As we inaugurated July as Let Loose and Relax month, this week’s episode of Monocycle digs a bit deeper into what that means — what I hope to get out of the month, what I hope you’ll get out of the month and the introduction to these weekly dispatches that I’ll start disseminating as podcast episodes next week wherein I assign myself a Let Loose task of the week and track my progress. For the week that just past, which found half of the Man Repeller editorial team out on vacation, I surmised that I would work on mothering myself. This would mean giving myself the same advice I would give to my daughter, treating myself as though I was my daughter. At first, it was really helpful — particularly because the week had already kicked my ass by the time lunch time on Tuesday swung around. But as the days progressed and the nervous pit that gets caught between my chest and my throat grew bigger and would not, for the life of me or meditation, go away, I realized that by treating myself as someone else — that is, as my child and not like, an infant version of myself — I wasn’t actually being compassionate with myself, right? On the contrary — I was disregarding myself all together. So, I’m going back to the drawing board and attempting a new version of this practice.
In the mean time, I invite you to cut yourself some slack if too many of your co-workers were away this week. Drop the fucking ball, you’re not going to get fired. It’s summer and you deserve to live it the same way your body does inside a caftan, unrestricted and free.
Monocycle is edited by Nicholas Quazzy Alexander; Logo illustration by Kelly Shami; photograph by Michael Ochs Archives / Stringer vis Getty Images.
