The Woman In The Forest...
There are things that happen inside us that we don't know where to put.
Not because they are too big, but because we haven't yet found the right language to touch them.
Something like that happened to me yesterday.
I was in a breathwork session. My breathing became deeper, my body softer and at some point I could no longer tell exactly where thought ended and something else began.
And then I saw her.
A woman in a forest.
In front of her ran a blue river, luminous, almost impossible. The water seemed to carry its own light, cutting through the density of the trees like an opening into somewhere else.
She was barefoot.
There was something ancestral about her. A presence that was difficult to explain, as though she had belonged to that place long before I arrived.
On her head was the head of a wolf.
And she was dancing.
There was no music I could hear. Her body moved on its own, surrendered to some secret rhythm. There was no concern with how she looked, no intention to impress.
It was completely instinctive.
Almost animal.
I watched her.
And then something strange happened.
I realised I wasn't looking at another woman.
I was looking at myself.
The feeling wasn't exactly surprise. It was deeper than that.
It was recognition.
Like meeting someone after many years and, despite everything that has changed, finding something in their face that is still immediately familiar.
And perhaps what moved me most was realising how far I had travelled from that woman.
I know the person I have become very well.
The one who thinks before she feels.
Who tries to understand. Who solves. Who takes care. Who anticipates.
Who turns experiences into questions and questions into answers, as though understanding were a way of keeping the world under control.
But she didn't seem interested in understanding anything.
She was busy living.
A kind of knowledge lived in her that didn't pass through the mind.
Her body knew.
Suddenly, the wolf made sense to me.
Not as a symbol of strength or power, but as an image of instinct. That quiet intelligence that exists before words. The place inside us that recognises danger, desire, closeness, distance.
The part that knows before it can explain why.
Perhaps I have spent too long asking for explanations for what my body already knew.
And perhaps I am tired of that.
Tired of translating every feeling the moment it arrives. Of asking what it means. Of searching for the right reason behind every choice.
Some things the body doesn't explain.
They happen. They are felt. They move through us like water. That wa s what I felt in that forest.
A woman completely inhabiting her body.
And perhaps that absence of effort was what touched me most.
She wasn't trying to become a better version of herself.
She was simply there.
Alive.
We spend so much of our lives building versions of ourselves to fit into life: learning to care, to solve, to protect, to be strong when necessary, to swallow whatever we don't know where to put.
And somewhere among all those necessary roles, perhaps there is a part of us that never learned how to perform.
That was the part I saw. And she didn't feel new. She felt ancient.
Like something buried that had finally found a crack through which to breathe.
Perhaps that is why the forest appeared.
Because a forest is not easily explained.
Shadow and light exist there at the same time.
Roots grow where no one can see them.
Things emerge without asking permission.
Trees fall and nourish whatever comes after.
Nothing there seems concerned with appearing orderly.
And through the middle of it all ran that river.
Blue. Steady. Without hesitation.
I thought about how often I have tried to do the same to myself: organise what I felt, name what I desired, control what frightened me, find meaning quickly so I wouldn't have to remain too long in the unknown.
Perhaps life doesn't always ask for an answer. Perhaps sometimes it asks for presence.
That thought stayed with me.
Presence.
Being close enough to myself to notice when something shifts.
Listening to my body.
Noticing what gives me pleasure.
Not ignoring what makes me contract.
Accepting that I can want things I cannot explain.
That I can change my mind.
That I can be contradictory.
That I can be soft and fierce, rational and impulsive, deeply sensitive and still not need to protect myself from everything.
Perhaps maturity isn't about becoming more and more controlled.
Perhaps it is about becoming more capable of holding our own complexity.
The woman in the forest seemed to know this.
She wasn't fighting any part of herself. She danced with all of them.
And I watched her with a tenderness I hadn't expected to feel.
Because I realised that perhaps I have spent too long trying to get somewhere when, all along, a part of me was simply asking to be heard.
I don't know what that image means. And I don't want to trap it inside an interpretation.
Perhaps the river means this. Perhaps it means that. Perhaps the wolf represents one thing or another.
I don't know.
And strangely, I am at peace with that.
I want to keep the image intact.
A woman. A forest. A blue river. A wolf. A body in motion.
And perhaps that woman appeared for exactly that reason.
Not to teach me who I should be. But to remind me of a part of myself I had stopped visiting.
The part that isn't trying to get anywhere. That wants to feel.
That doesn't need to turn every experience into a conclusion.
That can stand beside a river and simply watch the water.
That can dance without knowing who is watching.
That can exist without constantly evaluating her own existence.
Perhaps this is what I am learning now:
Not how to become someone else, but how to move closer to myself without needing so many explanations along the way.
To peel away a few layers. To listen a little more. To trust my body. To leave room for mystery.
And, above all, to recognise that some parts of us do not disappear simply because we stop paying attention to them.
They wait. Sometimes for years. Until they find a forest. A blue river.
A breath deep enough.
And a woman finally willing to stop and look.
Yesterday, I was that woman.
And for a few moments, I saw myself.
Not as I would like to be.
Not as I should be.
Simply as I am.
Maybe that is little.
Maybe it is everything.
Comments