The Gift of FreeFalling

Nov 04, 2016

By Myriam Machado Baker

FreeFall is in Brazil. Can you feel it?
 
Here I am, stepping out of the plane into my birth place: Rio de Janeiro. I take a deep breath in this humid warm dense air--the same air I first took breath in this life. I open my eyes to see the Guanabara Bay, my Brazilian womb.
 
I am here to facilitate a FreeFall class. The first FreeFall class in Brazil, ever. When I say this to my friends in America they are surprised, "Why on earth didn't they have a FreeFall class before?"

My coordinator, CĂ©lia Barboza, explained this very well, "This would be the 5th or 6th attempt to organize a FreeFall group in Brazil. The registration process started as always: people showing interest but not confirming--so many excuses and explanations. The truth is that even I had never seriously thought of attending FreeFall. Like everyone, I couldn't imagine being nude in front of the group!"
(You can find her full testimony below my story. I would invite you to read all the way to the end.)
 
Yes, I was going to facilitate the first FreeFall class in Brazil. This would become history. Or not. I wondered why it needed to be me? Some say it is not about me, it is about the maturity of the Brazilian matrix. Some say it it's because I am Brazilian: "It was written in the sky." And, although I am so proud to be a Brazilian ... am I still a Brazilian?

Sometimes I feel trapped in this American language and enculturation. I have been living in America for more than 17 years. Sometimes I feel there is some kind of heaviness in holding two nationalities. American or Brazilian? Does it really matter? As this mind exploration goes on, I feel the weight of all the programming in my life--childhood, teens, motherhood. My "little girl" remembers all the times her sensuality was denied, her sexuality was violated. Yes, this is "FreeFalling" already happening.
 
We tend to think of FreeFall as an event, or a class. You attend it, learn something from it, and that is it. But FreeFall is not something that happens once upon a time, in the future, when you are ready--when you are mature. FreeFall, it is an "ing" thing. It is the on-going revelation of your spirit in this body.
And it happens, whether you take the "course" or not.
 
If you take the course, you will consciously grasp it. You recognize the daily process of embodying your heart and soul--every time you put on your clothes, or take off your clothes. Or every time you enjoy your meal, or your sexuality, or your meditation, or all the above. If you do not take the course, there will always be a question, deep inside your pericardium (the heart protector): why not? And for this question, there will be many answers.
 
But what is FreeFalling?

John Veltheim put together an incredible series of rituals--mystical explorations of our humanness--with the purpose of awakening Presence in the body, the sexual body, the spiritual body. We move from individual exploration in the "Mirror Ritual" to anchoring partners in the "Ritual Without A Name" to group celebration in the "Let Go Ritual." And there is more. There is the more of supporting each other, of encouraging each other, and nourishing the "ing" that is the present in all of us.
 
The weekend is approaching, and I start to receive little text meesages from the students:
"I feel fried."
"I have diarrhea!"
"I am crying, do not know why."
"I am not sure that's for me."

This is "FreeFalling" already happening.
 
Yes, our defensive mindset is ancient. It can come in a whole package of an ancient survival album with self-justification prizes and revenge coupons. It can come with bonus sentiments of self-pity and victimization. It can come highlighting our stories--the ones we defend so fiercely and protect so dearly. And, yes, it can feel heavy, tight and constricted, like a prison. Or it can feel loose and raw, like an open wound. Or both. At the same time.

The electricity inside, the light, it vibrates and shakes our walls, our masks, our truths. Yes, this is "FreeFalling" ... happening before the class.
 
Then Friday night: The lecture starts. Feeling the group. Feeling myself. We become one. It is one apprehension. It is one light. It is one breath. I fear, maybe, that this will be the time I may not be able to connect with students from my heart. We are all consumed by one question: "Why am I doing this?"
 
Well, that's FreeFall being. FreeFall happening. And suddenly, I am swept deep into it. Because that's the magic of the heart's light: it shines. That's the force of our sex: it heats. Whether you would like it or not.
 
On Saturday, the rituals start to shake Rio de Janeiro grounds. In every ritual, we practice our sensuality. In every ritual, we resonate in sexuality. In every ritual, we re-discover, we re-align, we re-new--together. And we love. Even when we are not paying attention, we love.
 
During the rituals on Sunday, we do not only talk about love, we practice! We do not only talk about sexuality, we are! That's the mystical magic of the rituals. The energy flows through our spine and lightens up our eyes. It shakes our pelvis and our worlds and we hold each other. We re-discover that love is a necessity to all of us. American or Brazilian, or any human being. We are biologically, cognitively, physically and spiritually made to love and to be loved. We are wired to love ourselves and to be loved by our own self.
 
We remember that when these needs are not met, we fry and harden from inside. We fall apart and we suffer. We hurt and we get hurt. We are sick. Of course, there are other causes for dis-ease and suffering but the lack of (self) love always leads to dis-ease.
 
In the HeartMath book, Heart Intelligence: Connecting with the Intuitive Guidance of the Heart, the authors note: "... love is an advanced mode of intelligent living. People are just scratching the surface of awareness regarding the focused power of love and its capacity to create a heart-based environment; one where individuals can transcend fear--while manifesting their undiscovered gifts and fulfillment."
 
When we open for the unlimited heart's intelligence, instead of holding to our small ego stories, we allow for that process to unfold. And that's what it is all about: FreeFalling invites us to unwrap our gifts. FreeFalling invites us to transcend into our divine essence; to re-sync all the systems in the body and body-mind complex to a fuller experience of sexuality/sensuality.
 
Perhaps FreeFalling is just a practice to remember that we do not have choices. We only have one choice: to stay in our heart, and pelvis, and mouth, and genitals. We are resonance, synchronicity and frequency between brains, chakras, meridians, nadis, cells, quarks, all.
 
As suddenly as it arose, we have now come to the end of the course. Today is another day. Is it Monday? Or Tuesday? Each one of us is going back home. The FreeFall energy is arriving in all corners of Brazil, and rippling into the world. Can you feel it?
 
I walk at Copacabana beach. The FreeFall invitation of practicing to love myself is becoming, again, an on-going practice. As my yoga practice. Sometimes, I feel greater leaps of insight and joy; other times it is a hard step-by-step, slow and steady effort. Sometimes it is delightful, sometimes it hurts and it is not fun. But I am doing it anyway. Just. Because. I. Can.
 
And I will be practicing loving, not because I need to be a good girl or need a reason to be nice and to be loved. There is no goal or no reason. I will practice love just because I love myself now, as I never loved myself before. That's why I feel the honor and the gratitude to be a FreeFall facilitator.
 
Thank you, John and Esther. Words will never be enough ... to thank you for the magic you bring to the world.
 
Thank you my dear FF students. You are the best mirrors I see myself reflected on.
 
Immense Gratitude,
Myriam

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