TYPE A LOVE LETTER.

Type a love letter. To your parasympathetic nervous system.

Your parasympathetic nervous system is probably the most overlooked and neglected system of your body. This is the opposite of your sympathetic nervous system, the one that kicks into high gear when there are stress factors. Many thing that, in order to have a strong immune system, they need to amp up their sympathetic nervous system to be able to absorb more stress. In reality, it is the imbalance of the two that is causing many illnesses and suffering such as the inability to relax and the inability to sleep. It is also this imbalance that causes digestive issues as well as toxins to build up in our bodies.

It is a great ritual to type a love letter to yourself and especially great to pick a part of your body which you have neglected. This does not have to be the part that is actually visible to you such as hands and feet.

The thing about typewriters is that it takes effort to write and there is something very romantic about this meticulous endeavor.  With so many distractions in life, it is pretty rare to have a moment with ourselves, and offering thanks to ourselves. The effort also compels us to be mindful of our words and to be succinct yet effective when expressing ourselves. We dig for the precise words.

It’s not always easy to “do the work.” It reminds me of the story of the butterfly in its cocoon. I see a cocoon on a branch. It is swaying left and right, gently. As I watch, the cocoon sways a bit harder and then, it escalates to the point where it is moving with tremendous force. There is a tiny butterfly inside trying to get out. It is slamming its body into the sides of the cocoon, trying to break free. It is flapping its new, little wings against this heavy covering, trying to escape. I stare at the cocoon and fight the desire to help, because I can easily cut the cocoon open and release this butterfly. But why do I allow it to do the work instead? Because if I help, the butterfly will not have strengthened its wings enough to fulfill its destiny of its great migration which takes over two months and a distance of thousands of miles. Nature has its way of helping us “do our work.”

"Silence is not the absence of soundbut rather a shfiting of attention toward sounds that speak to the soul."  - THOMAS MOORE

So this love letter on a typewriter is our way of doing our work. Typewriter allows us to slow down and think. You are able to see the mechanisms behind the typewriter and why it works, from hard pressed buttons to swinging hammers with letters on the end that hit the rolling ribbon of ink. There is a sense of gratification in not just the visible and the feeling of the buttons, but also in being able to hear it work, from the clicks to the ding at the end of the page to the whir as you start a new line. As everything is so easy now on a computer, writing a letter on a typewriter has become a luxury and a privilege. Slowing down has become a luxury and a privilege.

1.      Address it to yourself but by description and not by name. Use adjectives that are passionate. For example, "Dear my beloved, my fulfilling and constant river of inspiration,"

2.      Describe the date and the time and place of where you are:

It was on evening of the 15th of February 2017 as I sat here in front of this typewriter on my hard, wooden paneled floor warmed by the roaring fireplace. It had been a few days since a snow storm hit New York City and as I looked outside, I noticed that the curved, wrought iron of the fire-escape still clung onto the very last bits of soft, clean snow in all of the city.”

3.      What does relaxation feel to you? What is it that you wished of the ability to relax?

I started to think about you, [again, this is the parasympathetic nervous system!] and thought of how, although I have constantly neglected you, you were always by my side, cherishing me. Although I wished for the excitement of anything adrenaline related, anything that was burning, at the end, all which remains is exhaustion and fatigue.

4.      Allow the mistakes to be visible. It is a sense of authenticity. There is no need to be embarrassed of mistakes or try to avoid them or hide them. Mistakes are a part of reality. With filters and the easy backspace/delete button, we are constantly bombarded with images of what appears to be perfection.

5.      Spritz it with perfume. Doodle a quick image.

The point of this ritual is to help clear your thoughts so do so gently and particularly. Do not just write your stream of consciousness. Take a moment. Because words carry with it energy. It shows effort and affection. Do not go fast. Go slow. Be deliberate. You are you are you are you.