chai with zia ep. 02: slow quiet soft season
chai with zia is a monthly chat for paid subscribers of the copper apothecary, my free weekly newsletter on healing and nourishment. You can listen online or in your favorite podcast app, or read the transcription. Feel free to submit a question for next month’s chat, share this episode with a friend, or leave a comment below.
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show notes
Cliteracy, by Sophia Wallace
HOW TO RECOVER begins January 28, 2023. Subscribers can use the code CHAI20 for $20 off.
transcript
Hello and welcome to chai with zia. I am Shivani, I'm your resident auntie or zia and your host today. chai with zia is a monthly chat that I share with paid subscribers of the copper apothecary, which is my free weekly newsletter on healing and nourishment. It is a cloudy January Saturday today. it's cool again, and somehow I am drinking an iced coffee, which is a really questionable life choice. But I think I just keep finding myself surprised by the fact that it's January somehow. Happy full moon, I hope it was gentle to you. Happy New Year, I hope you were having a very slow, beautiful, quiet, soft season.
I took a little bit of time away from the podcast last month, and while I was preparing to come back to it in the last couple of weeks, I was imagining where you all might be while you're listening. To me it feels kind of like you are here in my living room, curled up on this warm gray sofa under the softest red blanket. And we have lit the candles even though it's not quite dark out yet, and we're pouring cups of tea. We're straining out the slices of ginger, straining out the whole cardamom. And then I sit down too and I ask you, okay, but how are you actually doing though? I hope wherever you are that you have something beautiful to drink, that you're warm and cozy.
A little bit of housekeeping before our three gorgeous questions today. You can listen to this chat on substack or on your favorite podcast app, or you can read the transcription. You are always welcome to share excerpts on social media or text a quote to a friend, and you can send in your questions to my email, hello@shivani.co or anonymously via the Google form that's linked in the show notes. Thank you as always for listening today.
Our first question today comes in, I think, at a beautiful time post holiday whirlwind, but starting into the, the really cold and dark times -- this like January to March stretch. Anyway this person's question is, there's a lot I love about the winter months, but I also think it's a time where we can overextend ourselves with family and holiday commitments, and the cold and less daylight can take a toll. Do you have any winter specific care advice?
So, I, I think in an ideal world we like to prepare for these things before December, before November, before the holidays all happen or commitments happen or family stuff happens. But I actually kind of love that we're talking about this question in January because I think the after, like the aftermath of it, the falling out of it, is actually sometimes harder in a way. And we don't have as many like rituals, routines, practices around what comes next. So I actually find that like aftercare is the best medicine after, after this, in January, after the family and holiday commitments when the cold and less daylight like really starts to get at us. There's a part of me that always feels like winter is over at the end of December, and then I come back home and look out the window and realize that winter has like literally just started <laugh>. and it's gonna last a very long time and it's gonna be like the miserable part of it.
So I think part of that is like, part of it is what we talked about last episode around staying warm around being cozy around kind of leaning into the season. But I think for the, the overextending parts I want to encourage aftercare. Rest more than you think you need to take all of the time that you need to rest, be gentle with yourself in terms of expectations, in terms of where you have to show up and with whom you have to show up. try not to berate yourself for the amount of time you need to rest. I have needed nine hours of sleep a night, and I'm trying really hard to not shame myself for that <laugh>, you know, like that. It's, it's wintertime. We are mammals. A lot of animals hibernate <laugh> in the wintertime. it is okay to need more food and more sleep and more rest and to move more slowly than we do in the spring and summer and early fall.
The other thing that I find very helpful in that after overextending part when kind of everything feels really disrupted and it's, it's kind of coming back to earth and coming back to normal again is to be both very deliberate but very gentle with my routines and rituals and practices. I am not a spontaneous person, <laugh>, if you know me at all, I do not like things that disrupt my normal flow. And it really affects me when when things disrupt my normal flow, like holidays even fun things like, you know, going on a road trip or something or seeing people that I love when I don't expect to like it, that lack of expectation or that like change in plans still really throws me and I have to be really disciplined when I come back afterwards to reestablish those routines and to also be really nice to myself about reestablishing those routines.
So whether that's like, you know, doing yoga in the morning. I have a sun salutation practice that I do every single morning. and when I am not in my own space, I often -- that's like the first thing to go, right? I don't do that practice anymore. And so for the last two weeks that I've been back in my own space and, and kind of practicing this. I'm getting on my mat every single day but I'm not doing the full sun salutation practice in part because physically it's, it's pushing myself too much. but also because it's okay to just do the smallest version of it that counts as a routine. That counts as a practice. I'm, I'm allowing myself to say that it counts <laugh> instead of, instead of giving myself the second arrow, right, the second arrow. I think that's something that Marlee Grace says, and I think they got it from somebody else too. But I love that concept of the second arrow, like the, the second arrow is like the negative self-talk that comes after the first wound. So if the first wound is that I am not doing the full yoga practice, then the second arrow is where I beat myself up for not doing the full yoga practice. Like, ugh, you're so lazy. Ugh, how dare you, ugh, what does that say about you that you like have lost strength and can't do the full thing? I don't need that second arrow. I don't, I don't need to talk to myself like that. I can just show up on the mat and say, Hey, I, I like, put my foot on the mat today. That counts. That was beautiful. I gave myself the gift of a practice.
