EcoTrain Question Of The Week: What is intimacy to you? Do you need it to be happy? How do you fulfill your intimacy needs.. especially during COVID19?

When we think about intimacy, we may tend to think about the intimacy between two people and how important it is to share moments of intimacy so your relationship can grow. But Intimacy is so much more that physical expressions of love. It is the connection we feel with the people we love and trust, the connection we have with the environment we grow up in and now live in.

It is certainly not, something that always comes easy and we tend to suffer a lot, if it is something we have little experience of. Intimacy is something that frames our lives, from the presence of it, to the lack there of it.

But most important, is the intimacy, that we have developed with ourselves. Because how can we ever expect to share true intimacy with others, if we first have not explored it with ourselves.

When you become intimate with others , you first have to lower your barriers and allow them to see you for who you really are. Of course there are different types of intimacy, that can be experienced between two people, different ways of expressing them. But it all begins when we open ourselves up, and this is where self intimacy is so important. Because to really open up, you have to first, become comfortable with yourself. To explore and discover who you are and accept yourself. This is journey that you go on and one that ends in self acceptance and self love.

I struggled a lot with this, when I as growing up, I never felt really loved, never felt like I deserved to be loved, so in the end I had a hard time loving myself. I found it hard to explore the many emotions, I was feeling, because it hurt too much and in the end, I choose to just lock them away. It took me years to find the courage to open that door and really look at who I was and allow myself to feel. But those times have served to make me stronger and more resilient.

I do feel blessed that I have always had a very intimate relationship with the outdoor world, with nature, it is something that has empowered me throughout my life.

We are going through some really challenging times right now, where most of us, have faced many restrictions, resulting in us spending more time by ourselves. Time to reflect upon our lives, on the many choices we have made and the person that we have become. We have indeed been forced to become more intimate.

To discover if we are in fact being true to ourselves, because right now we are being forced to look at what is most important in our lives, to reflect deeply. This has given us a wonderful opportunity to reconnect, to relearn, to remember about what it really means to be a human.

As the powers that be are forcing us to become less intimate with the outside world and those we do not live with, we are all hopefully realizing how important that intimacy really is.

I consider myself lucky that I can continue my intimate relationship with the earth, by growing food and being outdoors everyday.(even if another lockdown occurs. But that is not a reality for many. Don't get me wrong, we do not need to be within nature to connect with it, because we always carry it within. However we do need to be able to be outdoors, to explore and play and lets face it, we all benefit from walking bare foot on the earth and being physically close to to trees and hugging them.

Hopefully many more, people are realizing just how important it is, now that it had been taken away from them.

Intimacy is needed in order to maintain physical, mental and spiritual well being. We all know about the many benefits of physical intimacy between two people, how a hug boosts our immune system and lifts our mood. I never stopped hugging people during the lockdown because I know how much I benefit from doing so, how much my girls benefit from them. I continue to embrace all of my friends and I will continue to do so.

I will also continue to work with the earth and work with the land I live on and in doing so, continue to work more intimately with myself, as all connected.

As I stated earlier this time of lockdown, was an opportunity to reconnect with ourselves and I for one am always trying to improve my self care, to work upon my self intimacy through acts of self love. This is something I believe we will always need to work on, as all life is ever changing. We will always need, to take the time to learn more about ourselves and our needs.

So I commit to stay focused, to not push myself too hard and to to reach that balance, between being active and respecting my limits. (These last 2 weeks have been a testament to that)To take moments to pause and reflect on where I am and where I wish to be. To continue to live true to who I am, living intimately with myself, my children and my environment.