the News:
I work with bodies.
I translate the language of the nervous system—those quiet signals beneath our story.
The subtle constriction.
The ache behind the eyes.
The shoulders that won’t drop.
The breath that won’t deepen.
I’ve learned how to track truth by listening to what tenses and what softens.
And right now, there is a quiet epidemic of contraction.
We are all, in some way, bracing.
Not always visibly.
But internally.
Bracing against the next wave of violence, erasure, rollback, betrayal.
Bracing against another day of pretending things are okay when they’re anything but.
It’s not just the news—it’s how the nervous system has started to adapt.
And what terrifies me most is not just the cruelty itself,
but how banal it’s becoming.
This is what happens when systems of harm are normalized.
When brutality is dressed up as tradition.
When unkindness becomes cultural currency.
When people who still care—really fucking care—start to go numb just to get through the day.
We call it fatigue.
Apathy. Cynicism.
But really?
It’s grief.
It’s overwhelm.
It’s the body saying: This is too much.
Act 2
This year especially, Independence Day feels more grotesque than ever.
A national holiday asking us to celebrate “freedom” while liberty is being stripped from so many, in broad daylight.
And yet, in a strange way, it also feels more honest—
because if we return to the roots of the Declaration of Independence, there’s something here;
Not in the mythology.
Not in the sanitized history.
But in the act of saying: ENOUGH.
In its rawest form, the Declaration was a rupture.
A refusal.
A nervous system response.
A people saying: The terms of these conditions are no longer acceptable.
We will not comply.
We will not collude.
We will not normalize harm.
It wasn’t perfect. Far fucking from it.
It excluded most of us and was written by white men who enslaved others, dehumanized millions, and sanctioned the theft of land under the banner of “The New World”
But the impulse—to seek self-determination, to dare to center the right to pursue happiness—
still holds resonance.
That part?
That part I want to celebrate.
The part that says: This is not normal. This is not acceptable.
That democracy means we can loudly and proudly proclaim our dissent & divestment from power over & delusional greed.
3.
This country isn’t just in trouble.
It’s in a state of engineered dysregulation.
And it is not accidental.
If you can keep people afraid, scattered, overstimulated, and ashamed—
you can control them.
If you can keep them disconnected from their bodies, their breath, their ability to pause and feel—and each other—
you can make them believe anything.
And that’s exactly what we’re witnessing.
We are not meant to live in fight-or-flight all the time.
We are not built to absorb mass suffering before breakfast and then log into Zoom like nothing happened.
The body cannot metabolize it all.
So it shuts down.
It flattens.
It dissociates.
Appropriate responses, under the circumstances.
But we’re not broken.
We’re adapting.
And we are paying dearly for that adaptation with our joy.
Our clarity.
Our connection.
4.
There is so much grief here.
Grief for what’s being done in our names.
Grief for rights revoked and safety shattered.
Grief for people whose pain never even makes the news.
Grief for how numb we’ve had to become just to keep functioning.
Grief for the world we know is possible, but feels so far away.
And here’s another thing: in this culture, grief isn’t welcome.
It’s not efficient.
It’s not profitable.
It doesn’t fit into a ‘content strategy’.
But unexpressed grief doesn’t go away—
it burrows.
It shows up as autoimmune disease.
As depression.
As reactivity.
As hopelessness.
As the slow leak of vitality.
Or it becomes rage.
Becomes violence. Silence. Despair.
We are saturated with sorrow.
And we’re being asked to pretend we’re fine.
We are not fine.
This is soul-level disconnection
This isn’t about politics.
This is about the soul of a country slowly being stripped of its capacity to feel.
This is about the normalization of cruelty.
The reward system for dissociation.
The slow, grinding corrosion of empathy.
And yet—so many of us are still here.
Still feeling.
Still holding onto our tenderness like a candle in a storm.
That’s the miracle— that’s worth celebrating.
5.
I don’t have answers or a solution for all that’s happening.
And I don’t have a to-do list for the revolution required to dismantle all of this.
But I do know that returning to your body is part of it.
That belonging to yourself is part of it.
That co-regulation and collective care and mutual aid is part of it.
That remembering how to stay soft, sovereign, awake & interdependent in a culture built on domination & divisiveness is part of it.
That you and I are a part of it when we raise our voices (and hearts) louder than the bombs (and fireworks) bursting in air.
That’s revolutionary.
Here are a few practices that can support you during this week of cognitive dissonance, if you need them. They won’t save the world—but may they help us stay tender, true, and human inside of it:
1. Let yourself orient.
Look around.
Find five things that whisper safety, warmth, truth.
Let your eyes settle.
Let your body know: I am here. I am not alone. I am allowed to feel safe for one breath at a time.
2. Grieve without apology.
Write it raw.
Cry until the shape of your sadness softens.
Howl if you need to.
Name what has been lost.
Name what you’re afraid of losing.
Grief metabolized becomes fuel. Grief denied becomes armor. And we are too alive to turn to stone.
3. Co-regulate with something/one that doesn't need you to explain.
A tree.
A dog.
A river.
A friend who knows the language of silence.
Let yourself lean.
Let your breath find theirs.
Let any pressure to perform fall away.
4. Protect your joy like a candle you’re carrying through a storm.
Because it is sacred.
Even in ruin.
Especially in ruin.
A ripe peach.
A song you sing twice just for yourself.
A poem that blooms on your tongue.
Let it all in.
Let it remind you of what still pulses with light & life & truth.
5. Refuse the trance of normalcy.
Say it aloud: This is not normal.
Say it like a prayer.
Say it like a boundary.
Say it like a declaration of allegiance to your own body’s truth.
You don’t have to fix it all.
You just have to stay soft enough to feel,
strong enough to refuse the numbness,
and human enough to keep choosing care—
even here, even now.
This Is Not Normal. And You Are Not Alone.
Let this be a love letter to the ones still feeling.
The ones who cry in their cars.
The ones whose rage is rooted in care.
The ones who can’t celebrate this country without grieving it too.
The ones who are too tender for this world and too fierce to hide from it.
There’s something honest happening beneath the surface of this Independence Day.
Not a celebration.
Not a spectacle.
But a remembering.
A remembering of the intent of freedom.
A remembering that our nervous systems carry ancient knowing.
That our grief is not the enemy—it’s the doorway.
So when the noise gets too loud, put your feet on the Earth.
Press your palms to bark, to stone, to soil.
Let the river wash over you.
Let the sunlight remind you: this, too, is your birthright.
The Earth holds more healing than any oppressive system can take away.
Let her remind you of a freedom older than empires.
Because out there,
freedom is just a slogan—
but in the body,
it’s emancipation
.