I think my last piece of advice for winter specific care in this after time <laugh> and, and looking down the barrel of the next two and a half months of cold and ever slightly long expanding, extending (what's the word I'm looking for) days is to, to practice the joy of saying no to things. I find that when I have been in a space of overextending myself, when I as a, as a people pleaser, <laugh> I will often say yes to things that I don't actually want to say yes to. I give myself a lot of permission to say no to things even more so in that aftertime because like I need to remind myself that my no is a beautiful thing and my no is a thing that I honor even when it's sometimes hard to do that. I have to again, give myself a lot of permission to practice that no and keep saying no even sometimes when it's something that I want or something that I think that I should want like, I don't know, going to, usually it's going to something social or like staying out later than I want to.
It's a beautiful thing to say no and to come home and to fill a hot water bottle and to be in bed by 9:30, like that's gorgeous to me. <laugh> In these, in these overextended times in the, in like the actual social time or the holiday time, that's beautiful. I love, I love that I can, you know, do my, do my midnight party situation -- fine, but for the next two weeks I want to be in bed at 9:30, 10 o'clock. I want to be curled up with a stupid TV show on Netflix and my hot water bottle and my like beautiful duvet and just stay there for a while. And that feels delicious, and I let it feel delicious.
Yeah, I think that's my advice. Let it feel delicious. Thank you for this beautiful question.
Our next question today is also a really gorgeous question and has some more lessons about the joy of saying no the deliciousness of saying no.
This question is, I currently work a nine to five job that I don't hate, but don't love, and I think I need a change. I am burned out and working a desk job eight hours a day has given me severe chronic pain, but I don't yet have a diagnosis. My boss is supportive and gives me a lot of autonomy and flexibility, which is why I've stayed so long. I'm trying to figure out whether or not I can leave either temporarily with FMLA or fully quitting altogether, but I'm worried not share what comes next and scared of the unknown. How do I decide?
Oh my gosh, I love this question. What a beautiful question. And to you dear question asker I want to first just send you so much love and so much care. this is -- you are doing a superhuman thing. I'm going to assume a few things about you, but -- you are trying to make big life decisions in the context of a lot of pain and potentially some trauma, and in a time that is like -- You're trying to be creative and imaginative in a time that is really hard to be creative and imaginative. And so I just want to first send you a lot of care and gentleness around, around your question. I think what I wanna offer you is like a permission to release expectations first. You are, like I said, doing a superhuman thing. This is an immense thing to try to, to figure out and to try to do. And I don't want to shy away from the enormity of that. I don't want to you know, make it, make it small and say that you are like, this is no big deal. This is a big deal, this is a big deal. It is a big decision. And how beautiful that you are, that you are being so thoughtful about this, and, and trying to decide what comes next. And I am so proud of you. Can I be proud of you, question-asker? I'm proud of you for trying to figure out whether or not you can leave and like finding ways to be creative about leaving and taking time and giving yourself the gift of time and break and a break and rest. Whether that's with FMLA, whether that's fully quitting, whether that's just like a week <laugh>, you know, whatever that time is that you can give yourself. I'm, I'm very hopeful for you and I'm very excited for you to have that time.
I think at the same time as all of that, like it is a huge and big thing, I also want to give you permission to make the smallest possible decision for yourself and like, let it be a small thing that can turn into a bigger thing. So whether it's just, just the piece of: I am going to leave. That is a small statement that has a lot of implications, but you don't have to have all the answers to all of those implications when you decide to leave. There's always kind of space to figure out what comes next and space to give yourself the rest that then means you can be creative about what comes next. You know? It's really hard to be creative when you're in the midst of burnout and stress and pain. It is not impossible, but it is really hard. And if there are things that you can do to give yourself the time and energy to begin to be creative again, I want to give you a lot of permission to do that -- to make it as small as possible, as you can in the meantime, and just take it one decision at a time.
