INTIMACY WITH IDENTITY: WOWCH! Version 2

This posting written from St. Marys, Ga. the southern-most coastal Georgia
town, camping in the Crooked River State Park. Version 2.0

© 2010 HOWARD MCQUEEN

Intimacy, this experiential journey with self

is accelerated and articulated

in the depth of connection,

the relationship space,

shared, occupied and felt with another.

There is only so much self-discovery work

we can do by ourselves.

We need the reflected surfaces,

the reactions and responses of another

to make our way into reconnecting

and discovering our human interiors.

We need to experience

our depth of separation

to come face to face

with our core, manufactured identity.

Much of what we have accumulated as identity

is destined to die, to burn up in our heightened,

over exposed re-entry

into our true home world atmosphere,

this trinity of integrity - authenticity - intimacy.

Our long postponed journey into intimacy,

this awakening of awareness,

this courage arising in the heart and gut

to send forth expeditions into the hidden pockets

where our discomforts fester.

At first, we don’t so much navigate as flat out

stumble, fall and succumb to the contents of our pockets,

these triggered traps of reactive pretense,

safeguarding and protecting long-held traumas,

dictating habitual behavior,

bullying about, spreading fear,

choking out freedom to be conscious and @CHOICE.

The dark shadows and fear arise and overwhelm … momentarily.

Deconstructing and un-doing identity,

the mentally ill-born, manufactured beliefs,

the passive-aggressive strategies of identity underpinning our hurt.

We learn to unwrap and decipher our human evolutionary capacity

to give ourselves the gift of learning to process,

to power-down and surrender

that which we hide and hold back

from becoming truly intimate

with our Self.

WOWCH!

Part of the gift arrives with the personal will of commitment to do whatever it takes when the journey into intimacy leads us into our blindness, our unconsciousness. In truth, it is as much your partner’s matching
contribution to do “whatever it takes” to show you your demons, despots and despairs, to unwaveringly guide you into your discomfort and discord, to shore up and invite into relationship the encouragement to dive into stuck, energetic kinks and knots, to hold the sacred space as both step into the overwhelming journey
into intimacy.

Know how blessed you are to be with a partner willing to process their own work and be a clear enough mirror to guide you inward, towards your hurt and ouch and ultimately transform this discord into a harmonious,
unifying WOW.

My partner, Emory Cortese, last week coined this full circle experience WOWCH! You don’t get to experience and harvest the WOW without doing the work to feel into and pierce through all the
OUCH.