LESSONS FROM FAIRY POLE DANCING: FEELING THE FEAR + DOING IT ANYWAYS
est reading time according to chatgpt: 10 mins
This is such a salient topic in my life rn.
I am going to teach you the art of giving a fuck, and doing it anyways. Actually, we’re going to learn together because this is an ongoing process for me.
I want to preface this by saying, if you are here, I believe it is 100% for a reason. Some part of you was curious enough about this topic to take the time to read this, likely because it applies to your current situation in some way. Likely because on some level you know that the thing standing between you and living your ideal life is the fear of being seen trying. Or maybe you just got click-baited by fairy pole dancing
How helpful is it when people say “just stop caring about what other people think!” like okay thank you that is sooo helpful my entire lifetime of social conditioning and every ounce of my human nature just disintegrated thx sooo much.
I find this approach to be so dehumanizing. The reality is, we are hard-wired to be social creatures. Back in the day, if people didn’t fuck with you, you would get exiled from your village and banished to the wilderness, so it makes sense why your nervous system is repelled by the thought of putting yourself out there. Not just out there for the hundred people in your village, but potentially the millions of people on the internet, depending on what ‘putting yourself out there’ looks like for you. Take a second to acknowledge that, and appreciate that it makes sense to feel resistance to this. There’s nothing wrong with you, and people that say they don’t give a fuck what anyone thinks are either lying on some level, or they have done immense inner work to overcome this.
A past version of me, a magenta-headed, 20 year old, man-hating, more rebellious Tori, would have told you to simply just stop giving a fuck about what people think. However, a more level-headed, compassionate version of me invites you to acknowledge that you do give a fuck what other people think, feel the fucks you give, and choose to do you anyways. This is how you truly become unstoppable. If you try to bypass your human nature, you will always lose in the end. Because the reality is pink-hair Tori cared too on some level whether she admitted it to herself or not. She just chose to do things regardless.
But how do you do this? How do you avoid the pain of being seen and judged and make it to the other side?
Step 1: you stop avoiding the pain.
what we resist persists
what we embrace is grace
bars
When you avoid feeling your pain, you are simply prolonging it. You are not above your human-ness, there is no way around it. That pain is stored in your body for later and it will either control you or come up for expression at likely an inconvenient time not of your choosing.
I have no idea how relatable this is, but when people used to say you need to feel your emotions, I literally had no clue what that meant. I did not realize that you physically feel emotions until a couple of years ago. I know to some of you that might sound crazy but I think there’s gotta be one person who’s sitting there reading this mind-blown that feeling your feelings means actually feeling a physical sensation in your body. My whole life I focused on articulating and intellectualizing my emotions. I thought that’s what “feeling” them was. The problem for me was never a lack of understanding of my issues, it was a disconnect from my body.
So why is feeling pain important?
Because the only way out is through. When you let yourself fully experience discomfort, your brain and body learn that you can survive it. The fear loses its grip on you. The physical sensations (racing heart, tight chest, however it shows up for you) start to feel less like stop signs and more like growing pains. Signals that you’re on the edge of expansion, not death.
I used to avoid uncomfortable emotions like the plague. If something made me anxious, I’d distract myself or try to ignore it. But what we avoid doesn’t disappear. It just waits. It comes out as self-doubt, overthinking, or a full-body shut down when you do try to put yourself out there.
In an effort to embrace discomfort, this week I decided to dive head first into the deep end of my fears and take a fairy pole dancing class.
Reason #34859 why I love Bali is for things like this. Literally who knew fairy pole dancing existed. Not me. But when I was looking for a dance class worthy of being my first, this was an obvious choice. After messaging the studio and asking wtf that even meant, I booked the class before my fear of dancing in public could reach my frontal lobe and steer me to a safer option like salsa for beginners.
The class was at 11AM the next day and I did nottttt want to go. My body tensed at the thought of being seen dancing, let alone ‘fairy pole dancing’…………… I had zero clue what to expect. But I was committed, and I am no stranger to discomfort at this point, so I went anyway.
I arrived with a highly dysregulated nervous system. You know when you’re nervous and you trip more than usual or say stupid shit against your will? Lots of that. I literally walked into the glass door on my way in which I think was the perfect humble entrance for me. The class was obviously filled with goddesses who my brain assured me were professionals and were probably going to spend the next hour judging my form.
We began by going around and saying our names, and because I had never been to class before and everyone else had, the instructor asked me what my experience was. I confessed that I had never taken any sort of dance class in my life prior to this moment, and the entire class started clapping and laughing. It wasn’t a mean laugh, it was like an omg ur crazy. respect. laugh and I appreciated it. It set the tone for the class. Honestly, I felt safer after that. Still uncomfortable, but safe to be uncomfortable, and to play, and to be bad at the thing I was about to do.