I think the last thing that I'll say here too is as you're deciding, figure out what's like the smallest thing that you need or how much time you actually have. Like how much money will it take you to quit? How much money do you need in savings in order to quit altogether? How much do you need in savings in order to take six weeks of FMLA? How can you be creative about how that works? Is, are there people you can ask? Do you have a partner? Do you have somebody you can stay with? Do you have some of those savings already saved up, and just have, you know, mental blocks around whether or not you are allowed to use that for yourself? To which the answer is, I hope yes. Get really specific with some of those numbers, some of those constructs, some of the actual tangible things that you need in your life in order to take that. And then just give yourself the permission to ask yourself, what if. What if I used this money for myself? What if I asked my partner for help? What if I asked my family for help? What if I asked my friends for help? What if I asked my boss for more flexibility or time? What if I asked HR for an FMLA policy? What if I asked my doctor for a diagnosis? Like I'm sure you're doing a lot of those things already, and I want to give yourself -- give you permission to kind of keep asking those questions in this slightly more expansive way. I think when we're, when we're in a place of stuckness those questions are, we, we answer them already. We answer them for ourselves. We say, I can't ask for this. They're just gonna say no. I don't have enough. I can't make this work. I won't be able to figure it out. We, we kind of give ourselves the no before we give ourselves the full space of the question. So I want to offer you the full space of the question. What if the unknown is not that scary? What if you get there, and it is actually known? What if you're able to figure it out?
I want to wish you so much luck and love in figuring it out. I'm confident that you will. And also I hope you get rest and I hope you get space.
The last question that I have today comes courtesy of a group of undergrad students that I had the chance to speak with towards the end of last year. and it was so much fun, <laugh>, and they asked such beautiful questions. I have not gotten the chance to be in a classroom like a physical classroom with real actual students in person in a really long time. So I really loved it. They asked me: If you could wave a magic wand and change sex ed in America, what would you do?
I love this question so, so much because I would change so much <laugh>. But I think the kind of core of what I would do and how I would design it is to start with the body and with pleasure and connection. I think those were the three things that I would, that I would focus on. And that consent becomes this byproduct of all of those things. It's like very obvious and natural byproduct, like it is inevitable, I think, when you focus on those three things. I think a lot of, you know, what these students were telling me about their sex education growing up is that most of it was not anatomically based. They didn't have the names of their bodies -- they didn't under -- like body parts. They didn't understand how things happened in their bodies. I love teaching about the endocrine system when I talk about sex ed, I love teaching about the clitoris and and, and a ver like a bunch of different art projects around cliteracy and, and actual anatomy of how people's bodies work <laugh> when we, when we talk about sex ed.
So I would start there, and then next I would talk and bring into this curriculum a focus on pleasure based sexuality. I think if we focus on bodies, if we understand how bodies work and we understand how bodies feel good and what we like to feel and what we don't like to feel, that fluency with our own selves and with our bodies leads to a sexuality that can be based on, on experiencing pleasure and experiencing connection with other people -- and whatever that connection means, both to yourself and to other people. That gets to be a very self-determined space, a very self-determined opportunity If we, if we focus on those three things. And then I think when we do that, consent becomes inevitable. It becomes the natural next step for, for anything there. If you are focused on what feels good to you and the people that you're with, then consent is a major part of that. What do you want to experience? What do I want to experience? What do I not want to experience? And what do you not want to experience? How do we make our yeses really solid and beautiful so that our nos can be really solid and beautiful, that those are sacred things to share with ourselves and, and and each other and kind of whatever that -- like, that yes is a sacred yes and no is a sacred no. And they're treated as as a, as a sacred yes and a sacred no.
So that was my, my wish for these undergrads <laugh>. and, and for students and for sex ed in America in general. I think it influences both how we can be more comfortable in ourselves, how we can be more comfortable in our relationships, how we can be in pursuit of the things that bring our bodies joy and stay away from the things that don't bring our bodies joy.
A quick one to end, <laugh> to end our episode today. I, as always, am so thrilled to be here with you all. I'm really grateful for each of you for making the space so beautiful, for sending me your questions, and for listening. If you have a question for me to answer on a future episode, you can submit it via the Google form that's linked on substack or you can email me at hello@shivani.co. You are always welcome to share this episode with a friend or on social media.
And I also want to share, I announced last week that I am teaching an online class in a few weeks. It is starting on January 28th. It's called HOW TO RECOVER. And it is on a five-week online class where we learn to deepen our own practices of healing and care. We will be exploring tools to build containers of safety. We'll find ways to reckon with the things that hurt us. I'll offer some routines and rituals to support resilience and restoration. And really importantly, we'll all just build systems together to make that care sustainable, pleasurable, and joyful. If you are a person with a body and a brain, I made this class for you. You can learn more, you can read the syllabus you can find some answers to frequently asked questions at the length that I'll include in the show notes. And as a thank you to you for being here, you are welcome to use the code CHAI20 for $20 off the list price. Again, we start on Saturday, January 28th. You are welcome to sign up, and please feel free to reach out with any questions.
I am sending all of you a lot of love as we try to be perfectly imperfect together, and I will talk to you again soon. Until next time.