Surrender—willful acceptance, yielding to a force greater than oneself. Not defeat, but an offering. A choice.
I’ve given up. I’ve rebelled. I’ve fought, aggressively and desperately. Yet, this is the first time I have truly surrendered.
Suspended, bound, and unable to move, I was forced to confront the perceived limits of my mind, body, heart, and spirit. It transported me back to a place of contraction—where breath-holding, self-minimizing, and persecution were my norm.
When we experience pain, we respond instinctively: fight, flee, or freeze.
Over time, these responses embed themselves deep within us, shaping our reactions, our relationships, even our culture. Pain ripples outward, passed from person to person, generation to generation. It seeps into society, becomes tradition, dogma—a fate we inherit rather than choose.
To protect us, our minds lock away the unbearable. We move through life carrying stories we never wrote, defending beliefs born not from experience, but from collective wounds. We unconsciously seek out familiar energies—replaying old narratives in hopes that, this time, we might rewrite the ending.
For some, this process is a single chapter. For others, it is an entire series.
Bound and suspended, I focused on my breath, humming life force energy into the pain. As I softened into the discomfort, long-buried memories surfaced—inflicted pain, familiar entrapment, echoes of childhood wounds. My body recalled what it meant to be held in suffering, yet I remained. I wanted to cry, to fight, to unbind myself. But instead, I breathed. Never have I focused so intently on breathing, it’s instinctive nature, at times, taken for granted.
Then came the chimes, the chanting, the guided meditation lulling me back to the present. A flood of endorphins rushed through me. It was as if my present self had stepped into a time machine, tethered by the art of shibari, reaching back to embrace the child who needed care the most.
Bound, past and present, we surrendered to the moment. And only after surrendering—fully, willingly, together—were we released.
My eyes fluttered open, the blindfold slipped away.
Air filled my lungs, stretching spaces within me that had been clenched shut for years. It was the deepest inhale I had ever taken—slow, deliberate, alive.
And then, I let it go.
A breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. A breath bound by fear, by shame, by memories too painful to name. It unraveled from my chest, spilling out of me like a silent surrender.
I was unbound.
This is Day 1 of Vulnerability Coaching with my mentor, Rina Trevi.