It was so much harder than I expected, and I expected it to be so hard. The amount of strength and grace it requires to do anything of that nature is an amount I will have to continue to work towards. I was awe-struck by the women in my class, they literally looked like fairies. They made it look so effortless. I felt so inspired.
By the end of that 60 minutes I felt more connected to my femininity, my body, and a playful side of me that I haven’t seen in years. I was obsessed. I am obsessed. Obv I signed up for five more classes. And once again, I went head first through my fears and made it through the other side with a new passion that I never would have discovered if I had allowed my brain's natural proclivity towards comfort to be my North star.
When we show ourselves that we can look fear in the face and do the thing we set out to do anyways, we stretch our capacity to do challenging things.
This is a micro-example of something that is happening on a macro-level in my life. As I continue to develop NOMAVEN, I find myself closing my eyes, crossing my fingers, and cringing as I click ‘post’. My brain says something along the lines of omg what if x sees this and thinks x about you pretty much every single time. And every single time, I have to acknowledge the fact that it’s possible x will see this and maybe they will think x about me, but I will survive. I feel that pit in my stomach, the jittery feeling in my hands, the tightness in my chest, and over time, those sensations become less and less prevalent as I show my brain and body that it is safe for me to be seen.
The problem with completely ignoring that part of you that worries and bypassing the discomfort with a blanket “i dont give a fuck what anyone thinks” statement is that it’s not really true. You do give a fuck, and that’s okay. Invite that part of you that gives a fuck to join you as you do the thing anyways. That’s how you actually reach a point where the fucks are so quiet you can barely hear them, or maybe they’re even gone altogether.
When I experience a flare-up of fuck giving, I don’t shame that part of me and I don’t ignore it either. I acknowledge it, and then I let go.
Let me walk you through what that process looks like:
example:
→ go to post something vulnerable
→ begin feeling resistance in my body and brain
anxious thoughts - what if x sees this, what if this gets sent in a group chat, blah blah `
physical discomfort - tightness in chest, heart beating a little faster, etc
→ stop what I’m doing for a sec and check in with myself
If I’m in a place where I can, I close my eyes, take a deep breath and drop into my body.
Where do I feel this in my body? I imagine an orb of energy where the sensation is, and I sit with it and focus on how it feels.
→ I take my attention off of the story in my brain, focusing only on what I feel in my body.
I am human, so my brain will of course interrupt this process with chatter and I will have to repeatedly bring my attention back to the body.
→ After I have spent some time giving my body the attention it needs, I can focus on reframing my internal dialogue.
Instead of trying to silence the fear, I acknowledge it with compassion. I might say to myself: Part of me feels scared right now, but it is safe for me to be seen. I don’t have to push this fear away. I can feel this feeling and still move forward
If this doesn’t feel natural for you, start by talking to yourself like you would talk to your best friend. If your best friend was scared to show up and be seen but you knew she had something valuable to share with the world, what would you tell her? You wouldn’t say who cares… you’re being overdramatic. get over yourself. How would that help her? It wouldn’t.
Fear is just a visitor, not an insurmountable roadblock. Fear is actually Team You, it’s not the enemy. Fear wants to keep you safe. The part of you that feels afraid just wants to be acknowledged and seen. It does not need to be shamed or banished from your brain.
The reason I engage in side-quests like the one I just described is because I have learned that the little things you do give you courage to take on the big things. This is what builds real confidence over time. Every time you feel the fear and do it anyways, you show your body that it is safe to take risks. And that lesson compounds over time.
I will admit, going from no dancing at all to pole dancing was really throwing myself in the deep-end, and that’s not always a great place to start when you’re first building this muscle. Like I said last week, it’s important to meet yourself where you’re at.
David practiced beating Goliath on a bear. We, on the other hand, tend to run from our bears and try to go straight for the beast. But true strength is built in the smaller, everyday battles. The side quests, the little acts of courage, that’s how you build internal strength to face your bigger fears.
So my suggestion to you if you are someone who feels like your fear of fear is holding you back from living a life that feels good for you, is to start small. Find one thing you can do this week that scares you, and do it. Show yourself that it’s okay to do things that scare you. Allow yourself to feel uncomfortable. Growth is uncomfortable. But I guarantee that any big, worthwhile, dream you have demands that you are able to handle discomfort.
If you can’t think of anything that scares you a little, here are some ideas:
Go out to eat at a nice restaurant alone
Try a new workout class that’s outside your comfort zone
Introduce yourself to someone that you are attracted to
Wink at a stranger (my fav)
Share your art online
Journal prompts to support u:
who am I afraid will see me fail?
why does their opinion matter to me?
what is the worst-case scenario if someone does judge me?
what is my earliest memory of feeling embarrassed about being seen?
what am I most afraid people will think about me?
what does that fear say about how I secretly judge myself?
Do ur homework and in a few weeks we will circle back here cuz I wanna talk about how we can work on actually calming our nervous system in those moments of fear so we can show up with a little more grace <3
Luv u byeeeeeee
