Hi from Hunni

a little share about writing, receiving, and vulnerability

This morning, in a small virtual recovery meeting, someone held up two copies of my poetry books for all to see.

It was a sweet, kind gesture. I was being bragged on, celebrated even, for the poetry I bring forth and share in this world.

Yet, in the moment, I turned as red as a goddamn apple.

I felt so embarrassed. So flustered. Speechless even.

“I have a pen name for a reason,” I want to bark.

“Oh my god, it’s not a big deal,” my tongue wants to spit out.

But I don’t. Instead, a grin as wide as my jaw line spreads across my face. All I can do is pause, be in the discomfort, and receive.

Receiving. This is something I am being invited to direct much of my energy into lately. Receiving. I receive. I accept. I open. I magnetize that which was always mine.

Receiving is not passive. It is active. To take in. To absorb. To draw forth. It is deeply feminine. It is the essence of deep feminine energy.

Yet, there’s an inherent element of receptivity we don’t think about, we don’t name very often. Vulnerability.

To receive is to touch and fill something inside us. It implies a layer of need. Of want. Of merging and communion. It can leave us open, dependent even, to the people, places, and things that will meet this opening, this longing within us. In order to receive, there must be someone or something that is giving. It’s dualistic. It’s relational. It’s connection, and connection means we cannot be alone. I am me because you are you.

And I share the poetry, prayers, and pointings that come to and through me, because I need to.

I need someone to read what I write. I need someone to care. I need someone to see me in these words. I need these words to matter. I need to make some difference, somehow, in this world.

I’ll say it. It is SCARY. S.C.A.R.Y. to put yourself out there with art. To create something, bring it forth into the world, and let it be seen by others. Because this art says something about you. It emerges through the deepest openings within, and so it reveals some fragments of those deeply hidden and protected places. It essentializes vulnerability.

But the truth is, we all need to be seen. We all need to receive the becoming of self that is only possible when we stand open and bare in front of another, and we are seen, we are given acceptance and absorption of who we are and all the parts of us that make us, us.

Often, I find it deeply uncomfortable to be naked in this need to receive.

But I will.

I will just keep grinning. And I will inhale deeply. And I will open.

Again and again, I will open.