The Hollow Belly & The Abandoned One Within.

Imagine the softness of a pillowed midriff, a place to rest one’s head.

As the breath of life fills this container, expanding and contracting like the ocean tides. Many a child has fallen asleep to the rhythmic flow of their mothers’ or fathers’ life belly breathing…

Yet the belly can become an ominous place that is avoided rather than attended to.

Rather than an instrument of the great orchestra of the body, through which the music of breath moves.

It can be blocked, resisted, and avoided.

Or stuffed with endless satiation attempts of food, entertainment, and validation.

Almost like a parasite that is feeding itself as it moves its host on autopilot in order to survive.

In my practice, I often see the belly avoided;

As attention lives from the neck up, head and mind focused, whilst this deep cavern of wisdom and expansion gets neglected.

There can be a deep sense of emptiness — a hole that life can’t seem to fulfil.

The body mannerisms, often unconscious, protect this belly space — an arm draped over the midriff, folded hands covering the belly button.

Unconsciously, the memory body is doing a job of protection and comfort. To the mind, however, to the person, this is often long forgotten, and it feels, for some reason unknown, very unsafe to go there.

It can feel very scary. There’s a hesitation, an apprehension. And often, rightly so.

Often we have lost parts of ourselves stored in the body. Fragmented parts of our psyche that remain frozen in time, scared and vulnerable.

These parts are unaware that time has happened and one has grown up.

To them, the threat is still looming; they are still very small whilst having to do a big person’s job of protecting themselves.

Healing and integration for this one requires the safety they never once had, a new experience of an empathic other to hear them, see them, comfort them, and let them know it’s safe to be here.

For the adult, the belly can feel like a foreboding abyss. To go into the void, one may fear they won’t come out. They’ll get stuck there, in a dark place of fear/sadness/distress.

In truth, we don’t get stuck anywhere forever.

Yet, the child within will still feel stuck until its trapped emotions are liberated, and its fragmented self integrated.

Then we become the safe space the child needed once.

Our empathic other, our therapist, our friend, our kin, is our ally in being the ‘other’ the child once needed.

We are not alone. We do not need to heal alone.

Most of the pain I see in people is relational.

Relational pain heals in new experiences of relational safety and love.

Then, the little one that was once trapped is free to express the inherent gifts that were locked away with it.

Everyone is gifted; everyone has a unique offering of their own magic.

If you feel stuck, unable to move on or step into your creativity, your power, or flow,

there may be a little one inside yearning, waiting, longing for your recognition.

What if your suffering is not something to fix but an invitation to come home to yourself?