may 2022 herbal meditation: protect relaxation massage oil

protect relaxation massage oil

ingredients: panneer roses, chamomile flowers, lavender, mahkir ginger, sesame oil, coconut oil, and olive oil.

supports us with: relaxation. calming and reducing stress. blood circulation and inflammation. living in our skin. re-connecting to sensation.

recommended use: use as much as needed for a full body massage. test in one area before using, especially if you have sensitive skin. this may be obvious but: use topically, not orally!

note: because this oil contains ginger, it may be more “activating” than grounding for some folks. i recommend testing it out both during the day and the evening, to see which time better suits you!

potion inspired by: my sex life

herbal meditation talk

themes: protecting relaxation 🤝 justice

The May herbal gift for sumistreet patrons is “protect relaxation” body massage oil.

Enjoy this herbal meditation talk — as a mini voice note, or read it below — including ideas for how to work with this potion.

If you’d like to start receiving monthly gifts in June, become a patron!

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I’m recording this right after we’ve collectively witnessed and been impacted by three mass shootings in the month of May alone, targeting Black, Taiwanese and Latinx communities. Last night I was listening to AOC and reading Mariame Kaba tweets and remembering how these massively traumatizing events and the lack of change we see in this country are really designed to rob us of our sense of hope. And what that does to the human spirit is an attempt to get us to accept and normalize these conditions we live in and numb us from our collective power – be that in the form of a general strike, a deepening of mutual aid and community care, or other forms of direct action. 

So I’m recording this as an offering to support, in any way possible, for you to reconnect to that inner resource of hope and that flame that exists inside all of us which cannot be suppressed.

For the past few weeks, I’ve been sitting with this question: What would change if we understood relaxation and justice to be more deeply connected?

How would we show up and would we show up more consistently? How would we become more precise and discerning about where we direct our attention and energy? What new conditions would it create in our systems —systems meaning our bodies, our families, our networks— so that we could more readily face what needs to be faced, tell the truth, and do the right (and bravest) thing?

May’s potion is an herbal massage oil, called “protect relaxation.”

Let me first back track to the place where this potion got its name.

I was in a session with my therapist, Nathan Shara — who I gotta say, could probably be Beyoncé’s therapist, like that’s the metric I would use to describe the quality of therapy he provides, but I just supremely lucked out. I was sharing how everyday stress was impacting my desire to have sex. I wanted to be having sex more often and prioritize connecting with my partner in that way, but I couldn’t relax enough to get in the mood to be sexual. At the time, I was putting much of my life energy into my work responsibilities and taking care of the basics. The monotony of pandemic life during the cold winter months didn’t help. I’d taken this quiz to learn what my “erotic blueprint” was. Turns out my blueprint is sensual, meaning it takes a carefully curated environment + my senses to be awake, for me to get out of my head and into the mewd.

After listening for awhile, my therapist said, “well then, it seems pretty important that you protect relaxation.”

The words he used intrigued me. I like the imagery of having a shell or protective container for relaxation. I also had a critical voice inside me saying, ‘that’s not an option.’ Its logic was that relaxation wasn’t something I could protect because I didn’t have any choice over being able to access it. (I find this important to acknowledge because these reactive first thoughts can tell me a lot about where I have a tendency to give up my power and relinquish the choices I do have. This can have really unintended consequences when we actually do hold a lot of power and privilege.) The reality was, if I was finding time for Netflix and chill — which wasn’t the type of relaxation that connected me to my body in its wholeness — I could make space for something more sensual that would. So, I turned to massage.

I started carving out time in the evenings for massages with my partner. Just that small change did wonders for helping us reconnect, decompress, and feel good. This little ritual helped me find my way back to the sweet spot that relationship therapist Esther Perel often talks about when she describes how we crave both safety and security in partnership, as well as risk and adventure.

Hence, protect relaxation massage oil came to be! This oil is made with the following:

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🌹 dried rose petals: roses teach us —so literally— about how in order to bloom from the inside out, we need boundaries (hello thorns!). they’re also a celebrity aphrodisiac of the plant world.

✌️ dried chamomile flowers & lavender buds: two gentle, calming herbs for stress, anxiety, and insomnia. true allies of relaxation. i wish there were public fields of chamomile and lavender which people could immerse themselves in.

🔥 dried ginger: ginger is a stimulating herb/spice. in addition to being an amazing medicinal plant, it activates the healing work of the other herbs. if our relaxation doesn’t support us to be a force of healing and justice in our relationships and community, then it just maintains the status quo.

I wanna talk about how relaxation can support justice. I feel like you can’t say this enough in any healing arts context, seeing as healing can easily become reduced to an individual well-being project that doesn’t express or act on the deep radical social change we need to shift material and emotional conditions for people, globally.

I understand relaxation as a pathway to finding more clarity (namely, being clear with ourselves), truth-telling, and a deeper responsibility over what we do. The more disconnected we are from our sensations, the harder it becomes to be responsible or accountable for what we do “with our bodies” (i.e. our actions, what we say). I say that part in quotes because we are not ever separate from this thing we refer to as “our bodies.”

Relaxation is often understood as that thing we do after we do our jobs. It’s a sideline luxury. But I am interested in relaxation, including other daily rituals that are designated as after hours activities, as integral to our work.

To give you a small example: In an attempt to write this month’s post, I forced myself to sit at the computer for most of the day and chug out my thoughts on relaxation. But it was actually when I was walking my dog, taking a shower, and paddling on a lake, that my most creative ideas for this project came to me.

In so much of the social media content that I see— aside from memes, which remain a fabulous millennial form of popular resistance— I can almost taste the exhaustion and creative deprivation in each post. If play, relaxation, and other forms of slow activity are not a part of this thing we call work, what are the chances that we will ever embody the radical changes that we so desperately seek? And I’m not talking about more work retreats, office parties, or happy hours. I’m talking about allocating time, space, and resources to relax and generating that for more and more people. I am talking about work roles that value relaxation and a deep diversity of daily actions which are not obviously related to producing, or even guarantee it. In other words, roles which protect relaxation.

I appreciate what Dr. Bayo Akomolafe says in this podcast called “Slowing Down in Urgent Times.” He says:

“Slowing down is not a function of speed. It is a function of awareness. It is a function of presence.”

Here’s a smol list of what a practice of protecting relaxation has done for me:

• I’m having sex with more spontaneity (and more frequently!) with my partner

• I can show up for my dear ones when they are navigating a major life event, or for no major reason at all, with a phone call or a home cooked meal. I am not too busy, avoidant, or at capacity to do repair work in friendships

• I can adapt to the ever changing needs of the groups I am a part of, without being stuck in my own sense of order. I let go of control more easily and more often

• I am more thoughtful and precise with what I choose to share, express, or externalize (i.e. one Leo’s ego-death journey)

• I am hungry to develop a deeper sense of the truth about who my people are. I am less willing to exist inauthentically inside a “QTBIPOC” or “brown person” umbrella. I am more rigorous about my political education on caste and facing historical privilege, power, and my deep ignorance as a dominant caste south asian american

• I spend less money (in general, but especially on things I see on Instagram that I really don’t need and tbh just bought to “feel something”)

• I feel more motivated to find and redistribute resources so that my friends and broader community can at the very least have their basic needs met

What would protecting relaxation mean for you? I hope this herbal potion is a useful tool in your journey!